Following heavy rains, rice paddy flooded by a dam run off are yet to be replanted. Many farmers are suffering even as the season progresses and they are unable to replant.

About 200 acres of rice paddy fields are inundated with water from the Winphanon dam project in Mudon Township, Mon state. The flooding has come after particularly heavy rains in the area.

“About 200 acres of paddy fields can’t be replanted with seedlings since the heavy rain. We are out of time now to transplant the paddy. We are trying to drain out the water so we can weed out the grip grass in our paddy field, and grow more seedling plants, “said a farmer from Doe mar village, Mudon Township.

Since the recent heavy downpour, paddy fields near the Winpano dam in Mudon Township have been destroyed in Kalort-tort, Taungpa, Doe-mar, and Kwan-ka-bue villages. The fields were flooded by water spilling from the dam, which is located up river from the villages and their fields.

Early on in the month heavy rain lashed Mudon Township destroying rice seedling plants which had already begun to grow.

“We only can grow our plants in one acre out of eight. Paddy fields in other townships have been transplanted. Now we have to restart planting. We lose money and time. If we transplant our seedlings late in the season it will be difficult when we cultivate the rice," he added.

After the government built the Winphannon dam in 2001, the main river that flowed out to sea was blocked. The authorities dug a trench to act as an alternative run off for overflowing water. But because the trench is unfinished the overflowing water has not been able to run off in the rainy season and instead flows into paddy fields and lower land village.

According to several Taungpa villagers, the Burmese authorities grow their own summer paddy in the villagers’ fields around the Winphanon dam. The authorities use water from the dam in summer. But, according to local villagers, the workers for the authorities are inexperienced, and cultivate the crop in such a way that a lot of grass ends up growing in the paddy fields. So when the rainy season arrives, farmers find their fields destroyed and have to take time pulling out the grass.

“When it rains heavily the water floods our villages and we can’t go anywhere,” a villager who lives near the dam said. “Before the Winphannon Dam project was completed, we didn’t face this kind of situation,” he added.