Civil Engineering and Architecture 10(4): 1526-1537, 2022 http://www.hrpub.org
DOI: 10.13189/cea.2022.100422
Small Farm Reservoir Suitability Analysis in
Tarlac Province, Philippines
Ermalyn DG. Galo
College of Engineering and Technology, Tarlac Agricultural University, Philippines
Received October 19, 2021; Revised December 17, 2021; Accepted January 21, 2022
Cite This Paper in the following Citation Styles
(a): [1] Ermalyn DG. Galo , "Small Farm Reservoir Suitability Analysis in Tarlac Province, Philippines," Civil
Engineering and Architecture, Vol. 10, No. 4, pp. 1526-1537, 2022. DOI: 10.13189/cea.2022.100422.
(b): Ermalyn DG. Galo (2022). Small Farm Reservoir Suitability Analysis in Tarlac Province, Philippines. Civil
Engineering and Architecture, 10(4), 1526-1537. DOI: 10.13189/cea.2022.100422.
Copyright©2022 by authors, all rights reserved. Authors agree that this article remains permanently open access under the
terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License
Abstract Small farm reservoir (SFR) suitability
analysis is useful in water resources management and
development assistance of government and
non-government agencies for farmers and farmer-groups.
The researcher utilizes the geographic information system
to analyze the suitable areas for the construction and
management of small water impounding to store and
conserve rainwater in rainfed areas. The factors on rainfall,
soil texture, slope, land use, irrigation status, groundwater
availability and distance from river were considered for the
suitability mapping of SFRs. The following factors have
their corresponding weights which are derived from using
the analytical hierarchy process (AHP) procedure. The
testing of the model was done by determining the
suitability value (S) of each sample SFR. The research
findings showed the areas in the province potentially
suitable for SFRs of the total land area of Tarlac: 47% are
not suitable, 25% are marginally suitable, 13% are
moderately suitable and 15% are highly suitable.
Keywords Suitability, Small Farm Reservoir,
Geographic Information System, Rainfed Areas, AHP
1. Introduction
The Philippines has 41% total rainfed cropped area that
mostly relies on rainfall; however its availability is lesser
in dry season (Moya et al., 1994). In addition, development
of facilities for conventional irrigation is unlikely because
of undulating topography, surface drainage and monetary
constraints. Rainfed farmers suffer frequently from
drought because of the inadequate water together with poor
management practices of irrigation water. To mitigate the
effect of drought in these areas, farmers with small farms
are collecting rainfall and runoff and storing rainwater in
small farm reservoir to be used for the wet and dry season
crops (Guerra et al., 1994). Small farm reservoir (SFR) is
an earth dam structure used to harvest and store rainfall and
runoff for irrigation. It is the smallest version of small
water impounding project with an embankment height of
less than 4 meter (Ines et al, 2018). Studies showed that
small farm reservoirs (SFRs) serve as an economically
viable means for storing and conserving rainwater to lessen
the effect of drought and cropping intensification in rainfed
drought-prone areas. However, information about this
technology is very limited making a hindrance to
researchers, technical implementers and government
agencies in utilizing its maximum potential in rainfed areas.
Generating information system about SFRs with the aid of
geographic information system (GIS) technology can be
used as a basis for areas suited for SFRs as an effective
water management scheme for individual farmer and
farmer groups to improve crop production. Furthermore in
the water resources development planning strategies of the
government for the national, regional and local levels, as
GIS has often used for the geographic concerns on
agriculture. Thus, the objective of the study was to generate
suitability maps for SFR construction in the province of
Tarlac.