Flood in the North

Pix : The Borneo Post

15 years ago, I was up north in Limbang helping MARA talk to small Bumiputra contractors. The Market in the picture was not built yet. Hardly any news come out of the place. It has now, with shortage of vegetables! Limbang people are basically Bruneian Malaysians. They speak Brunei Malay with a very strong accent.

Limbang faces vegetable shortage

By Philip Kiew
November 4, 2008 The Borneo Post

Limbang, Sarawak: Floods which hit several parts of this district recently- at least for four days - have destroyed vegetable gardens leaving consumers here short of vegetables, especially leafy ones.
Hawkers at Limbang market (Tamu) are claiming they are facing a shortage in vegetable supply now.

The shortage in supply has forced prices to shoot up and the distributors have to source for supply from neighbouring Sabahto make up for the shortfall during the monsoon season which wreaked havoc on crops.

According to a local Fatimah Raub, 60, she first noticed the lack of leafy vegetables during her shopping trip recently when only long beans were on sale instead of the usual display of various types of leafy vegetables at the Tamu.

“I was caught by surprise when I went around the market for the first time after my village, Kampung Merambut, was hit by flood for days,” she said.

She suspected the recent floods could have wiped out vegetable supply to the Tamu. Fatimah was resigned to picking up non-leafy vegetables during her shoppingtrip, expecting the situation to return to normal soon.

Limbang town was cut off by floods on Oct 28 when. flood waters submerged the Pan Borueo Trunk Road near Batu Danau bridge, and travellers were caught on both sides of the flooded 100 metre-stretch.

The raging floods even swept one vehicle off the road and those inside were lucky to escape alive as only the roof of the 4WD was visible at its height.

The Pan Borneo Trunk Road was submerged under a metre of flood waters, about 31 km from Limbang, Sunday leaving thousands stranded on both sides.

The locals said the floods which occurred at 4.30 pm on Oct 27 made the road impassable to many vehicles leaving hundreds of them stranded on either side of the stretch.

View of Limbang when not under flood. | Pix by Google