ILAGAN, Isabela – A black bug infestation reportedly hit hundreds of hectares of rice farms in neighboring Aurora, fearing this would significantly reduce the coastal province’s rice production amid apprehensions of continued rising of price of the country’s major staple food.
According to reports, black bugs have already spread in some parts of Aurora, especially its known rice-producing areas, fearing that it would escalate to the entire province as well as to neighboring areas in Central Luzon and Cagayan Valley, two of the country’s major rice-producing regions.
Reports from ABS-CBN-Cagayan Valley hinted that at least five barangays in Aurora have already been infested with the said pest, an insect bug which thrives on the leaves of rice plants.
Earlier, rice black bug infestations had hit various farming areas in this province’s Dinapigue town, destroying millions of pesos worth of rice crops.
Isabela’s Dinapigue and Aurora province are adjacent areas. Both are bounded by the Pacific coast.
Observers fear that the reported ongoing infestation in Aurora province might again spread to Dinapigue and eventually, the whole of Isabela if rice bugs attack would not be contained in Aurora farmlands.
Reports of rice bug infestations came in the wake of reports of a looming rice crisis as a result of the alarming decrease of food supply in the world, partly due to global warming as well as conversion of agricultural lands into commercial estates. – Charlie Lagasca