The Profile of Aurora Province
Location.
The Province of Aurora
(hereinafter referred to as “Aurora”) lies
at the mid-eastern coast of Luzon some
232 kilometers from Manila and is
located between 15º 31’ 02” to 16º 31’
00” N Latitude and 121º 31’ 02” to 122º
01’ 30” E Longitude.
It is the
north-eastern most province of Central
Luzon (Region III).
It is bordered on
the north by the provinces of Isabela
and Qurino, on the west by Nueva Ecija
and Nueva Viscaya, on the south by
Bulacan and Quezon, and on the east
by the Pacific Ocean.
Aurora is
considered the gateway to the Pacific
with coastline stretching spans 410
kilometers. (See Figure-1)
FIGURE-1 Province of Aurora
Aurora has a total land area of 323,954 hectares, representing about one percent of the
country’s total land area. The province’s main link to the rest of Luzon is through a narrow
mountain gravel road that twists through the Sierra Madre Mountain Range.
The road is
located between Baler and Bongabon, Nueva Ecija. Travel by car from Baler to the nearest urban
center of Cabanatuan City in Nueva Ecija takes three hours.
There are five (5) land routes going to the Province of Aurora, namely:
1. Subic-Clark-Tarlac-Nueva Ecija-Aurora Dingalan Port Road;
2. Bongabon-Villa-Aurora Road;
3. San Luis-Ma. Aurora-Castañeda-Pantabangan Road;
4. Dinadiawan(Aurora)-Madella (Nueva Vizcaya)-Cordon (Isabela) Road; and
5. Dinapigue-Dilasag Road.
During typhoons and heavy rainfall, these roads are blocked by landslides and swollen rivers
making land transport to and from the province very difficult.
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Aurora covers the eastern portion of the Sierra Madre Mountains, hence it is generally
mountainous.
There are flat lands unevenly distributed throughout the province. The
municipality of Dingalan, in the south, has the most irregular topography.
Political Division.
The Province of Aurora is the 73rd province of the Philippines created
by Batas Pambasa Blg. 07. It is the youngest among the seven (7) provinces of Central Luzon.
It has eight (8) municipalities with a total of 151 barangays divided into three (3) development
zones, i.e. Northern Zone (Dilasag, Casiguran, Dinalungan); Central Zone (Baler, Dipaculao, Ma.
Aurora and San Luis ); and Southern Zone (Dingalan).
Current Development Trend. The recent “super-region” development initiative of Her
Excellency President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has included Dingalan municipality under Metro
Luzon Urban Beltway and the rest of the province under North Luzon Agribusiness Quadrangle.
Topography.
The topography of the province of Aurora is generally influenced by the
forest-covered Sierra Madre Mountain Range which runs through the whole province from north
to south and reach up to 1,900 meters above sea level. It has two major alluvial plains around
Casiguran in the north and Baler Valley in the central area of the province. The foothills are
dissected by numerous alluvial valleys and descend further to coastal plains. Headlands taper
along the coastal areas of the municipalities of Dingalan, San Luis, Dipaculao and San Ildefonso
in Casiguran.
Climate.
The Province of Aurora has rainfall evenly distributed throughout the year.
Average monthly rainfall ranges from a minimum of 30-90mm to a maximum of 450-1,200mm
as recorded over a 40-year period by synoptic stations in Casiguran and Baler.
The annual
maximum daily rainfall is associated with typhoons.
The average number of cyclone occurrences in the province is 3.4 per year or 17 percent of
all the cyclones which occur in the Philippine Area of Responsibility.
The main risk occurs over
the 6 months from June to November, with an average of about 0.5 per year of each of these
months. In May and December, the average drops to 0.2, or about once in 5 years.
Hydrology.
Study conducted by AIADP in 1989 reveals that there are 315 individual
watershed areas of which 96 is true watersheds while 70 major catchments are identifiable
throughout the province. The two largest watershed areas in the province with combined
drainage impact area of 30,900 hectares are those of Cabatangan/Malupa River and Diteki River
affecting the central municipalities. Amro (7,190 has) and Calabgan (6,150 has) are the next
largest watersheds affecting Dilasag and Casiguran.
Physiography and Geology.
Four main terrain units characterize the province, i.e.,
coastal landscape, alluvial landscape, foothill slopes, and mountain slopes.
The coastal landscape shaped by tidal processes is characterized by mixed coarse and fine
alluvial deposits. It forms an almost level terrain of beaches, swamps and mangroves, rising to
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only a few meters above sea level and represents around 2 percent of province’s total land area.
The alluvial landscape consists of mixed gravel pebbles and boulders, sand silt and clay.
This type of terrain is subject to varying degrees of flooding and represents around 11 percent
of the province of Aurora.
The foothill slopes, formed by volcanic uplift and natural earth movement or crustal stress,
range from 51 to 500m above sea level and comprise up to 20 percent of the province’s land
area.
The mountain slopes of the Sierra Madre Mountain Range considerably typify the
topography of the province ranging from 501 to 1,900m above sea level and occupy around 68
percent of the entire province.
Water Supply.
The topographic configuration of the province and the abundant
watershed resources in the province provide adequate supply of water to a number of
population for household consumption and other domestic purposes. Springs from mountain
and foothill areas serve as main source of water for upland dwellers. Groundwater, either in
the form of spring flows or directly from well and boreholes supplies water for domestic
consumption.
At present, there are no consuming industries in Aurora and industrial water
consumption should be considered in the overall domestic consumption.
Household
connections are made possible in the municipalities of Baler and Dipaculao through local water
utilities, whereas Casiguran and Dinalungan by their respective municipal governments. All
municipalities have levels 1 to 3 water facilities except Dilasag which lacks level 3 type of water
source.
Though Aurora has plethora of water resources, there is paucity of information on water
quality in the province. Generally, however, households have access to potable water supply as
shown in Table-1.
TABLE-1
Access to Safe Water & Sanitation
% to total
Total number
number of
of households
households
Number of households in the province with access to safe water in 2007
98.67
42,321
Level
1
51.59
18,499
Level
2
22.11
7,390
Level
3
24.96
8,952
Unknown
Number of HH in the province with toilets (2007)
35,857
With septic tanks
76.96
27,597
Without septic tanks
23.03
8,260
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Power Supply.
Almost all municipalities of Aurora, except Dingalan are served by
Aurora Electric Cooperative (AURELCO). AURELCO subscribes power supply from the National
Power Corporation (NAPOCOR) through the latter’s power station in Sta. Rosa Grid, Nueva Ecija.
The power sub-station in San Isidro, San Luis, Aurora supplies a 24-hour power to Central
Aurora and the power generator plant in Casiguran, a maximum of 20 hours supply for the
northern municipalities of Dinalungan, Casiguran, and Dilasag. The total number of households
with access to electricity is shown in the following Table-2.
TABLE-2 Access to Electricity
Total Number
Number of Barangays in the province
146 barangays covering
with electricity (2007)
33,360 actual consumers
% to total number
Total number
of HH
of HH
94.95
35,131 total potential
consumers
Population. Aurora has a population of approximately 211,604 based on the estimates
provided by the National Statistic Office for the year 2007 (see Table-3 below) and has a density
of 54 persons per square kilometer, the fifth lowest in the country. The annual growth rate of
Aurora has slowed down to an annual rate of 1.84%.
TABLE-3 Population of Aurora Province
Municipality
Area
Population
Male
Female
(Hectares)
Baler (Capital)
Number of
barangays
Number of
households
9,451.47
33,739
17,243
16,496
13
6,748
Casiguran
61,987.12
23,954
12,322
11,632
24
4,791
Dilasag
42,997.84
17,445
9,286
8,160
11
3,489
Dinalungan
26,348.51
10,361
5,430
4,932
9
2,072
Dingalan
40,085.95
34,409
17,993
16,417
11
6,882
Dipaculao
40,496.94
25,897
13,211
12,686
25
5,179
Maria Aurora
40,518.00
34,580
17,868
16,711
40
6,916
San Luis
62,068.17
31,219
16,145
15,075
18
6,244
323,954.00
211,604
109,498
102,106
151
42,321
TOTAL (Province)
Aurora has a predominantly rural population. Approximately 75.85% of the total populace
lives in rural areas, while the remaining 24.15% lives in urban areas. Aurora also has a large
youth demographic, with 43.16% of the total population younger than 15 years of age.
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