Residents of the Philippines are accustomed to tropical storms and heavy rainfall at this time of year, but no one was prepared for an entire month’s worth of rain to fall in less than seven hours. Typhoon Ketsana (locally known as Typhoon Ondoy) brought the worst flooding to hit the Philippines in more than 40 years, flooding the homes of nearly half a million people and prompting the government to declare a “state of calamity.” Eight days later, Typhoon Parma (locally known as Pepeng) dealt the Philippines a second blow.

The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration documented a record-high amount of rainfall in 24 hours at 455 millimetres (17.9 in). The amount of rainfall recorded for six hours, which was at 341.3 millimetres (13.44 in), was comparable to the 24 hour rainfall in 1967, the last major natural disaster to hit the Philippines. The storm affected nearly 2 million people, recording a death toll of 337 lives and forced the evacuation of 567,000 victims. At one point, 80 percent of the capital Manila was under water after experiencing the heaviest rainfall in 40 years.

The damage to property was estimated to be 6 billion Pesos (USD130,434,782.00), including 4.1 billion Pesos in damage to infrastructure, 1.9 billion Pesos in damage to schools and 882.525 million Pesos in damage to agriculture. According to the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics of the Department of Agriculture, an estimated 126,721 hectares of rice farms have been wasted and will affect almost 3% of the country's expected rice production this year. Added to this, Ketsana devastated some 1,374 hectares of corn plantations.

Although relatively brief, the 4-day visit gave Force of Nature an insight into some of the conditions and needs in the Rizal region and we got a good overview of the situation on the ground and some of the community needs.

On our part, we can contribute towards funding projects that can help survivors who have lost their means of livelihood to restart their businesses so that they are not dependent on the government for aid. We can also consider funding (in the future) programmes that would minimize the risk of disasters and help survivors better cope in the event of another disaster.