DISASTER MANAGEMENT

H.M.M.B. SENEVIRATNE
ISBN 978-955-52362-7-0

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Since the publication of the 1st edition, natural and societal hazards
have increased rapidly. The main theme of the book remains and
additional material and chapters have been added.

Font cover 1st photograph – the well constructed covered drains to

prevent erosion and undercutting on steep slope in an area nted for
landslides – Beragalla

Front cover 2nd Photograph – a well set background for a tea factory
with sufficient space and erosion prevention measures.

H.M.M.B. Seneviratne, B.A. Hons. (Cey), M.Phil. (Notts),

PhD. NTNU

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Chapter 1

Introduction

The definition of the word "disaster", in this book is placed within the
context of development and change. The book will use methodologies
from natural sciences, social and management sciences and traditional
belief systems, because this book is aimed specially at investigating the
status of disaster in the space and time of the developing world.

Disaster is an event that requires help from an outside source to recover

as the immediate living environment of the affected has been
temporarily or permanently destroyed. It is an event that can occur
unexpectedly or due to negligence of governance. When it occurs, a
disaster is a sudden, calamitous event that seriously disrupts the
functioning of a community or society and causes human, material,
economic or environmental losses that exceed the community's or
society's ability to cope using its own resources. Though often caused by
nature, disasters in the developing world are mostly a result of poor
knowledge on nature of disaster.

“For a disaster to be entered into the database of the UN's International

Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR), at least one of the following
criteria must be met:

 a report of 10 or more people killed

 a report of 100 people affected
 a declaration of a state of emergency by the relevant
government
 a request by the national government for international
assistance “

(http://www.irinnews.org)

In the context of developing world where, democratic institutions are

not properly established and socio-political inefficiency leads to non-
adherence to scientific ways of development, the identification of
disaster has to be extended beyond the scientific understanding of
disaster. In here the definitions utilised by the developed world has to be
extended to include the types of disasters of natural and societal origin
present in the developing world. This extended definition will account
for the social disaster, which is not considered within the general
understanding of disaster in developed world.

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Therefore this book written specially for the use of students of Sri
Lanka, will present the extended concept of disaster, which adds
following criteria to the ISDR definition (http://www.irinnews.org).

In addition to ISDR definition of disaster, this book includes events

resulting from negligence due to failure to establish democratic
institutions, socio-political corruption and non-adherence to scientific
ways of development as disasters. This is because the problems of
development are today considered a result of lack of freedom (Sen,
1999) and non-utilisation of capabilities.

For example, poverty of the farming population in Sri Lanka is related

to inability of the nation to find a market for their agricultural products,
increase efficiency in agriculture and lack of new vision on
diversification of production. Media reports referring to farmer
economy indicate that there are serious problems in the distribution of
fertiliser, irrigation management and crop diversification. A survey
conducted between 2005 January 1st and 2006 January 1strevaled that
there were 413 different cases of reported corruption in four daily
newspapers in Sri Lanka. Further there were 216 cases of political and
administrative corruption reported in media during the same period.
Political and administrative corruption is recorded in about 12,000 web
sites and World Bank, Asian development Bank and Japan International
Cooperation Authority have warned of high level of corruption in
government tender procedures.

The effect of this inefficiency and unscientific approach results in poor

quality roads, public transport operations, and traffic congestion. These
activities lead to a massive destruction of resources of fuel, property and
life amounting to about 100 to 200 billion rupees annually making it the
most damaging disaster. Most recent reports (LMD, 2006) indicate that
71 percent of the population believe that government sector is corrupt
and the level of efficiency of public services is about 15 percent. A
survey conducted in about 120 government offices between 2004 and
2006 by a group of MBA students indicate that they are highly
inefficient with long delays in attending to revenue collection and road
repair.

About 200 (Seneviratne, 2003) surveys on poverty conducted by various

authors since 2000 indicate that corruption is one of the major social
disasters in Sri Lanka, which leads to an annual loss of about 600 to
1000 billion Rupees. The situation in most of the other developing
countries is not much different from the situation in Sri Lanka and these
countries are poor mainly due to financial corruption in them. Therefore,
in the context of developing world corruption and related anti-social
activities have to be treated as disasters, because they lead to poverty of

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their people and in turn poverty reduces the ability of the society to plan
and implement disaster management systems.

Social construct of disaster

The social construct of disaster can be personal and communal, but the
damage can be explained within the domains of scientific definition of
disaster. It is clear that it is the effect not the scale of disaster which is
important in the social construct of disaster in the developing world.
This is because that the effect of disaster in the developing world has
only a limited and temporary support from the institutional or any other
system. Therefore, immediately after the clearance of the first impact of
the disaster, people (communally or individually) have to find avenues
of recovery by themselves. Long term recovery depends totally on the
ability of the people (communally or individually) to find solutions to
the problems associated with recovery. This is because decision making
in disaster management in developing countries are not conducted
within the principles of scientific disaster management. Therefore
person, extended family and community have to gather help and support
the victims.

Therefore the definition of disaster has to be extended to include many

disasters which are not considered to be disasters in the developed
world. Therefore this book includes many types of disasters which are
not listed as disasters in the books written in the developed world.

Further, it is evident that all the developing countries are subjected to

financial corruption, gluttony and feudalistic elitism, which retards the
proper development of national resource base. The result is continuing
poverty, conflict and wastage of national resource base. Improper
utilisation of national resource base, leads to poor nutrition, serious
health hazards and war in most developing nations. Therefore, financial
corruption, gluttony and feudalistic elitism in the developing world and
in Sri Lanka is considered a societal hazard in this book.

The following life experiences show the effect of disaster on people

(communally or individually) in the developing world. Some of the
incidents report less than 10lives lost and do not require outside help if
they have occurred in the developed world, where social and insurance
support is available.

1966

“We have lived here for three generations, we never knew that there
will be a disaster like this” A plantation worker commenting on Beragala

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Land Slide, which killed 13 people. Property damage was estimated at 2
million Rupees at 1966 value.

1966

“All the paddy fields are gone, our livelihoods are totally destroyed” a
farmer at Kolonne, Sri Lanka, after a mudslide has destroyed about 20
hectares of Paddy. 7 people lost their lives and property damage was
about 10 million Rupees (1966 Rupee value). The area remained barren
till about 1980 and the total loss of income was estimated be about 200
million Rupees. About six families migrated to Walawe project area as
they had no other income.

1983

“ We may not be able stop this process, we may have to leave by next
year” a farmer at Gumsi, Nigeria-Niger border, commenting on
advancing dunes, settlement was abandoned in 1985 as sand began to
bury houses.

1984

“ This is a disaster of Bibbilical proportions, Lake has never been so

low” a regional Prince commenting on the lake level of Lake Chad at
Baga, Nigeria-Cameroun border, Lake Chad continued to dry-up and in
1990, the lake was at its lowest level resulting in mass migration from
the area.

1991

“ Oh my god why this happened to me” a mason who lost his family in a
flood formed due to dam collapse, Alo Dam Collapse, Maiduguri,
Nigeria, dam collapse was due to a flash flood in the northern Mandara
mountains, which killed about 14 and damaged and destroyed property
worth of about 12 million US Dollars.

2001

“Oh it was a disaster, it washed off my paddy field”, farmer (average

monthly income of Rs. 3000/=) who lost all his paddy fileds in the
Puwakgahawela Landslide, at Belihuloya, Sri Lanka.

2001

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“ I could not believe that very big trees can fall like that and if the big
tree was not blocked by an another big tree, it would have fallen on to
our house and we would have been killed” a school leaver’s comment
on what happened during 2007 Tornado at Mihinthale, November, 2001.
Total damage to Mihinthale area was about 2 million Rupees.

2004

“Accountability is disastrously low”. Expert on development planning

referring to financial corruption (related to Tsunami expenditure) in a
developing country,

2004

“ What a disaster is this, Oh God why did this happen” father (Railway
Station Master) who lost his family in the 20041226 Asian mega
Tsunami, at Telwaththa train tragedy, Telwaththa, Sri Lanka.

2005

“ We knew that this disaster will happen. How many times we told
them to look into the problem”. A fatal accident at a railway crossing
(Driver, who was in a hurry entered the bus into the railway track from
the opposite lane and resultant accident caused 42 deaths and 35 serious
injuries and 11 minor injuries), Yangalmodera, Sri Lanka,

2006

“ It was a disaster waiting to happen. Why did they concentrate so

many unarmed troops at one point” (the Navy troop exchange point
located at a vulnerable location), comment by a villager, Suicide
bombing of a navy convoy at Habarana, Sri Lanka, which killed more
than 100.

2007
“My secretary (ministerial secretary) told me to inform you that what
you have predicted has come true. I have told her that you base your
explanations on field facts” A comment made by one of the author’s
student (now working as an assistant director in a ministry related to
environment) on the 2nd February, 2007, referring to heavy landslide
activity in the hill country of Sri Lanka. Author has informed the
importance of climatic change and poor settlement planning during a
lecture series and field tours with the above student in 2002.

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Primarily, the social construct of the nature and severity of disaster is
based on their individual or communal cost of damage. In addition
trauma caused, is a valuable variable in personal disasters. However, the
more permanent construct is formed as a result of a disaster with higher
losses than lower losses. For example any disaster with more than four
lives lost is considered to be a major disaster by about 74 percent of the
people interviewed in a survey on impact of disaster. This may be a
result of four is the average family size in Sri Lanka and any number
above may hint that the loss is equal or more than a loss of a family.
Loss of a family from a community is felt without any form of social
borders as during most of the big disasters, it was clear that people were
shocked when they heard of four or more than four deaths. This finding
is not in accordance with the international limit of 10 or more people
killed for a hazardous occurrence to be identified as a disaster
(http://www.irinnews.org). The limit of property damage for an incident
to be categorized as a disaster was a situation equal or more than the
destruction of about 2 or more houses, permanent blockade of road and
burial or erosion of farmland or home garden. At the end of about 164
observations made between 1966 and 2006 in Sri Lanka, it was noted
that, term disaster was used in relation to deaths at 78 percent of the
time, indicating that death is the basic denominator of the social
construct of disaster.

Traditional understanding

Traditional understanding and modern disaster management identifies

disasters on the basis of their relationship to origin. On the basis of
origin, disasters are studied under two major groups: Natural and
Societal.

Natural disasters

Origin Time line Scale of destruction

Geological

Space Debris All the time Local to Global

Meteorites All the time Local to Global

Magnetic Fluctuations Any time Local to Global

Pole shift Any time Global
Solar Flair Any time Local to Regional
Magnetic storm Any time Local to Regional

Earth Interior System failure Any time Global

Plate tectonics All the time Global
Mountain Building Cyclic Regional
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Isostasy Cyclic Regional

Earthquakes Sudden Local

Earth tremors Sudden Local
Subsidence Sudden Local

Climatic Change Cyclic Regional to Global

Climatic Oscillations Cyclic Regional
Drought Intermittent Local to Regional
Flood Intermittent Local to Regional
Tornado Intermittent Local
Blizzard Intermittent Local
Dust storm Intermittent Local

Biological evolution Evolutionary Local to Global

Species Extinction Evolutionary Local to Global
Species reduction Evolutionary Local to global

Man Induced

Cultivation – over cultivation – poor cultivation techniques

Industrial – mechanical and chemical waste
Construction – settlement – roads – buildings
Recreation – lossening of rock, soil and vegetation
Animal intrusion – story of elephant and man

Man Made

Technological –
House work related – electric shock, gas explosion, various types of
falls (from roof/ from tree/ on steps/ in the bathroom etc.)
Traffic flow related

Corruption – unpatriotic behaviour

Gluttony – not adhering to rule of law/ stealing of biomaterial

Madness – sadism
Conflict
Terrorism
War

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 Level of damage effect on development

Country Geological Man Man Made Effect on

Induced economy
Sri Lanka High Very high Disastrous Very High
Nigeria High Very high Disastrous Very High
Indonesia High Very high Disastrous Very High
Switzerland Moderate Low Very Low Very low
India Moderate Moderate Moderate Moderate
China Moderate Moderate Low Moderate
Malaysia Moderate Low Low Low
Singapore Moderate Low Very Low Low
USA High Low Very low Very low
UK Moderate Low Very Low Very low
Israel High Low Low Very low

Disaster management

Disaster management can be defined as the programme of work

designed to organize control over disaster and emergency situations.
Further it has to provide a management system for helping people
susceptible to disasters and supply them with prior warning, and educate
them on possibility of avoiding disaster. Then disaster management is a
process, which operates before, during, and after the disaster.
Aim of disaster management is to reduce or if possible to avoid human,
physical, and economic losses suffered by individuals, society and
country. Further, disaster management should aim at reducing personal
suffering and help victims to recover as soon as permitted. In case of
refugees or displaced persons they should be provided protection and
safety.
Disaster management therefore is the discipline involved in learning and
practising the holistic scientific system of avoiding, limiting and
controlling risks. These risks can be natural and societal and pre and
post disaster. Therfore total disaster managemnt involves a true scientifc
approach with the utilisation of physical, social and management
sciences.

Primary requirement of disaster management

Primary requirement of disaster management is that the operation is

based on scientific systems of data collection, analysis, prediction and
management. All scientific systems have a set method of operation and
disaster will occur, when this set system is disturbed or destroyed, by an
internal or external instability. Therefore scientists should be involved at
all stage of study, identification, planning and prevention.

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Management originating from Italian ‘maneggiare’ is the act of directing
all sectors of an organisation through use, deployment and manipulation
of all available resources. Italian word originated in relation to the act
of controlling a horse, which is considered to be one of the most difficult
tasks in the world. “Maneggiare” refers to manus or hand, indicating full
control. French original term ‘mesnagement’ and later word
‘management’ was utilized in the construction of the English term
‘management’. Mangement theorists indicate that management is
present only when there is authority, power and leadership.

Management is as old as the beginning of organized cultivation and

construction, but the organized form of management may have begun in
the Sumerian civilisation. Ancient Rajarata civilization of Sri Lanka had
a highly developed system of water and human resource management
system which enabled it to be successful at times other than massive
south Indian invasions. All civilizations of the past were destroyed by
massive outside invasions and even today no nation has any resistance
to massive outside invasions which was proven by the Second World
War in 1939.
Today management has divided it self into two major systems of product
oriented and service oriented and has intruded heavily into common life
systems through the application of the concept of globalization. At the
beginning of the millennium management has become a complex study
system with six major branches.

Human resource, operations, strategic, marketing, and financial and

information technology are considered as these six major branches.

However the advanced management systems in countries with advanced

and secure societal order are now conducted through human interaction
management, which devolves power to the operating system. Similarly,
advanced military systems of the world today operate on ubiquitous
command and control systems, which carry specific commands as they
run to the battlefield expected situations. Therefore management has
become an extremely useful system of organization where advanced and
secure societal order is present and a useless tool when there is no
secure social order.

Development of theory and thought on management began with

economics . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Management, gives the
following historical development to modern management.
Adam Smith (1723 - 1790), John Stuart Mill (1806 - 1873) Eli Whitney
(1765 - 1825), James Watt (1736 - 1819), Matthew Boulton (1728 -
1809) and Léon Walras (1834 - 1910) were the economists who
contributed to the beginning of modern management. Joseph Wharton
offered the first tertiary-level course in management in 1881. Henry
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Towne's Science of management in the 1890s, Frederick Winslow
Taylor's Scientific management (1911), Frank and Lillian Gilbreth's
Applied motion study (1917), and Henry L. Gantt's charts (1910s)
developed management as a discipline. J. Duncan wrote the first college
management textbook in 1911. In 1912 Yoichi Ueno introduced
Taylorism to Japan and became first management consultant of the
"Japanese-management style". His son Ichiro Ueno pioneered Japanese
quality-assurance.The first comprehensive theories of management
appeared around 1920. People like Henri Fayol (1841 - 1925) and
Alexander Church described the various branches of management and
their inter-relationships. In the early 20th century, people like Ordway
Tead (1891 - 1973), Walter Scott and J. Mooney applied the principles
of psychology to management, while other writers, such as Elton Mayo
(1880 - 1949), Mary Parker Follett (1868 - 1933), Chester Barnard
(1886 - 1961), Max Weber (1864 - 1920), Rensis Likert (1903 - 1981),
and Chris Argyris (1923 - ) approached the phenomenon of management
from a sociological perspective. Peter Drucker (1909 – 2005) wrote one
of the earliest books on applied management: Concept of the
Corporation (published in 1946). It resulted from Alfred Sloan
(chairman of General Motors until 1956) commissioning a study of the
organisation. Drucker went on to write 39 books, many in the same vein.
H. Dodge, Ronald Fisher (1890 - 1962), and Thornton C. Fry introduced
statistical techniques into management-studies. In the 1940s, Patrick
Blackett combined these statistical theories with microeconomic theory
and gave birth to the science of operations research. Operations
research, sometimes known as "management science", attempts to take a
scientific approach to solving management problems, particularly in the
areas of logistics and operations.

The science of disaster management therfore straddle on all avialable

scientific areas of study and utilse the knowledge required for disaster
control withn the sphere of environmental management. Therfore
environmental management, environmental change and new strands of
culture have to be placed within the study of disaster mangement.

Environmental management and disaster

Modern scientific environmental management treats environment as a

multi faceted resource with enormous capacity to provide many types of
items from a single unit of the resource. Here the resource is blended in
to the systems of economic development, where each and every product
can acquire a value. Therefore, a proper and scientific understanding of
the environment is utilised to reduce the impact of hazards and disaster.
All types of resources are identified as items capable of providing
multiple products and supports.

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For example, a tree was treated as sources of wood or crop or a unit in
the protection of water source in the old system of environmental
management system. Today a tree is part of a harvest system which
produces wood, wood chips, fire wood, compost, aesthetic value, food,
preserve water and soil.

Then a tree is treated as an object to interfere with and looked after

according to the principles of forest management and harvesting. In the
advanced system of forest management and harvesting in the developed
world tree is managed from the seed or sapling to the time of cutting for
other uses. Within this advanced system of forest harvesting tree is
identified as a scientific unit, which has to be planted and managed in a
scientific way. In planting the type of tree decides where to plant, the
distance between planting positions depending on its root distribution
and height as globally, falling trees kill about 300 to 400 people
annually and damage property worth about 12 to 15 billion US dollars.

When the tree is planted on commercial scale, it is checked for disease

regularly, cleaned to avoid fungi formation, broken or damaged parts or
branches of the tree (by wind, rain and animal action) are removed and
cut at the prime maturity level to obtain the best wood or wood chips for
paper industry. The residue is not wasted in the developed management
system as every part of the residue is utilised for some form of human
use.

Then a tree is a resource when it is treated with scientific understanding

and it is capable in the formation of a hazard and disaster when its
scientific nature is forgotten and treated as a just a plant or tree which
grows and produce timber or food.

Disaster in the context of Environmental Management and the

concepts of Environmental Change and Change of Environment

Concept of environmental change and change of environment are also

considered as important in the study of new environmental management
and disaster.

Environmental change is the process of changing environment through

human activities with the use of technology, social and political
ideology. For example the ancient civilisation of Sri Lanka was based on
the concept of irrigation and a strong monarchical rule, which arranged
the environment to suit the sustainability of a hydraulic civilisation.
Since the arrival of western colonists, the environment of Sri Lanka was
changed to suit the cultivation of tree crops and spices. We are still in
this environment and have begun to introduce an unplanned urban and
rural settlement expansion. Therefore our environment is becoming
more and more polluted, dangerous and chaotic to live.
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 Change of environment is the change of living environment by
migration for the purpose of living and economic activity. Migration to
farm settlements, urban areas and emigration, results in change of
environment. Again if these activities are not planned properly, the
migrant in the new environment is expected to encounter hazards and
disasters originating from environmental pollution and endemic hazards
and disasters of the new environment which will lead to danger and
chaos. When emigration is not conducted in a proper manner the
emigrants are subjected to many legal and social difficulties. As
indicated in the global migration crisis, which began in 2015, sometimes
the illegal migration leads to death by drowning, suffocation, freezing
and hunger.

The holistic view of environment is utilised in the new concept of

environmental management, where value of economic activity is
weighed on the basis of its long-term sustainability within the
environment. Therefore the new concept is constantly linked to
agriculture, industry, investment, monetary policy, livelihoods,
technology and economic planning. This enables the environment
manager to begin at the point of investment and end at sustainable
control (Figure 1.1).

Figure 1.1, Flow of activity of the new environmental management system

Investment programme

Technology

Environmental–natural and societal resources Sustainability

Scientific
decision
making

Economic, social and institutional policies

Government agencies and other resources users

The sustainable control has to be applied at all levels of disaster

management to achieve the desired development objectives. Resource
management has to be conducted within the best available technological
frame, good governance and decentralization of power. The disaster is a
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highly localized occurrence other than for the uncontrollable disasters
like Asian Mega Tsunami, Category Five Hurricane Katrina, Chernobyl
Nuclear Reactor Meltdown or war. The developing countries have
highly inefficient public service system mainly due to lack of
decentralization and the slow response to disaster is mainly a result of
lack of decentralization of observation, research and control. For
example universities of Sri Lanka are rarely used in settlement planning
or environmental planning and about 90 percent of the disasters occur
due to this isolation of research from reality.

The following statement made by an expert in a discussion on housing

policy reveals the poor coordination between public service and research
in Sri Lanka. This discussion was held to discuss the vulnerability of
housing to floods and landslides which led to about a 60 billion rupees
damage in October – November, 2006.

“There are many academic research and papers published, but in reality
we have to look into the situation we are in” (comment by a high
ranking public servant)

the above statement is a normal stereo type comment of a public servant

in the developing world where most of them and the politicians believe
that development should not be based on scientific theory, but on their
socio-political programme, but the reality is environment operates on a
truly scientific basis and any unscientific act conducted by human
beings will be rejected and destroyed by environment.

Concept of Disaster Management

The disaster management inquires the vulnerability of populations to

environmental change and resultant disaster scenarios. Environmental
change is created both by natural changes in the geo-sphere and man-
environment interactions. Developed countries have well understood the
nature of disaster and conduct activities required to control and limit the
effect of them within the scientific knowledge available to them.
Therefore they have the ability to reduce loss of life and limit property
damage during disaster. However, this type of systematic approach is
not established in the developing countries where disaster management
is activated only during the time of disaster and its immediate aftermath
and the suffering of people and reconstruction of property is not
conducted in a planned way. Therefore, disaster management in the
developing countries cannot be truly discussed within the established
concepts of the developed world.

Environmental Change and disaster

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Environmental change is the process of change of the nature and
dynamics of space and place. The concept of environmental change
emerged from the studies on changing nature of earth systems, like
green house gases, ozone depletion, soil erosion, desertification and
emergence of new diseases. The geological forces of the environment
create changes in the physical environment and form various types of
disasters. Society change space and place through many types of
consumption systems from cultivation to recreation and in the present
civilisation, culture has become the primary force behind change of
natural space and place. Human activities utilise culture to develop
space and place and in doing so create a constant competition for places
(Sack, 1999). Therefore we can assume that, natural disaster is created
or formed when there is a crisis between nature of place and culture, and
the societal disaster is formed when there is a conflict between the
established forms of culture and new or emerging strands of culture.

The historical transformation of human behaviour is recognised as one

of the most important factors in the construction of many social
responses to environment and concept of disaster. The human response
to environmental change and disaster is conducted through either
adaptation or avoidance. However, total adaptation is not possible and
avoidance is extremely expensive.

Since 1960s the place of environmental change has become one of the
most important approaches in the study of environment. The global plate
tectonics and study of Quarternary history has changed our
understanding to be more scientific and now all global environmental
problems can be addressed through the utilisation of this concept
(Slaymaker and Spencer, 1998).

New strands of culture and disaster

Ethnic identity, feminist thinking and human rights has also introduced
many new social perspectives on disaster. These are more important in
the developing world where there is a deeper connection between
environment and social groups based on ethnicity, women play a more
crucial role in the survival of family and human rights are constantly
violated. For example in Sri Lanka, the social group associated with the
coast, where fishing is the major occupation is stricken with poverty due
to high level of hazardous nature in their occupation. In the tea
plantations the work force most exposed to continuous wetness (as they
walk among the dew filled tea bushes) is women and respiratory
ailments are more common among them. Most of the poor live in
marginal areas and when they are faced with disaster, relief and
compensation is not provided on a free and fare basis, because of
inefficiency and mismanagement on in the public and private sector
organisations in Sri Lanka. However the fishermen and farmers in the
16
developed world are not poor and are less exposed to disaster, basically
due to existence of a developed social security system, which warn of an
incoming disaster and provide proper relief when a disaster occurs.
Then it is clear that the social organisation is of paramount importance
in the study, preparation and recovery from disaster.

Ethnic Identity and disaster

Ethnic identity is primarily based on culture and cultural identity can be

defined simply as “the way people live in accordance to beliefs,
language, history, or the way they dress”. These thoughts may develop
psoitive or negative ideologies and when there is conflict of beliefs,
some groups of people will take arms. This has happened since man has
managed to establish communal living. Toaday, identity is sued for
many purposes and in poor and developing nations it has become a
major factor for dissent among communities. The result of this dissent is
the formation of terrorist groups.

Today there are about 50 internationally operating terrorist groups who

fight a disastrous battle with many democratically elected governments,
western civilisation and opposite ethnic group. Therefore terrorism has
become the most frequent disaster in the world which record a daily
average of 20 deaths and 200 injured. Trauma, famine, malnutrition and
continued hatred between communities resulting from these conflicts
result in genocide where thousands are killed.

The only way available to live freely with ethnic identity is to follow the
basic democratic way of life, but the behaviour of many governments
and communities in the developing world have proven that some human
beings have no regard for a democratic way of life and problem solving.
Most analysts believe that it is the socio-political corruption which
allows identity to be used in conflict and the countries like Singapore
(now a developed country) and Malaysia (rapidly becoming developed)
show that reduction of socio-political corruption can reduce conflicts
associated with ethnic identity.

Gender and disaster

Gender and feminist thinking has to be discussed as a factor in disaster

management as women are the most important part in constructing
social space as they rare children and guide their thinking pattern. In
addition women have begun to contribute heavily to family income in
the globalised economic system. This has exposed women to disasters
which have not affected them before and resulted in the change of the
cultural foundations of family. This change of cultural foundation has
increased the amount of personal disasters related to suicides, drugs and
sexually transmitted diseases. Globalised economy has constructed a
17
media which has begun transmitting complex cultural values to
traditional societies of the developed world creating culture clash
between the international culture and local culture. This type of
activities have sometimes lead to crisis in gender by exposing women of
the traditional developing societies to concepts of free living of the
developed world.

Human rights and disaster

Understanding of human rights is essential to the study of disaster,

because one of the primary aims of disaster management is to save life
and property from undue impact of societal disasters. The effect of bad
governance, corruption and anarchy affect the rights of people to live in
peace and develop their community. The establishment of human rights
is aimed at controlling these anti-social activities and allow people to
represent their right to free and fair justice. Therefore, human rights and
disaster management has a simple and direct relationship between them
in saving lives and property.

Disaster management –origin and evolution

Disaster management originated from risk management and the study of

disaster is presented in this book under identification of patterns and
trends of disaster, pre and post disaster management and short-term and
long-term predictability of disaster. This study makes no differentiation
between disasters originating from natural and societal causes and
attempt to pay more attention to disasters originating from man-
environmental interaction in the developing world where scientific
environmental planning is at an infantile stage. This type of approach is
required in the developing world situation where disaster management is
not properly organised and pre-disaster planning is almost non-existent.

The history of impact of disaster is noted since the beginning of

organised agriculture and living in a defined environment. It is because
the effect of any disaster is felt and society feels injured or damaged
more when people have a definite place to live.

Modern study on disasters began through the study of natural hazards in

the middle part of twentieth century within the domain of physical
geographers. Natural hazards were discussed in geology, engineering
and agricultural sciences within the topics of geological evolution
(Hutton, 1937 and Strahler and Strahler, 1976). Gilbert White (1936 and
1945) and Smith (2001) produced the social perspective to the study of
natural hazards. Geographers led the hazard based approach and
sociologists were using a disaster based approach (Mileti et al, 1995).
1973-74 killer drought of the Sahel brought about a new thinking on
18
disasters and the effect of drought, disastrous cyclones and earthquakes
in the decade of 1970 brought awareness on natural disasters to world
organisations. White (1974), White and Hass (1975) and Burton (1978)
were primarily responsible for the development of thought on natural
hazards and disasters. The studies conducted by the author from 1974 to
2005 in Sri Lanka, United Kingdom, Nigeria and Norway, on the effect
of climatic change and migration in Sahel, climatic change and social
destabilisation in Sri Lanka and disaster preparedness in Sri Lanka is
also used in the formation of this presentation. The above studies were
conducted using the primary methodology of White (1974).

The rapid rise in population in the developing world between 1970 and
1980 made the impact of disasters originating from natural hazards more
exposed to the global academic and research community. Introduction of
personal computers and formation of Internet made the exchange of
information a norm in the study of sciences. The rapidly rising
population in the developing world is settled in marginal land where
impact of disasters is felt more and number of deaths and injured have
increased to alarming heights. The death toll from 1973-74 Sahel
drought were in the millions, most of the dead in the 1970 Bangladesh
cyclone were poor living on the beach front, majority of the 1976 China
earthquake victims were living in mud houses. By 1980s hazards were
also making an impact in Europe and USA where high living standards
were a norm.

This trend continued into 1980s and terrorism and rogue states became
places of killing grounds of many innocent people in cross fire. Between
1 and 2 million non-active population were killed and wounded between
1980 and 2000 by acts of terrorism. The rise of religious
fundamentalism added another dimension to disaster management
studies. The study of disasters became the domain of all types of
scientists and institutions. The UN began the formation of disaster
response teams (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees,
UNHCR) and USA established FEMA (Federal Emergency
Management Agency). Soon all the developed countries joined USA
with the establishment of their own national and some times regional
disaster response organisations.

The 2004 December 26th South Asian Mega Tsunami, brought a

completely a new dimension to disaster originating from natural hazards
due to exposure of vulnerability of unplanned and unprotected coastal
settlements.

The emergence of new diseases and their rapid spread added another
dimension to hazard and disaster studies. Impact of Influenza epidemics,
Malaria, Polio, HIV Aids, Ibola fever, Avian Flu on populations of the
developing world made the developed world to wonder about the
19
destructive power of disease in a globalised world. The fast aeroplanes
and easy immigration laws in the 1990s increased the risk of spread of
communicable diseases in the developed world. Reports of Malaria in
and around the airports of the developed countries and suspicion of
transportation of animal disease viruses by dust laden wind from the
desertification of Sahel, brought another important perspective to the
study of hazards and disasters.

System of disaster management is conducted by three major

organisational systems

Institutional system of disaster management - bureaucratic

organisation
Business system of disaster management – service industry
Grass root/ Participatory systems of disaster management -

Institutional system of disaster management – bureaucratic

organisation

This system is operated through the offices of the government and its
auxiliary services. For example the largest single organisation of disaster
management of the world is present in USA where all sectors from
President to local philanthropic organisations are linked into one.
Business system of disaster management – service industry
Business system of disaster management is a multimillion-dollar service
industry, which supports the institutional and grass root/ participatory
systems of disaster management through specialised services and
equipment.

Grass root/ Participatory systems of disaster management – This is

the oldest system of disaster management which relies on traditional and
local self-help systems, supported by religious and traditional threads of
society.

Disaster in changing global environment

By the time we entered the latter half of the 20 th century society has
become an extremely powerful force, affecting nature and its dynamics
leading to chaotic behaviour of natural things. In addition society was
changing so rapidly a crisis was formed between the established norms
and ethics. This change of living environment became a great challenge
to science and other belief systems of the society.

Most of the population of the world live on flood plains and coastal
lowlands. Alaskan Tsunami, Hurricane Andrew and Northridge
earthquake in USA, Kobe earthquake in Japan and the south Asian
Tsunami of 2004, showed the depth of vulnerability of human
20
population to disasters associated with natural environment. Poverty and
ethnic cleansing in Africa, globalised terrorism and gluttony of the elite
in developing countries have become more disastrous than the natural
environmental disasters causing massive loss of wealth.

The emergence of management science led to the formation of many

types of management systems, which were capable of providing answers
to disaster management. Environment also became a focus of
management as the demand for natural resources have risen to
unimaginable heights. The experiments conducted in countries like
Switzerland, which utilised its knowledge on snow and ice became a
leader in disaster management through conducting search and rescue
which enabled them to save many more lives than before. The
methodology and technique used in these disaster control helped their
industry to produce special equipment which brought them valuable
foreign exchange and fame. This type of thinking led to the idea that
disasters can be managed and the loss of property and life can be
minimised with the use of scientific management. The production of
special listening and photo devices which will warn of landslides, mud
flows, tsunamis, planning an explosion by terrorists, nuclear disaster,
anti-collision- systems for air planes, side impact resistant systems for
cars today save many hundreds of people who would have been killed
otherwise.

One of the best examples of disaster planning came from 9/11 disaster
where the inclusion of the possibility of air craft collision with the
World Trade Centre Towers in New York. This inclusion of the factor of
aircraft collision in the design resulted in the saving of about 3000 lives
within and around the building as the buildings stood for many minutes
before their final collapse. And when even they collapsed they collapsed
in a vertical way down preventing any lateral damage.

Most of the earthquake victims in the developing world die of lateral fall
of weakly constructed walls of the buildings with more than one floor. It
is estimated that between January 2000 and December 2005, about 25 to
30 billion US dollars of property damage was prevented and 3000 lives
were saved through the application of disaster management techniques
in USA.

The best story comes from the south Asian Tsunami of December 2004,
in which a schoolteacher from Eastern Sri Lanka saved about 40 people
from drowning, because he read about the warning signs of Tsunami
(that water recedes before the onslaught of the big Tsunami wave) in a
journal article about 4 years before the day of the Tsunami.

21
Chapter 2

Disaster Management Systems

In this book disaster management systems are studied in relation to
developing world status where there is no organized system of disaster
management other than in well established multi-national businesses.
Disaster is an event which is extremely difficult to study and analyse by
conventional scientific means as the scientists themselves may be at risk
from disaster. Therefore, disaster data base is generally unreliable and
there is a vast difference in the data produced by different agencies.
Therefore most of the time disaster management becomes an activity,
which requires additional resources, which cannot be comprehended at
the time of pre-planning. This is why all systems of disaster
management have one or many back-up systems in their operational
system.

Development of disaster management systems

Disaster was looked upon as nature’s will or God’s will by the early
inhabitants, and they prayed and demanded protection from disaster.

This practice is conducted even today in the developing countries by

countless millions as the public institutions are incapable of protecting
the masses from most of the disasters.
For example listening to the prayer at the shrine will teach you that all
the deities can protect you from all the disasters except the disasters
generated by ‘the forces of the sun and wind’. This may be explained as
deities cannot protect someone from geological forces, which originate
from the basic processes of sun and the wind. Then deities can protect
you only from the disastrous forces originating from societal systems.

The early civilizations managed to utilize both physical and human

planning systems to combat disaster. Embankments, ditches and walls
were used in the early civilizations of China, Egypt and Mesapotamia.
Settlement based environmental planning system was used in the
Rajarata civilization of Sri Lanka, which enabled the maximum
utilization of available resources of a dry zone environment. (Read Case
Study 1).

22
 (Case Study 1 / Gama and Weva (Gama Kalamanakarana kramaya –
gamparisara) Settlement planning system of environmental
Management: A time tested programme for areas with seasonal
drought. (In an earlier documentation this was termed Tank
Cascade System, Seneviratne, 2006)

( the term Weva is used in the following presentation as the name tank is
not suitable for the reservoir which was constructed not only to store
water, but to fulfil many other requirements of the area which it is
situated)

Gama saha Weva system of environmental management is one of the

best sustainable solutions to seasonal drought and flash floods, which is
practised today in a more modernised form in many developed countries
for irrigation, power generation and urban water supply. This system is
capable of providing a system, which is universally acceptable in
environmental management.

The system practised in Sri Lanka during the period of ancient

civilisation was designed to fulfil the following requirements.

1. Collect high run-off from the catchments where rocky ridges and
hardpan latosols lead to high rate of runoff during thunderstorms and
depressional rain. Both rocky ridges and hardpan latosols have low
infiltration and very low percolation capacity. An experiment conducted
in Mihinthale area between October 2005 and May 2006 revealed that
between 80 to 90 percent of the runoff from the two 2 sample sites
(forest cover and cultivated) were released into the streams or interfluve
clay pans.

2. Stabilise the surface ground water flow in the catchment to support a

system composed of forest, shrub, grassland, village, tank and cultivated
areas.

The experiment indicates that the stabilisation is present in the areas

with more than 60 percent forest cover.

Field surveys reveal that when the ratio of forest to shrub forest is 1: 0.6,
the flow ratio was 0.2 and the ratio of forest to shrub forest is lowered to
1: 0.5, flow ratio doubled to 0.5. Therefore, a 0.1 decrease in ratio of
forest to shrub forest was damaging to environment.

The ratio between forest and shrub forest (supplied household

requirements of firewood, medicinal products and construction material)
23
was a strong stabilising factor. Higher ratios between forest and shrub
forest were found in the catchments with higher spring levels indicating
that the areas with higher spring levels were conserved more strictly
than the other areas.

It is the theory of micro-drainage which was put to use by this system.

The first order weva (Kulu Weva) were followed by the second order
weva (Kuda weva) and the third order weva (Maha Weva) were the last
in the system though many complex patterns are present within the weva
hierarchy. There is a relationship between the weva order and stream
order as the experiment indicated. The first order weva were
constructed on the 4th or higher order (Strahler, 1967) streams at the field
mapping level.

Most of these appear as 1st or 2nd order streams in Aerial Photos and
mostly as 1st order in 1:50,000 topographic sheets. These 1 st order
streams increase their dimension to 5 th or sometimes 6th order after a
total rainfall of 200 millimetres during the rainy season. The
geomorphology of the area contributes to this increase through two
major factors identified in the Rassagala and Bulankulama micro
catchments.

The slopes of the upper catchments of Kulu Weva on the Erosional

plains of the North Central Plains have upper catchment slopes between
1:100 and 1:300. These slopes are quickly saturated under high intensity
thunderstorm rain as the thin organic soil is underlain by a thick latosol
layer which is not very permeable. Rainfall intensities over 60
millimetres/hr, which are common in the thunderstorms of the area
during the first rains in October, start the flow of water to the 1 st order
streams and low slope angle constructs many winding 1 st order streams
through the leaf litter. The experiment conducted produced following
data from the Rassagla catchment.

Table 2.1 Development of ephemeral streams and rainfall

Site 1 Ground cover Rainfall Stream

Rassagla 1 Shrub forest 0 1

Rassagla 1 Shrub forest 80 2
Rassagla 1 Shrub forest 200 5
Rassagla 1 Shrub forest 300 6

24
Table 2.1 Development of ephemeral streams and
rainfall
Site 2 Ground cover Rainfall Stream

Rassagla 2 Teak Plantation 0 1

Rassagla 2 Teak Plantation 80 2
Rassagla 2 Teak Plantation 200 2
Rassagla 2 Teak Plantation 300 2
* uneven surface produced by land preparation results in heavy ponding
and reduces the out flow to streams. In total about 40 to 60 percent of
the water in the teak plantation is converging into these pools and
evaporate.

Data (Table 2.1 and 2.2) indicate that the undisturbed shrub forest
absorb a large quantity of water to the limit of about 80 millimetres,
before starting the stream flow, but the streams in the teak plantation
area cannot flow properly as disturbed micro-slopes construct pools on
the surface. The 1st and 2nd order streams in this identification are truly
ephemeral unless fed by an artificial source like wastewater from a
settlement or cultivated land. The 3rd and 4th order streams flow between
1 to 3 days after rain from middle of November to mid January.

The system is not always simple and there were complex construction
systems to handle local situations, which demanded special techniques.
These local situations arose from the variations of rock type, soil cover,
slope and land use. The experiment showed that micro-slopes were
responsible for loss of water to the stream and to weva. The average
slope in most of the cascades is in the region of 1:10,000 to 1:25,000,
where a slight variation in slope will result in accumulation of water in
micro-basin type formations on latosols. During the experiment it was
clear that a rise of slope by 2 to 3 inches locally would lead to heavy
blockage of water flow to the stream.

Then it was paramount that the settlement, cropland, shrub land and
forest were kept in pristine condition. The most important disturbance
to the regular flow of water into the stream system generally originates
from human activities.

Therefore following planning was required

Firstly, the settlement in this system was located in a high ground

besides the weva or cultivated area. This prevented wastewater, seepage
of sewage residue and animal waste and other types of solid and liquid
waste entering weva. Further the location allowed the settlement to
direct its wastewater into some type of wastewater pond, which was
used as a recycling unit. Non-existence of chemical waste may have
25
allowed these ponds to be non-toxic and some types of plants and fish
may have been used in this organic recycling or cleaning system. There
is evidence that craft industries like iron, silver and paint production
were situated in special locations where waste water was treated before
discharge into canal or ela.

Secondly, though it is not very clear, inscriptions and designs of the

sacred and built up areas of the ancient civilisation support an existence
of a highly developed hydrological management system. The wastage
of water was controlled with heavy legal and communal commands and
user-friendly system was maintained. Rocky ridges were not utilised for
settlements and they were either fully conserved or kept in the custody
of monks, who managed the area in pristine condition. The experiment
conducted on these areas indicate that the rock ridges under the care of
monks had about 4 to 6 times more springs than the areas closer to other
types of settlements. The specific purpose of the shrub, forest and the
upper catchment of weva were defined by law and tradition and the law
breakers were punished.

This system was capable of maintaining a population of about 5 to 8

million between the period of 100 and 1100 AD, when the civilisation
was in full bloom. National plan for the civilisation was in operation
with periods of rapid and slow phases of weva building, resettlement in
the peripheries and inter-basin water transfer (Paranavitane, 1959).

Today the total disregard for the Gama saha Weva system originate from
the public sector planning of settlements (including Resettlement
programme since 1930), construction of roads and railways,
establishment of forest plantations, construction of large government
and private sector institutions, waste dumping and land fill since
independence.

These activities have increased the regular blockage of 1 st, 2nd and 3rd
order streams in the area, destroyed some of them totally and redirected
water to local depressions where they accumulate and evaporate, thus
seriously starving the Kulu weva system.

It is clear that the present civilisation of the wet zone has never managed
to understand the principle of environmental management of the ancient
civilisation though rhetoric is evident in all types of utterances and
unscientific publications. It is time that we attempt to understand that it
is not only the existence of the Gama saha Weva system which made
possible for the development of the dry zone civilisation, but the
hydrological management system in operation through various royal
instructions and laws, which defined the terms of water conservation
and water use. Existence of officials like dolos-maha-vatan, va-
vajarama, vel-kami and compensation paid for loss due to royal order
26
clearly indicate this existence of an efficient management system. If the
orders of the palace were not conducted properly the officials
responsible were punished. Then it is clear that this system of
management was user friendly, community oriented, but strictly legal
and orderly (Paranvitane, 1959). The king himself was well educated on
his duties and was under the guidance of council of ministers and high
dignitaries.

The present planning system or the legal system is not built on this type
of regularisation and today we are forced to depend on inter-basin water
transfer. However, it is clear that we are even unable to maintain a well
operational inter-basin water transfer system at present due to poor
upper watershed management. There is chaos in the drought control and
flash flood management system and it is high time we understand that
this problem can be solved only through a well-managed scientific
system and not by just feeding the area with water from somewhere as
we do today.

The management of environmental disasters require a holistic approach,

where the physical hazards and disasters are controlled through
technical expertise and the societal organisation required for the
stabilisation of environment is to be conducted by implementation of
laws and regulations and development of positive attitudes. The
existence of hazardous management leads to disaster. Therefore, disaster
management programme requires the support of an organisational
framework with knowledge and authority if it is to support the survival
of humanity.

It is evident that, the use of a planned settlement with a surrounding

shrub and forest supported by a detailed system of laws and regulations
have reduce drought and flood disaster to a minimum in the ancient
Rajarata Civilisation of Sri Lanka.

The scientific development in modernization led to the formation of

capabilities in disaster control in the developed world. European systems
originating from Swiss and north European regions managed to install a
mix system of engineering and agronomic measures with strict
adherence to law and regulations. These states succeeded in controlling
many disasters in their domains with the use of this mix of systems and
today they are taken as examples where disaster impact is reduced to a
minimum.

USA with its extremely rapid development began detailed studies on the
impact of disaster and with the use of river basin development model
believed in the engineering systems and engaged in the development of
technology required for the future.

27
However the Dust Bowl disaster in the early 1900 led USA a re-think
the strategies of disaster control and the scientist began to adopt a more
ecological view (Burrows, 1920). 1936 the US Congress passed the bill
on Flood Control Act and construction systems were favoured by the
disaster managers. White (1945) indicated the importance of
management infused into construction as a better methodology in
management of disasters and favoured a behavioural approach. His
much used questionnaire on natural hazard provided a basis for
digitization of data on environment based on percentage values. Hewitt
(1983) indicates that this approach is characterized by three major
approaches in disaster management.

1. application of scientific knowledge in disaster management

2. use physical and human control measures where necessary
3. use of armed forces in the emergency response

This is still the dominant view in disaster management but this approach
is continually re-organised through the application of more society
oriented methods.

By mid 1970s an alternative approach to disaster management was

installed through inclusion of role played by individual action. The
arrival of this approach was necessary because there was a massive
increase in disasters in the developing world which were not truly of
physical origin. Developing countries have faced many disasters
because they have unplanned settlements and local knowledge is not
used in public programmes of disaster mitigation. Further the effect of
disaster is felt more in the developing world because of the inability of
their public institutions to organize long term programmes as they have
alienated the local knowledge, use of scientists in the field and
grassroots knowledge in disaster management.

The behavioural approach has failed in the developing world because

the corruption in the governance has led to non-adherence to scientific
method of utilisation of resources of the natural environment. Most of
the world organizations and funding authorities have indicated that
inability to install economic and environmental sustainability in the
developing world is a case of this public sector mismangement and
disasters are intensified due to this mismanagement. For example the
massive damages occurred in the 2003 Rathnapura floods and 2006
October-November rainy season in Sri Lanka, is due to construction on
stream reserves and not listening to scientific advice both by the
populace and institutions.

The future of disaster management is well organized in the developed

world with the use of scientific method and local participation. The story
of disaster management in developing countries is in a state of flux
28
which has not found its direction mainly due to corruption in the
institutional and local management systems. Therefore future looks
bleak for the developing world as disasters emanating from climatic
change; increased geological activity and societal crisis will increase
rapidly in the next 25 to 50 years.

This is the case of Sri Lanka where the public sector is yet to install a
working disaster management system in the country, though it has a
fairly good relief provision system. The people talk of ‘flood vehicles’
(ganwathura prado eka), tsunami houses’ (sunami mandira)and
‘landslide cars’ (naya cab) in reference to vehicles bought and houses
build by many categories of workers of the public and private sector,
through engaging in corrupt practices during relief work related to
disaster.

The behavioural approach has failed in the developing countries and

they are yet to find a solution to disaster management. Today most of the
developing countries operate a wait and see relief system. This is an
excessively expensive system where cost of compensation and
rebuilding affects not only the merger financial resources of the public
organizations, but sudden redirection of funding results in a loss to the
regional and sometimes national economy. Further, the trauma of the
incident will continue in the affected well beyond the physical relief and
rehabilitation and poverty is increased of the affected.

For example listening to the stories of affected of 2003 Kalu, Gin and
Nilwala floods and landslide disasters in Sri Lanka reveals the misery of
the affected, where most of the affected have many complaints of not
receiving proper relief and aid until 2006. Some of the foot bridges in
the rural areas destroyed by the floods are yet to be rebuilt making their
daily journeys seriously hazardous, the housing reconstruction is not
properly managed and the roads are not properly repaired. The trauma of
loss of family member and disability caused by serious injury lingers on.

The structural paradigm (Emel and Peet, 1989) was in existence in the
developing countries during the times of early civilization. For example
in Sri Lanka, the monarchial system of governance had a disaster
management system based on settlement planning as indicated above
under the topic CS 1 / Gama and Weva. The early civilization has faced
many serious droughts and famine as given in Mahawamsa. The weva
cascade system was the first line of defense against drought and famine
and when it failed in a continuing drought of more than three years the
civilization could not adjust within it domains and the system of disaster
management guided the king to expand into new areas of settlement.
Sometimes, the disaster has led to abandonment of some of the frontier
regions and populace was accommodated in refugee camps in the
nearest available area which was not affected by drought or flood.
29
Massive floods were rare under peaceful conditions but at times of war,
the purposeful destruction of wev bunds have resulted in disastrous
floods. The technology used in the construction of weva and weirs
(amuna) indicate that there was pre planning for heavy floods which
occur in intervals of 10, 20, 50 and 100 years. The 1957 floods indicate
that most of the medium sized weva is not capable of controlling 50 year
and 100 flood. This is why the location of settlement was properly
planned with an aim of reducing damage to a minimum. The dearth of
records on massive disasters during the times of ancient kingdom in
histrical records is due to the reason that the environment and disasters
were properly managed in it, specially through the construction of the
settlement away from the most possible disaster.

The environment – man relationship was maintained through a strict

enforcement of law, which prevented continuity of disasters and reduced
the human and capital cost to the economy. The following evidences
from the inscriptions and pronouncements indicate the strength of the
belief which prevailed in a highly organized governance of Rajarata
which is equal to systems of the developed world of modern times,
which controls the environment-man interface through strict
environmental regulations and laws.

The following information Lagamuwa, (2007), indicate the management

system of the ancient kingdom of Rajarata.

Total environment: with reference to the environment in and around the

settlement

“In every settlement it is prohibited to cut timber, kill animals, erect new
construction and pollute water within a circumference of 60 feet. It is
designated as an intermediate zone between the settlement and forest or
shrub”

The value of above imposition was to keep a stable organic environment

with a balance of living beings (which is not kept today). This was
possible as the settlement of the kingdom was designed and structured in
association with the environment. Similar environmental laws are in
force in the highly developed western world and in countries like
Malaysia and Singapore where all human acts including planning of
settlement is also conducted according to strict environmental
requirements.

“ in the 3rd century BC, it was prohibited to slaughter animals within a

circumference of 25 miles of Anuradhapura city ”

30
“In 12 th century AD, it was prohibited to slaughter animals, fishing
and cut timber within a circumference of 35 kilometers of Polonnaruwa
city ”

the above two edicts were aimed at preventing water pollution, spread of
disease and securing a religious environment.

The following of above edicts were possible because there was an

advanced level of environmental planning in the system of governance,
where honest leader guided the populace.

The breaking of environmental law and edicts demanded heavy

punishment.

The illegal felling of trees was punished by hard labour related to tank
building and restoration. These actions were punishable by a fine or
manual work.

“ illegal cutting of trees were punished by a fine or cutting and repairing

an area equal to about 48 cubic meters of weva”. Mihinthale Pillar
Inscription, King Mihindu IV.

“ the palm, coconut, tamarind and Mee trees on Mihinthala hill should
not be cut or removed. The persons including the royal servants who
break this law should be punished by a fine and the income collected
should be given to the temple” Mihinthale Pillar Inscription, King Sena
II, AD 853-887.

The technology of water management was the core of the success of the
kingdom.

“ The sluice of Tissa weva should be closed nine days after harvest in
the fields of Isurumuniya and allow it to fill again. Then the remaining
water can be released first to the temple and surrounding area and any
excess water should be released to Malwathu Ela. In addition the land
belonging to the temple should not be taken over by anyone.”
Wessagiriya Inscription, Mihindu IV, 956-973.

“ 2 Aka (an older currency) was fined for flooding of paddy fields (over
use of water), before ploughing (there was a set standard for ploughing).
If ploughing was not done correctly the person at fault was fined with
one Kalang of gold. If the ploughing was not done as prescribed the
person at fault was fined 5 kalangs of gold.”

The modern structualist view is practiced in most of the developed

countries where there is free and fair access to information and
governance is people friendly. The scientific research and information
31
dissemination is at a very high level of development in these regions
where people are continually consulted and informed about disaster
vulnerability in an environment where physical and societal change has
become a common affair. However the complexities arising from lack of
technology and inefficient public service system in the developing
countries result in poor usage of the structuralist paradigm. These
countries have to depend on developed countries for their methods and
techniques of disaster management as socio-political corruption have
prevented them being capable of development of technology and
methodology of disaster management.

This increase in disaster vulnerability in the third world has been noted
by Torry (1979) and Susman et al (1983). Poverty, technical change,
technical dependency and unequal trade arrangements were given as
reason by above authors for the existing high vulnerability of third
world population. Sen (2000) identifies lack of freedom from global
and local market forces as a primary reason form underdevelopment and
hunger and indicates disaster risk in the developing countries is much
higher than in developed countries.

Behavioural approach provides a framework for practical hazard control

while structuralist approach attempts to reduce the risk of disaster
through control of poverty. Then the best disaster control has to be
conducted in a way that there is a fusion between the two approaches,
which will facilitate the reduction of effect of factors responsible for
disaster and through use of technology. However, in the developing
world countries where there is high rate of socio-political corruption,
disregard for scientific approach and neglect of local knowledge,
disasters continue to increase with heavy damage to life and property.
This neglect and nonchalance has resulted in excessive trauma and
suffering of the populace during after disaster situations. It is estimated
by UN and related agencies that about an average of 10,000 people die
and property worth of 300 to 600 billion US dollars are damaged in the
developing world due to inefficient management of disaster. However,
experts on disaster management believe that the loss of life may be
about a thousand to two thousand and property damage will be about 30
to 50 billion US Dollars if proper disaster management is utilized in
these countries.

A recent field visit to a landslide site at Paradeka, Central province, Sri

Lanka revealed that the people who were killed in the slide were
watching the debris clearance from an unsafe distance (environmental
illiteracy). Steep retaining angle kept by road construction (not adhering
to scientific data) and disregard for dip of rock in stabilizing the slope
(not utilizing scientific data) were the major reasons for slump type falls
along the road under construction.

32
It is clear that the study of theory of disaster management is not
considered as relevant in the planning systems developing countries and
in Sri Lanka, but the aim of the above discussion is to provide the
available information on approaches to disaster management.

Present system of disaster management in the developing countries

depends on institutional help, when necessary, but most of the time the
loss of life and property damage is not fully supported by them. After an
initial period of help and relief the institutional system fade away and
the victims have to depend on their local or relative help systems to see
an end to their suffering. Recently the involvement of NGO’s have
eased the sufferings of many as major international support programmes
are reluctant to fund public systems in the developing countries as these
public systems have visible high levels of mismanagement.

The case of Tsunami funding in all the countries in Asia except for
Malaysia and Singapore are questioned by international auditing
organizations, and even after almost two years after the Tsunami most of
the people are dissatisfied on the support they have received. In the case
of Tsunami it should be remembered that about 25 percent of the
pledges made by the developed countries are yet to materialize into
action. Then it is not incorrect to say that the disaster management
system of the developing world and in Sri Lanka is in a state of
confusion, which has resulted in a high impact on the general economy
leading to poverty of nations, regions, localities and persons.

System of disaster management is conducted by three major

organisational systems

Institutional system of disaster management - bureaucratic organisation

Business system of disaster management – service industry
Grass root/ Participatory systems of disaster management –

Institutional system of disaster management - bureaucratic

organisation: the Model –

US Disaster Management and Control System

In the last 20 years USA (government and people) lost about 2000
billion dollars worth of property due to natural environmental and
societal environmental disasters and the loss of life is estimated to be
15200 (excluding traffic accidents). However, as Homeland Security
Authority (formerly Federal Emergency Management Authority)
indicates “the losses were kept to above numbers because of continuing
scientific research and policy changes”.
33
Work schedule of the US Disaster Management Control System

Study/Research

The basic research on disaster management is conducted by the

University system and technical research centres and these results are
fed into the national research centres and warning centres. University
research scientists and people also head the national research centres
with research degrees in their respective fields.

Monitoring/Warning

Data for monitoring and warning is gathered by all research

organisations and analysed with the help of specialists in the field who
are the University research scientists. When a disaster is predicted the
state authorities take over the warning system through national
television, radio network and Internet. Police will travel around the
most vulnerable areas warning people of the locality. If the disaster is of
national nature (the control of 9/11 World Trade centre Attack) the office
of the president will control it through FEMA (Figure 2.1) and special
security services like FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation), CIA
(Central Intelligence Authority), NSO (National Security Organisation).

34
Figure 2.1FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AUTHORITY (USA)

Home Land Security THE

Cabinet Member PRESIDENT
(formerly)FEMA

National Guard
US Armed Forces

National
State Police
Hurricane centre
Governor Fire
United States
Emergency Services
Geological Service
Volunteers
National Oceanic
NGO’s
and Atmospheric
Philanthropists
Authority and
National Weather
Centre
PTWC

University Research Centres Spotters

Technical Research Centres

National and State

Media Warning System

People

PTWC – Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre

Rehabilitation and Rebuilding

Normally conducted by the state authorities, but federal help is always

available. FEMA keeps a massive storage of food, water and medical
supplies in stock away from disaster zone and deliver when required.

35
Failure rate

Failure rate in Warning, Search, Rescue and Relief in this organisational

framework is estimated to be 10 to 12 percent. The most devastating and
damaging disaster in the history of USA occurred on the 28 th of August
2005. It destroyed an area of about 123,000 square kilometres (about
twice the size of Sri Lanka), but the death toll was below 2000. The
prediction was 80 percent accurate and most of the deaths occurred
among the people who refused to listen to the warning to evacuate.

Israel System (Figure2. 2)

Disasters resulting from flash floods, dust storms and war related
incidents are common within Israel. Constructed to control war related
disaster management, Israel has applied its system successfully to
control other natural and man-made disasters.

Local spotters and listeners work throughout the day in shifts listening
to distress calls. Once the distress call is located the local resource
(single or multiple units) rushes to the point of disaster. The whole
country is linked into one single system of emergency wavelength,
which makes the distress call is heard in all sectors of disaster
management at once. But the higher levels do not respond until they are
called-in by the local group.
Local spotters then call all the local resources together to find the
place or magnitude of the disaster. If the disaster is beyond the capacity
of the local group they will call for outside help.

As soon as the local-group call is received by the National Centre it acts

with a full assistance programme. As the disaster management is the
responsibility of the Armed forces in Israel it works with the highest
efficiency possible. Their training in search and rescue is one of the
highest in the world, if not the highest. The duty officer in the centre is
authorised to use any resource available to him for the job at hand and
ask for approval later.

36
Figure 2.2 Israel System

Listener / Spotters

Information
systems
Local resources (local University/
guides and trained research
response teams – Institutions

National Disaster Control

Centre

(Controller on duty)

(Armed Forces)

This system works very well as local resources are utilised with
precision. For example this system utilises the support of Bedouin
tribesmen in search and rescue missions in the desert areas, where
footprints are covered by wind blown sand or flash floods.

The local military facilities are utilised in local disaster management

activities making access and transportation of victims much easier for
the controllers. This is possible as all adults in Israel are trained in
military activities and mobilised for disaster management.

Sri Lanka

37
Sri Lanka is yet to establish a people friendly disaster management
system though we have formed a ministerial level organisation.
However lack of coordination and inefficiency in various public sector
departments and officials makes disaster response a highly inefficient
activity. Since 2010, armed forces have established a system of rapid
response at the onset of disaster, which has yielded good results in
rescue and security.

Firstly the studies on disaster probability in Sri Lanka are not properly
conducted even after warned by the scientists. Exact reason for this is
unknown but author’s experience is that the corruption in the
institutional system refuses to listen to scientific and local advice and
people have very limited knowledge on disaster due to poor information
system in primary and secondary systems of education, which is the
common level of education in about 5 percent of the populace.

Secondly, complaints, protests and reports made by local people on local

situations are not properly analysed and evaluated by most of the
authorities responsible. For example, there were serious warnings by
scientists, on the slope instability in and around Peradeniya town, but
neither people nor the institutions managed to take note of them. The
investigations carried out with the field class on the aftermath of the
slump at Peradeniya town the team managed to observe 6 more sites
with loosened soil profile, but people continue to live and the
institutional organisation has just begun some settlement relocation.
However, the settlement planning should have been conducted at a much
earlier period.

Droughts of various kinds have a disastrous effect on village economies

of Sri Lanka, but lack of National Strategic Development Plan prevents
the establishment of a disaster reduction system. Disasters originating
from Illegal Gem mining, sand mining and tree felling can be listed
second, third and fourth after drought in Sri Lanka, which.

Financial corruption is the major societal disaster and number one

national disaster in all the developing countries including Sri Lanka.
Marketing of farm produce is a disaster which leads to even suicides in
Sri Lanka, but the governments since independence have failed to
establish a proper marketing system for farm produce making it the
major societal disaster in Sri Lanka.

Business system of disaster management – A Service industry

This is where the disaster managers complete their education as the

scientist becomes a manager or manager becomes a scientist through
further education. The developed countries have incorporated disaster
management into their National Strategic Development Plans and
38
continue to be ready for disaster. This is because that they believe proper
national planning is able to reduce the intensity of disasters.

In the developing countries lack of proper national planning leads to

haphazard development which results in heavy damage to settled
environment at a time of disaster. The planning of rural and urban
settlements in the developing world are not conducted according to the
principles of modern development methods or properly researched
traditional methods, which results in failure in construction and
environment quality.

Business system of disaster management is part of human resource

system of a business organization. The success or failure of a business
organization depends on its ability to hire manpower required by the
organization. In addition disaster management has become one of the
popular fast developing businesses in the modern world. Therefore,
firstly, the disaster management has become a part of business
management and secondly, business has organized an income generation
enterprises from disaster management.

Business disaster management systems are involved in many types of

activities from fire prevention to protecting intellectual property. The
scale of operation of the business of disaster management is vast and
highly lucrative for the industry as the application of knowledge from
the science of disaster management saves massive amount of property
and life in all types of industries of the world. It is estimated that the
savings from the use of disaster management principles industry
amounts to about 6 to 7 billion US Dollars in the developed world and
loss in the developing world is estimated to be about 10 to 12 billion US
Dollars.

An examination of business of disaster management in the developed

countries enables us to study successful systems and utilize them in case
of disaster in developing countries (Figure 2.3)

Disaster management knowledge

Planning

Construction
Low losses

Operation
39
 Maintenance

Figure 2.3 Relationship between disaster management knowledge and

loss

Planning stage is the stage in which business systems prepare for

disaster management. The type of disaster the business may face will
vary between financial to loss of property by fire. However, the loss due
to unplanned disaster will be the responsibility of the disaster manager
(mostly operations manager handles disaster management ) of the
business. Therefore the value of disaster management is clearly stated in
the advanced learning systems of business management under human
resource management and strategic planning.

Information on disaster management is given at the time of training and

constantly updated using rewards. Importance of disaster management
increases as the risk level of the business is increased and the nature of
products changes from durable to soft.

Risk level of business depends on the product or the service provided by

the business, system standards in operation and level of legal
enforcement.

Product or the service provided by the businesses in the developing

world is known to be of lower standards and lead to more disaster
situations. The graphic evidence provided below is a result of many
surveys conducted in Sri Lanka over a period of two years by a group of
MBA students.

40
 120

expected - 0 to 100
100

Level of damage
80
60
40
20
0
1 2 3
Category (refer text for details)

hard soft financial conflict

Figure 2.4 Level of disaster counted on three categories (Table 2.3)

Table 2.3 Level of disaster counted on three categories

Category Damage level Percent damage

1 Low 0 - 24
2 Moderate 25 - 49
3 High 50 and above

Categories used here are based on White (1976) as given in table 2.3.
Lowest risk is associated with the production and marketing of hard
goods, which are durable, easily stored and used for specific purpose.
The businessmen dealing in this type of goods have reported the lowest
effect by disaster, as about 82 percent of them manage to recover their
goods after an impact of disaster.

Businesses dealing with soft goods have faster rise in their damage level
as the damage to their goods accelerate after initial decay. For example
vegetable grower, transporter and retailer loose large amounts of
finances if there is heavy rain, high heat or transportation breakdown.

41
Media reports revealed that the vegetable growers of Central and Uva
provinces have lost about 200 to 300 million Rupees during the ultra
wet period of 2006 October-November, due to heavy rain and blockage
of roads by landslides. Total loss due to damage to soft goods during
Tsunami of 20041226 was estimated at 2 to 3 billion Rupees.

Businesses operating in financial systems are always at risk from

situations like ‘bad loans’ ‘bad management’ and ‘bad investments’. For
example in Sri Lanka bad management and bad loans has stagnated all
State owned banks and limited their financial capability to support the
larger economy. However, the assistance and recovery grants from the
government has kept them operating with limited capacity. About 200
to 300 cases of business bankruptcies are reported annually in Sri Lanka
with many enterprises in the category of small scale businesses going
bankrupt due to poor market survey, financial mismanagement and
disaster. Poor market survey is one of the major reasons for small scale
bankruptcies in Sri Lanka as most of these businesses do not conduct a
preparatory market survey and start their business with an idea that they
can earn a living from the business. Secondly due to addiction to alcohol
or attempt to follow the life style of big business lead to their
bankruptcies. About 30 percent of the bankruptcies in the small scale
businesses originate from a disaster related to family or weather. In a
survey conducted during the 2006 October-November heavy rains
revealed that 61 small scale businesses and 12 medium scale businesses
were closed for an indefinite period due to landslides (Table 2.4).

Table 2.4 Reasons for failure

Percent of bankruptcies Reason given by the respondent/or

informant
42 Poor market survey
28 Financial mismanagement
30 Disaster

The cumulative rate of loss from financial service mismanagement is

higher than the loss from hard and soft product systems. This is because
the financial services rest on their capacity to meet the sudden demand
for funds. Therefore, loss of trust by customers on the basis of inability
to provide quick services makes losses in a financial business. For
example, weak state owned banking system in Sri Lanka suffers
continuously from this type of failures and looses a massive amount of
savings and investment capital.

The highest level of losses occurs in business when they are affected by
conflict and war. The estimated loss to the Sri Lanka economy from

42
1983 to 2005 from conflict and war is estimated at about 6500 billion
Rupees without counting on the losses made by the loss of about 60,000

to 70,000 lives. Two world wars (1918 and 1939) have destroyed
business properties valued at about 45,000 billion US Dollars and at
present there is an annual loss of businesses valued at about 20 billion
US Dollars by war and conflict. Today war and conflict is the major
factor responsible for loss of national financial resources in the world.

Even the developed world has fallen into this sad situation where
businesses loose large quantities of finance due to global terrorism and
their contribution to armed forces against selected terrorist targets.

Daily the forces of the developed world spent about 2 to 5 billion US

Dollars (US= 1.5 to 2, UK= 0.5, other nations (European, ANZAC,
Canada and UN Peace Keeping Force) collectively about 3 billion US
Dollars to secure their nations from terrorism.

The arms, airplane, pharmaceutical and vehicle manufacturing industries

benefit heavily from war and conflict and prosper. For example the
competition for regional superiority in the Indian sub continent has
made India to manufacture a modern stealth jet fighter with an
investment of more than 20 billion Indian Rupees, when about 30
percent of Indians live below poverty line as indicated by United
Nations. This is a common scene in the international political scene,
where power and domination is considered more important than
humanity.

The three most disaster prone businesses are transportation, oil and
production of chemicals. The most disasters in transportation industry
occur in railway and bus accidents which amount to about two thirds of
the deaths. About 60 percent of the deaths and 70 percent of the injured
are reported from developing countries, where system standards are not
kept properly due to socio-political corruption. The reasons for accidents
given in Table 2.5 indicate that all the four top reasons originate from
lack of proper legal control on transportation by the respective
authorities. This results in serious traffic congestion, delays and more
accidents resulting in a loss of about 5 to 6 billion Rupee annual loss to
the economy of Sri Lanka.

The developed world uses strict enforcement, heavy fines, video

evidence, and cancellation of license and jail terms for the regularization
of their transportation business. The disaster ratio arising from
43
transportation business in Sri Lanka is 1:6 vehicles compared to USA
where the ratio is 1:11. USA has about 600 million road vehicles while
Sri Lanka had only about 4 million vehicles.

Table 2.5 Factors responsible for transport related accidents

(450 accidents and five major factors)

Factor Category Percent

Over Speed No proper legal 41
control
Carelessness No proper legal 30
control
Not following traffic No proper legal 11
code control
Poor vehicle No proper legal 10
maintenance control
Poor road use by 08
pedestrians

In developed world, the business systems provide many types of disaster

management to cover all types of businesses. But in the developing
countries, disaster management is taken seriously only by multi-national
or high-income group of companies, which are involved in large scale
operations. This is primarily a result of low environmental literacy and
poor understanding on risk in private and public service systems.

Grass root/ Participatory systems of disaster management –

Knowledge on disaster is first gained at home from the mother as she

warns the infant with the word ‘No’. The infant learns to react to
sounds of the mother and wait for her to warn of any impending disaster
in his life. Then the family members are recognized as helpers and
school becomes the main provider of information as the infant grows
into a child. Then the radio, TV, print and other electronic media supply
the child with information on his environment and disasters. At a later
stage child will gather information on traditional systems of disaster
management and the modern systems. However the functioning of this

44
system depends on the efficiency of the public information system and
the business systems of disaster management.

The developed world has a well established system on disaster

management which supports and learn from the grass root/
(participatory system) of disaster management, but due to inefficient
coordination between the grass root/Participatory and public service
system of the developing world, the developing world suffer from heavy
damages from disasters.

If the Grassroots/Participatory systems are well developed alongside

modern systems, they become highly applicable and suitable disaster
management systems. This is constantly being proved by the fact that
well disciplined families produce more of well-disciplined children than
the rest of the families.

At the time of 20041226 Tsunami it was clear that the use of local
knowledge saved about 40 people at Kalkudah area, Sri Lanka;

a village in the coastal area of northern Sumatra as the people knew of

dropping sea level is a sign of a big wave, Indonesia

and

a group of tourist in a beach in Thailand by the elephants running away

from the shore just seconds before the wave hit.

The warning centers operated by local fisherman’s associations in

southern India also helped to save many people in Tamilnadu.

Author was warned by the driver of the department vehicle (who noticed
goats standing under a tree in a ring, which indicate an imminent arrival
of a powerful wind force - of a massive sandstorm- Khamsin), when he
was returning from a field trip to Baga, in the border between Niger and
Nigeria on the shores of Lake Chad.

Traditions and belief systems have always had limits on travel, food and
social mixing, because these are the areas where most of the unknowns
are present. The prohibition of girl children to leave home without an
escort is a remedy made against preventing indecent assault or rape.
Restriction on some food items at certain times of the day or limit on
quantity according to maturity was practiced to prevent disease or
discomfort. Marriage between different ethnic groups, castes, classes
and religions are not readily supported by many communities of the
45
world today because of fear of emergence of disparity once the
freshness of the marriage is worn out.

Chapter 3

Types of disaster management systems

Traditional disaster management identifies disasters on the basis
of their relationship to natural and man-made systems, which will
be presented to the reader in the first part of this book. However
in this book an attempt will make to study disasters within a
framework of man: disaster interface, where the scale of disaster
is treated as an important factor in disaster management. This is
because today it is not the cause, but the scale of disaster, which
decide the type of management system required by a given
disaster.

Traditional disaster management (Figure 3.1)

Traditional disaster management is based on the approach of

security and safety developed by the military system of disaster
management employed by monarchial or colonial system of

46
government. Though this is identified as a traditional system of
management, it formed the basis of present management system,
which uses democratic systems in place of old methods.
Therefore, the modern system differs from the old system only
through the change of operator and the methods employed by the
operator.

The traditional system of disaster management depends on the

central authority to plan, be ready, face, provide relief and finally
help rehabilitation. In here the system depends on the decisions
made by the central authority for all activities of disaster
management.

Figure 3.1 Traditional Disaster Management Systems

King/ President/ Premier/ Council/ Governor/ Chairman/CEO

Police/ Army command Local

authority
Local Government
officials
Central Command
Philanthropists
Local leaders

Disaster control

Rehabilitation begins
Local groups

This system works well in the developed countries where

communication links are well maintained and specific instructions are
readily placed with all responsible persons or organizations involved in
47
disaster management. Only marginal problems of delay occur in this
system in developed countries because of the system is highly
coordinated from the central authority and whenever required ordered
(Figure 3.1). The most recent example for this type of operation was
visible in the management of Cyclone Katrina in USA. The progress of
events is given below to show the system of operation available under
FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Authority), the most extensive
hazard and disaster management system in the world.

Developing countries today have no specific system of disaster

management and utilize systems closer to traditional disaster
management. It is very difficult to categorise the systems available in
developing countries due to use of incorrect methodology and lack of
pre-preparedness. Further all disaster management activities in all the
developing countries are troubled by corruption as reported in the
documents of international funding authorities. This results in the failure
of disaster management and continuation of trauma in the majority of
the affected.

New disaster management

New disaster management is constructed on the basis of sustainability of

the systems where the massive organizational framework is supported
by many regional and local networks. This is because big government
has always being plagued by bureaucratic failures due to its many
sectors which have inherent system failures. This was evident in
response to all major disasters of local, regional and national disasters.
In addition the failure of global organizations was evident in Sahel
famine and drought of 1983, Bangladesh cyclone in 1976 and recently
in the south Asian Tsunami.

This type of weaknesses results from failures in the established systems

of scientific knowledge, operational procedures and human response.

Scientific knowledge system and Disaster:

Science is supreme in modern and post-modern thinking and therefore

any prediction without a proper scientific base is not adhered to by
institutions and community. This thinking has to be seriously questioned
in new disaster management thought. Following stories may clarify the
reality of thinking though these thought patterns may not be considered
truly scientific.

Story 1
48
“I said that sinking the foundation to the corners (neriya) would have
reduced the disaster” was the response of the 73 year old mother of the
disaster shown in plate 1.

Plate 1

The destruction exhibited in Plate 1is due to poor foundation constructed

on a deeply weathered regolith and detailed investigation conducted at
the site revealed that the design of the foundation was not sufficient to
bear the weight of the construction on a loose regolith. The design
adviser was a technical officer with design knowledge only and he was
not able to calculate the flow ratio of this type of regolith. In addition
none of the research orgnisations involved in landslide research in Sri
Lanka has provided people and local design approval agencies with flow
ratios for local regolith load bearing capacities. Then the conclusion is
that big government has failed in the training of technical officers and
providing vital information to people in the issuance of building permits.
However, like in all other developing countries, people of Sri Lanka
have no facility to challenge big government. Then the modern or post-
modern concept of science has failed in this case, by refuting the advice
of the mother and listening to the technical officer and plan approval
authority.

Story 2

49
Scientists at the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre were not ready to issue
a tsunami warning to Indian Ocean states on the 26 th December, 2006,
because they had no direct data from the Indian Ocean. However, they
were of the notion that the earthquake was very powerful and had the
power to construct a massive tsunami. This is the basic weakness in
modern science in relation to disaster prediction, which depends on age
old statistics. Our scientific knowledge is very new, but its acceptability
depends on very old system of statistics, which were constructed to suit
a slow moving world where plate and climatic stability was the norm.
We cannot blame anyone of any organization for this type of delay as all
our training is based on the acceptability of logical and scientific facts
only, but it should be remembered that not all activities during the new
era of change ushered in by climatic and geologic changes can be
studied within a framework of modern science. Questions have to be
raised on finding new ways and means of predicting natural and man
made disasters.

Story 3

“ they were standing downward of the mechanical digger which was

removing the freshly fallen slide debris and suddenly the whole block
shifted and in a moment I saw people getting buried alive” A bus driver
who watched the Paradeka slide from the drivers seat of his bus parked
away from the slide path. The motorists and pedestrians in Sri Lanka
has the habit of watching this type of activity dangerously close to the
site and three people died and four vehicles were seriously damaged at
Paradeka site.

Story 4

When we were on field class tour of Mathale, at Sudu Ganga Bridge a

motorcyclist was looking at the girls taking notes of the flow of the river
by the side of the road and did not see the motorcyclists in front and ran
into the back of the motor bicycle in front of him, causing damages to
the parking light. This is identified as one of the causes of traffic
accidents by the author after interviewing a sample of injured drivers
and accompanying people on the environment before the occurrence of
the accidents. This has some relationship to the clothing worn by the
girls or their attractiveness which distracts drivers. On the day of the
accident described in this story girls were wearing tea shirts and
trousers, which is highly attractive to most of the drivers in Sri Lanka as
our culture limits tightly worn clothes (it was only about an hour ago
author was reminded of this type activity as another cyclists slipped his
foot when making an attempt to look at students).

Then a truly scientific system of analyzing and prediction of disaster is

not very useful in the reduction of disasters in a highly complex natural
50
and human situations experienced today, specially in the developing
countries.

Where is the weakness: Failures in the established systems of

scientific knowledge?

Firstly, the weakness arises from lack of scientific governance which

leads to non-democratic system of social relations. This system of
governance results in blockage of transmission of scientific ideas of
disaster to people. For example present day settlement planning has to
be based on concepts of environmental change activated by geological
and climatic forces. In here the establishment of any new housing and
settlement system should consider latest geological data and climatic
data which show a period of high variability.

Form example the field class of the M.Sc. Environment Science,

Department of Zoology managed to identify the risk of excavations
made at Peradeniya town. A detailed field exercise conducted between
2005 April and 2006 December by the filed class of four groups of
students at Rajarata University of Sri Lanka, Mihinthale, Sri Lanka
confirmed that most of the flood and landslide damage occurred in this
period was due to poor design and failure in authorities responsible for
issuing building permits without referring to latest geologic and climatic
data available.

Secondly, nonchalant attitude of the authorities responsible to adapt or

develop technology required in the development of high risk areas has
become a major factor in the occurrence of disaster. This is a common
practice in all developing countries where local scientific systems are
not developed properly. Even if these systems are developed the
institutions are not capable of operationalising them due to
administrative and political interferences.

Thirdly, lack of scientific environmental planning is responsible for the

above presented two problems relating to disaster management because
lack of a holistic approach results in failure of disaster management,
which is a principal sub-system of environmental planning. It is very
clear from our experiences with the systems operated in the Ancient
civilization of Sri Lanka and the traditional beliefs in the present day
society, that the best methods of disaster management has to be
constructed with use of a mix from both the scientific and traditional
belief systems.
51
Then the fear to go beyond structured science (Stories 1, 2 and 3) and
not listening to other available systems makes disaster management a
difficult task for all types of communities, regions and countries.

Where is the weakness: Failures in Operational systems –voluntary and

involuntary?

It is very clear that industrial and domestic disasters occur primarily as a

result of operational systems failures. This is because primarily these
failures are associated with machinery and utility goods.

Operational system is a scientific method for the sustenance of

production of goods and services.

Firstly, user guides or instruction booklets given to users of products and

services based on the recommended operational system. These are
produced after a detailed study of the nature and behaviour of the
product or services. The studies on the use of these user guides have
shown that about 60 to 70 percent of the users will not utilize them
properly in the installation or use of the product or services.

Secondly, operationalising advice gathered from scientific or any other

reliable method has to be tested and utilized if the impact of disaster is
to be reduced to a minimum. However, in developing countries advice
gathered is not utilized properly or not directed properly towards
disaster management. For example in Sri Lanka a system of information
dissemination on disaster is yet to be installed and operated though
there are about 4 to 5 government departments engage in disaster
management research. The websites of this organization do not update
their information or issue warnings regularly and the users who are
expected to operationalise them are not in constant contact with each
other.

Following stories reveal the true nature of utilization of operational

system information (user guides and scientific data).

Story 5
“ the user guides produced by the manufacturer were too technical for
the local airline maintenance crew and the authorities responsible were
not able to correct the matter” A crash investigation into a plane crash

which killed 63 people in Hawaii.

Story 6
52
“ the area around here is unstable, even during the British period the
plantation managers have not permitted any construction on this land.
However about 20 years ago the land was distributed among landless.
See what happened now, the whole area has slumped” Comment on
Naketiya slump slide, Naketiya, Sri Lanka, by a local elder.

Story 7
“ these are definitely a sign of some instability in the region and I think
a major slide is imminent, but we have no capacity to find the place as
we have no equipment and Universities are not consulted on these
matters until after the disaster” Author’s comment to Field Class, 2001,
M.Sc. , Environmental Science, University of Colombo, Colombo,
referring to small and medium scale soil falls, rock falls and slumps seen
between Balangoda and Naketiya . (in 2002 October, a major landslide
occurred at Puwakgahawela Ela, Belihuloya , which killed 6 people and
destroyed property worth about 15 million rupees and loss of livelihoods
is estimated to be about 2 million annually for the next 50 years as about
12 farmers lost their paddy fields).

Story 8
“ the emergency control switch was not serviced as advised in the
manuals and once the overheating of the reactor began the emergency
shut-down systems were not functioning, which led to the massive
disaster”. Technician who managed to save his life from the Chernobyl
atomic reactor melt down in 1986 (Discovery 2001).

Story 9
“ falling trees is the major cause of power loss in our area, but we are
helpless as we have no authority to remove them”, Manager of a village
area CEGB referring to frequent power failures.

Then the poor operational system utilization (Stories 5 to 9) and not

listening to new information within the operational systems makes
disaster management a difficult task for all types of communities,
regions and countries.

Human response:

Failures in believing and listening to scientific and belief system

information and following advice given by respective authorities on
disaster is one of the weakest points in disaster management. This
basically arises due to two major reasons.

1. Feeling safe
2. Sarcasm towards scientific predictions

53
1. Feeling safe

In relation to disaster most people generally feel safe until they are faced
with disaster.

Firstly, it is the human nature to believe that there is no danger as long

as society does not encounter danger. This is based on the belief that
society is expected to feel or know of danger. Further most people
believe that it is your fate, which will expose you to disaster. In addition
most of the people in the developing countries believe that it is wish of
God to encounter disaster, though all the established religions like
Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity and Islam reject this type of fatalism.
Concept of fate and power is definitely older than all the established
religions, but its control on human thinking in the developing world is
extremely powerful. This may be primarily due to helplessness formed
due to bad governance and corruption in them.

Story 10
“ Sea was our friend, we loved it and we never thought that sea would
take my wife and daughter away from me” person who lost his wife and
a daughter to 20041226 Asian Mega Tsunami. Weligama, Sri Lanka.

Story 11
“ Are they mad,Tsunami safety area here? If the water level reaches 20
feet, which it will be in the expected Tsunami, this place will be under
water and it is an enclosed area, people have no place to run”, Tsunami
expert’s comment on safe areas provided for Tsunami in the Pacific
coast of Washington State.

Story 12
“We never thought that this deep soil can move. However, the rain was
the heaviest in about 50 years”. Person who encountered a loss of about
1.5 million Rupees in a slump which destroyed his three story house.

Story 13
‘there was a huge low tide, people have gone to sea enjoying the dry
land. Then all hell broke loose” Tsunami survivour. Phuket, Thailand

Story 14
‘Why concrete could not retain the slope? Question from a trader at the
site of the slump at Peradeniya town. Peradeniya, Sri Lanka.

54
Story 15
“ We take that bus daily to work, but that day we missed it by about a
minute. We think that it is Lord Buddha who saved us” two people who
travel daily by bus to work referring to Yangalmodera collision which
killed 42 people. Yangalmodera, Alawwa, Sri Lanka.

Secondly, in the developed world a well established system of disaster

management and insurance is available to society and they have a better
knowledge on disaster situations than the people of the developing
world. In the developing world people have to forget about disasters to
work and live as their political system has failed to provide an
acceptable level of protection from disaster.

2. Nonchalance and Sarcasm towards scientific predictions

Science of disaster is a very weak area of understanding and many

mistakes are encountered in prediction and control. This is because
disaster is an event which is formed from many complex factors and
present scientific knowledge is yet to become capable of fully
understanding disasters. This may also be a result of the weakness of
modern science as discussed earlier. The serious weaknesses in disaster
prediction and control in developing countries including Sri Lanka is a
result of not utilizing available knowledge base due to lack of national
planning, which prevents the development of scientific knowledge base
required by disaster management.

Story 16
“ In 1998, when I indicated that there is high risk for tourist areas of
Phuket from Tsunamis, I was fired from my job and they have now put
me in charge of Tsunami warning system”. Present Head of Tsunami
Warning System of Thailand, who was fired for frightening people in
1998.

Story 17
“Though we cannot stop them we have the scientific knowledge to
control them and bring the impact to a level, which will not affect the
economy of a region or a country. As one of the authors has already
proposed since 1990s, a household based environmental conservation
programme must be initiated immediately to avoid more disasters of
this nature. The same authors indicate in a letter to the national daily in
2003 that the catchments of Maha Oya and Deduru Oya are also

55
seriously eroded in the upper reaches and over loaded with sediments in
the lower reaches.

A climatic occurrence similar to that which happened in the Denawaka

Valley moving across this catchment may cause a similar disaster. The
long-term data indicate the south-west monsoon is slowly shifting its
path in a North-North-West direction and this may bring a cloud mass
and block it between the Matale-Ambokka ranges and the lower ranges
of North-western plains resulting in a massive rain storm. This will
create a condition conducive to a major flood.” (Seneviratne and
Karunaratne, 2003). The predicted floods came in 2006, but authors
were not able continue research due to lack of recognition given to the
article.

Story 18
“A lot of people died in Sumatra, Thailand, India and Sri Lanka,
because they did not know warning signs, although we cannot bring
them back, if we help the public understand natural rhythms, we will
help them survive and help them live in harmony with the planet. We
got to live in harmony with the planet and Tsunami is a classic example
of a clash between a planet and humanity, and humanity lost. We think
we run our lives and we control our destinies. Planet controls our
destinies.” (Austin, 2005).

Options of disaster management in developing countries

Developed countries have shown that they require only to continue with
their present line of research and approach for disaster control systems
in operation in their countries. These countries have made adjustments
to suit the increased frequency of disasters due to geological and
climatic change, which has overtaken all human activities. They
continue their research into probable scenarios expected with a notion
that development of knowledge is the only way to manage disasters in
future. Further they have put a high value in people centered systems in
their approach to disaster management to establish connectivity to
information dissemination and to increase literacy on disaster
management.

Two worst disasters in the recorded history of mankind occurred

between December 2004 and December 2006: Asian Mega Tsunami and
Hurricane Katrina. Total lives lost were estimated 250,000 in the Asian
Mega Tsunami and 2000 in Hurricane Katrina respectively. Estimated
damage to property in Asian Mega Tsunami was about 150 billion US
dollars and in Hurricane Katrina the damage was estimated to be about

56
25 billion US Dollars. However it showed that the intensity of damage is
related to lack of environmental control in the Asian Mega Tsunami
(refer to stories 16 and 18), and slow response of authorities and people
towards warning in case of Hurricane Katrina (story 19).

Story 19
National Weather centre records indicate that the prediction was correct
and their warning on Hurricane Katrina was about 80 percent accurate.
The prediction was that it will make landfall in the delta area of the
Mississippi with category four (4) strength. The area affected was too
large to be controlled with the available state and even resources
immediately available to FEMA were not sufficient to cope in a
situation where massive flooding occurred. Area affected was the size of
United Kingdom (about 9 times the size of Sri Lanka).

The levees were not ready according to experts and were neglected due
to higher spending on national security after the September 11 th attacks
on World Trade centre in 2001.

Poor people of the area were not properly supported in transport and
many of them did not take the warning seriously and as one elderly
women who refused to evacuate commented “I have got my provisions
and pray for us”.

Email records of the operation of Huricane Katrina reveals that political

decisions of the State authorities and relegating FEMA to a non-cabinet
level organization by the White House were responsible for the slow
response to disaster.
Then there was crisis in information sharing and operation command
until Colonel Honore from the military was appointed for the conduct of
the relief operation.
Therefore following stages have failed in the disaster management
system during Hurricane Katrina in the economically most powerful
nation in the world.

1. Hurricane was predicted accurately as possible – science prevailed

2. Hurricane landed in the worst place possible and
a) levees were not ready – pre-planning failure
b) people were too confident – low environment literacy due
to poor evaluation guided by local belief system?
c) FEMA was ready but the hurricane was unexpectedly
severs – effect of climatic change – power of the
unexpected event

57
 d) Search and rescue operation was beyond the state level but
the decision to allow a higher authority to intervene was
delayed –human error? Inexperience?

Story 20

Heavy rains have resulted in landslides and floods in most parts of the
wet zone, eastern and south eastern dry zone and in the hill country of
Sri Lanka resulting in damage estimated to be around 60 billion rupees.
In addition repairs to roads and other structures may take another 5 to 6
billion rupees. The loss and damage to crops are also in the region of
billions of rupees.

Heavy floods occurred in Maha Oya and Deduru Oya catchments and
heavy sliding occurred with high level of damage due to unscientific
clearing of slopes as predicted in the article published in 2003.

Following information were provided to the nation by the author and

his co-researcher, which is part of a massive information system
presented by many scientists, in learned journals, general journals, news
papers, laymen and affected, radio and TV networks in the last five to
ten years.

CSP 1
The New Village (Seneviratne, 1975)
Extract from - January 10th, 1975 – Daily News, p 6

The development and environment has begun to initiate many interests

in the field of economic development as the 1973 – 74-world drought
has made aware of the accelerating environmental degradation. The
developing nations are faced with the massive task of feeding the
rapidly rising population and increasing rich-poor gap. Lack of proper
planning has led to destruction of available land and other resources in
the developing world and it is clear that the future looks bleak.

The aim of this article is to inform planners and political leaders of our
nation that only a village based development programme is able to
revive our nations economic growth and stabilise the future status of our
nation as a developed country. The models taken to describe the process
of development needed are taken for some countries, which have used
their environment to be developed and stay developed.

58
In this programme the village as we know may not be always suitable as
the new village proposed here is to be a unit where sufficient amount of
local resources are available for a local economy to be established. In
here the existing small village units may be amalgamated and some
large village units have to be redesigned to suit the future. New village
in the latter half of the 20th century is to be a modern village with village
resources and crafts are developed aiming at local as well as
international market.

The village resources are of two major varieties. Firstly there are
physical resources of the village, such as its geomorphologic, vegetation
and hydrologic resources. Every village has its speciality in the available
physical resources. The finding of these resources have to conducted
using modern morphological surveys and specially a technique known
as geomorphologic mapping. Geomorphologic mapping is not only
suitable for finding the physical resources, but it can be used for the
understanding of the natural forces working within the villages unit. For
example the flood occurrence, slide probability and many other unstable
forms operating within the village such as gulling can be identified from
this type of survey.

In countries of the developed world they have already finished the

identification of the village based resources and risks in the environment
through this method. The growing science of Satellite mapping is now
aiding this work with rapid provision of new maps with risk
environments. As we already have the aerial photography of high quality
we can begin this work immediately and use of university resources at
Peradeniya and Colombo is advised to begin this work. This survey will
indicate the types of local mineral and vegetal resources and their
capacities. For example after this survey it is possible to know

where clay and sand required for pottery and construction respectively
is. Pottery is going to be a highly marketable product in future in the
local and international markets and the demand for sand is going to
increase by about 10 fold in the next 20 to 30 years.

The village based cultivation systems are also under pressure from
rapidly rising population and villages are expanding into higher slopes
or wet lands. This results in the erosion of hillsides and burial of the
wetland both which will lower the water availability of the surrounding
area and limit the quantity of good quality drinking water.

59
The village in the ancient civilisation was a well-planned unit of
operation, which had only a very limited effect on water and vegetal
resources. This arose from the location and organisation of the village.
Location of the village was ideal for living and was in a safe are out of
the way of the spillway of the tank and the tank bund. It was located
away form the main forested area and the pressure from the settlement
was limited on the forest. The modern village is expanding along the
roads in a linear form and this puts a high pressure on the roadside lands
either wet or dry. In addition private ownership of land has forced
construction in any place you like not listening to risk factor. Today
about 12 percent of the total population and about 70 percent of the poor
live in lands with high risk from flood, landslide and disease.

A new village therefore is required to be established with a great

concern to our environmental factors. We should aim at nuclear type of
villages in the future with all the infrastructure facilities supplied in a
well-planned manner.

The current emphasis on village based economy by the government is a

timely activity, but the stability of a village is not only achieved by
cultivation and related economic activity, the water and soil resources of
the village also have to be taken care under a long term plan if the
prosperity of the village is to be maintained. Further, the village depend
heavily on its craftsmanship, where many types of craftsmen practise
their craft with dignity and faith. Crafts are a product of high demand in
the international market and with the expected development in air
freight there is a lucrative market for crafts in the latter part of the 20 th
century.
Therefore it is timely to look towards a new village based on its
location, size, capabilities and development in the next 20 to 30 years. In
the process of development the highly trained university staff and the
students with the newest knowledge should be utilised well.

Climatic change and its effect on Sri Lanka (Seneviratne and

Karunaratne, 2003)

Present global climate is defined here as the climate of the decade 1980-
2000. This period witnessed the highest level of development in
climatology, since its origin in the early part of 19th century. The
60
development of digital recorders and use of weather satellites to view
the earth globally has enabled climatologists to understand the global
picture better than ever before. In summary global climate and
environment was in a time of change in the decade of 1990 to 2000 and
the changes in climatic phenomena identified in the early 1980s were
confirmed by research conducted in this period. The following global
components of climate were identified in detail during this period.

1. Greenhouse effect
2. Ozone depletion

3. El Nino and La Nina

4. Change in ocean circulation

Greenhouse effect is the primary mover of the change in earth’s climate.

Ozone depletion and El Nino and La Nina are primarily a result of
global warming which leads to the formation of greenhouse effect.
Change in ocean circulation is partially geological but at present it is
accelerated by greenhouse effect.

Sri Lanka

Climatology is a poorly developed science in Sri Lanka as there is no

national policy on the study of climatic change, drought, flood and
storm rainfall damage control. It is believed by many that the lukewarm
attitude of policy makers towards climatic change arises from lack of
understanding of the dynamics of nature and the value of integrated
studies on environment. This has resulted in the annual loss of lives and
property, which affect the gradual development of local and regional
communities and sometimes the national plans for economic
development through massive damage to environment as in case of 2003
floods.

Firstly, research conducted on climate and its regional variation,

seasonality and agro-climatic significance is rare due to non-availability
of equipment and trained personnel. The present group of scientists
concentrates their efforts either on impact studies and human interface
rather than the basic nature of change and predictability. This is a result
of lack of experienced climatologists in the field and the domination of
meteorology and climatology by pure science oriented personnel, who
have a limited knowledge in spatio-temporality of climate change.

Universities in Sri Lanka are not conducting technical research due to

absence of field climatologists, though there are many that study impact

61
and weather phenomena. Secondly, increase of damage due to climate
events occurs due to very low literacy on spatio-temporality of climate
in the general population and policy makers.

This low literacy emanates from the lack of a proper place for climatic
events of local environment in GCE (OL) and GCE (AL) levels of
education. Thirdly the database is poor due to lack of data from many
sensitive locations in the scenario of climatic change in Sri Lanka,
specially intermediate and dry zones.

Agriculture, power supply and communications suffer regularly due to

lack of knowledge on local events and low literacy on climate. The
occurrence of annual and seasonal droughts cannot be predicted due to
lack of studies on climatic change in Sri Lanka and its immediate
surroundings.

The seasonal droughts account for about 60 to 70 per cent of the crop
failures and about two to three suicides among farmers annually. The
suicides occur among the farmers who have become heavily indebted
and unable to settle their loans due to repeated loss of crops due to
seasonal drought.

The impact of this type of crop failure are mostly not recorded in regular
surveys in detail and downplayed by the media, which affect about a
200,000 farmer families every year. The primary reason for this type of
failure is poor prediction of water availability, which depends on
seasonal rainfall.

Police and judicial records indicate struggles for water due to seasonal
drought result in civil and criminal disturbances in most of the
resettlement projects in Sri Lanka, which sometimes involve the local
political authority. Recently, there was a case of a politico and a group
of his supporters breaking locks on weirs in Kala Oya irrigation system.

These are the beginnings of new group of conflicts related to water in

Sri Lanka. One of the reasons for the present crisis in hydropower
generation in Sri Lanka is non-adherence to the long-term predictions on
climatic change and seasonal variation of rainfall as proposed by the
global climatic database from 1970 to 1990. Today all the hydro power
plants in Sri Lanka work under-capacity for more than nine months of
the year and the industry is yet to find a solution to power crisis.

Power lines and telephone lines suffer heavily from their inability to
withstand pressure exerted by moderate thunderstorm winds as these are
designed without much consideration to average wind speeds. It is

62
common to hear from the authorities that the reason for the power
failure or telephone failure is either the equipment is under floods or the
line is damaged by falling poles or trees. Therefore the present
relationship between climate and man in Sri Lanka is a story of
helplessness and misery.

Lessons to learn

A recent visit to Switzerland, Germany, Sweden, Finland and Norway

enabled one of the authors observe the attempts made by these countries
to find solutions to increased intensity of snow fall and rain storms one
author had the opportunity of joining two field visits in Norway to
observe the solutions used by climatologists and hydrologists in the
increase of infiltration and percolation in some problem catchments. In
Norway there is a long-term decline in the mean annual snowfall, which
provides most of the water needs for the generation hydro-electricity.

The critical areas of study are based on a well organized and managed
rural conservation built upon small administrative areas known as
communes (equal to District Councils in Sri Lanka). The individual unit
of operation was lowered to the level of household, which was
systematically controlled and helped to maintain the best possible level
of run off control.

The control of the smallest to large streams by forestation or

maintaining a thick grass and herb cover on the steep slopes are
supported by very strict laws. The law-breakers are subjected to heavy
fines and sometimes prison sentences. This was made possible by the
division of ownership of forests and grassland on a jointly owned basis
by the State and an individual.

Almost all the farmland in Norway is privately owned, but the forests or
grassland are of the perimeter farmland can be used by the seasonal
traveler to these areas, provided that they obey the laws, with regard to
berry picking, tourism and hiking. One author went on a berry picking
tour with his friend and observed how the people come and pick berries,
without damaging the environment.

The forests are well maintained and used on the principle of forest
harvesting, which provides a continuous growth and an economic value.
The urban areas were well managed with a network of storm drains,
which enabled the storm rainfall to be gradually sent back to the rivers,
streams or fjords.

63
This has resulted in the prevention of the destruction of springs and
small streams in the rural areas and the damage to power distribution
and telephone lines. On the basis of this knowledge, it is timely to say
that Sri Lanka belongs to a group of countries where very little attention
is paid to increase infiltration and regularized disposal of storm water in
an era of increased intensity of storms and changing climate.

The above mentioned developed countries have carried out the

conservation measures in parallel to the maximum utilization of land. In
these countries all the land is well utilized within a framework of
legislation and scientific use of land. Though there are problems of land
use in these areas, they are reduced to minimum through the use of
scientific knowledge. Water resources exist on the principles of
hydrology and dynamics.

Therefore to obtain the maximum utilization capacity the humans should

be knowledgeable and efficient.

Who suffers?

The IPCC has indicated an average of 1.7 degree Centigrade increase in

temperature by 2070 for the area in and around Sri Lanka. Concurrently,
it predicts a maximum of five percent reduction of the wet season
rainfall, while there will be no change in the dry season rainfall. The
rising sea level will make the lowest 3 to 5 kilometers of the lower
reaches of all the rivers saline.

It is clear that the poor is the most vulnerable group to climatic change
as their capacity to cope with sudden events resulting from climatic
change is less than the other groups with better financial capacity.

It is clear that about 92 percent of the householders who suffer a

property damage of 70 per cent and above in the last major floods and
slides in Sri Lanka are in the low income group. This is because higher
income groups are able to live in safe locations, which are more
expensive and situated on stable geological foundations.

This is a reality in all the developing countries where the poor is left
with the poorest quality and highest disaster prone land as feudal and
elitist landlords still hold power of land ownership and control. Data on
fatalities from annual floods and landslides in Sri Lanka reveals that 94
per cent of the fatalities occur in the poorest group of people and they
live under continuous threat of natural disasters.

64
In a survey of 12 districts in Sri Lanka conducted between 1996 and
2002, 84 per cent of the low income groups identified climate related
events as damaging to their livelihood and 32 per cent were seriously
affected with damages leading to heavy loss of income.

In addition to physical damage there is a rising health risk associated

with climatic change. Climatic change and health is a well researched
topic of study in the developed world as they have accepted the concept
of change and probable increase in new and existing health risks.

There are three major health risks associated with climatic change in Sri
Lanka. Firstly, the increasing dryness in all parts of the country will
increase the risk of mosquito borne diseases and water related diseases.
Secondly, increased intensity of rainfall associated with climatic change
affect the health of people in poor housing (all houses without a proper
ceiling - about 90 per cent of all housing in Sri Lanka are in this
category) through fine droplet spray, which the researchers believe to be
one of the major causes of the increase in respiratory diseases.

Thirdly, the increase of high flood levels, severe droughts, landslides

and heavy winds will increase the instantaneous health risk all over the
country. At the moment there is no data bank on this aspect, though
related data is available in many public sector documents.

In addition to physical damage there is a rising health risk associated

with climatic change. Climatic change and health is a well researched
topic of study in the developed world as they have accepted the concept
of change and probable increase in new and existing health risks. There
are three major health risks associated with climatic change in Sri
Lanka.

Firstly, the increasing dryness in all parts of the country will increase the
risk of mosquito borne disease and water related diseases.

Secondly, increased intensity of rainfall associated with climatic change

affect the health of people in poor housing (all houses without a proper
ceiling - about 90 per cent of all housing in Sri Lanka are in this
category) through fine droplet spray, which the researchers believe to be
one of the major causes of the increase in respiratory diseases.

Thirdly, the increase of high flood levels, severe droughts, landslides

and heavy winds will increase the instantaneous health risks all over the
country.

65
At the moment there is no data bank on this aspect, though related data
is available in many public sector documents.

CSP 2
Floods and landslides : the emerging scenario (Seneviratne and
Karunaratne, 2003)

A detailed review of the relevance of climatic change shows that the wet
areas of Sri Lanka will face an increasing threat of floods and slides in
the period ahead of 1990 to the future. More than 500 academic and
technical publications bear witness to this scenario. The best available
most recent academic and technical data are provided by the
WMO/UNEP Report (1998) on the regional impacts of climatic change,
which clearly indicates an increase of total and intensity of rainfall in the
South Asian region.

In 1975, 1998 and 2002 one of the authors had warned that the
frequency of flooding would increase in Sri Lanka, associated with
climatic change and development. In 1998 in an article which appeared
in Dinamina about an earthquake near Kandy, one of the authors called
for the establishment of scientific organisations to study and predict
natural hazards and disasters, as most of the developing countries have
done in the past two decades.

Most of the damage which occurred in the present flood situation could
have been avoided, if the people who are responsible for safety of
human resources of Sri Lanka watched radar weather maps and listened
to predictions regularly for about four days before the arrival of the
depression.

Information of the WMO reveals that the depression clouds can get
stagnated when they are caught between two mountain ranges and that is
what exactly happened in this situation. Some strands of the depression
clouds were caught in between.

Samanala and Gongala-Hiniduma ranges in Denawaka valley: They kept

on creating cloud streets and line squalls, which brought heavy
continuous rainfall. One of the authors has published an article in 2000
(Daily News) on new detailed evidences of rain formation and line
squalls in Sri Lanka.

In addition there are more than 300 research papers published between
1900 and 2002 on changing climate and dangers of poor environmental

66
planning in Sri Lanka, which were also disregarded by the policy
makers.

The destruction caused to lives and property due to the inability of the
policy makers to grasp the value of scientific data and technical data is
indicated well from the present disaster. The use of floodable land and
geologically unstable slopes for housing, neglect of heavy sedimentation
of streams and rivers and forgetting that nature has its rhythm were the
three major errors committed by the policy makers.

Grassroots also have to be blamed for their ignorance of nature and poor
environment literacy. However, none of the developed countries in the
world has not achieved the present status of balance of environment
without strict environmental regulation and law. One of the authors of
this paper lived at Ratnapura in the 1960s and 1970s and is a regular
visitor in the study of sedimentation and flood hazard and has predicted
many times in his writings on the possible dangers. The lowlands in and
around Ratnapura are built by Kalu Ganga to store its floodwater in the
time of its major flood (This applies to Gin Ganga and Nilwala Ganga
also).

The mean annual rainfall of Ratnapura district is 3,000 millimeters. Kalu

Ganga is a river in which the flood can be predicted easily, if there is a
watch of rain in the Samanala range and Western slopes of Gongala
ranges (Kalawana and Kukulegama areas). These three rivers have the
steepest gradients for any river in Sri Lanka in their upper reaches,
which leads to rapid flow of rainwater from the highland to the lowland.
There are only limited virgin forests in the catchment areas of Gin
Ganga, Nilwala Ganga and Kalu Ganga.

These facts were forgotten in the modern development process, which

became very rapid in the 1980s and 1990s. Information on floodable
land was forgotten or disregarded by the policy makers and users, as Sri
Lanka experienced a dry phase in its climate in the 1980s and 1990s.

One of the authors was alarmed on a visit to his old village area at
Ratnapura in 1998 after a lapse of about 10 years, when he witnessed
that the floodable area was thickly covered with housing of all types.

This was a disaster in the making as Kalu Ganga will always come back
to its pre-prepared flood plain during its high flows. The frequency of
this return of Kalu Ganga is fairly regular and repeats around 25, 50 and
100-year floods.

67
Almost all the landslides originate from heavy saturation of slope
material. However, human activities like over loading of a slope with a
thin weathered regolith or unconsolidated soil cover can also initiate
landslides under heavy rainfall conditions. Both these have contributed
to landslides in this disaster. Quarrying may have contributed, but if
only the regolith was too thin in which case the planning and
environmental authorities should have recommended that the area is
unsuitable for building or any other human activity.

There is news about slow pace of draining of floodwater and this is due
to sedimentation of micro waterways and sub streams, which prevent
outward flow in the flood plain. Ratnapura has no drainage system,
which can cope with its own daily drainage, not to talk of flood
drainage. This applies to all our towns and cities, where smell reign.

The poor drainage or sedimented waterways is again a result of poor

policy application and maintenance of environmental law.

One of the authors read a paper on dangers of sedimentation of

waterways recently at a seminar funded by a donor organization and its
local area organizers, early this year, pointing out the real dangers of
sedimentation of waterways with local monitored examples.

One of the more informed Ministers in the present government was

interested in a proposal submitted by the same author about a year ago,
but it is yet to materialise into action. As we know, the Pavithra Ganga
programme has faced many obstacles due to disregard of scientific
information.

Only a long-term (minimum of 50 years) programme will minimize the

effect of major flooding and landslides. As the wet areas of Sri Lanka
are going to be wetter and dry areas are going to be drier and annual
average damage from these disasters may be about a billion rupees.

This may rise if we are going to experience a major flood every 25

years. A fair estimate of 50 billion rupees damage has occurred in the
present flood. Another 5 to 10 billion loss of income is yet to come from
loss of farm crops and tree crops. The number of affected families by
this flood is 162,800 (Ministry of Social Welfare, 2003). It is time now
that the policy makers listen to scientific advice on settlement planning,
location and housing. An attempt to conduct this type of programme was
disregarded by the Government and foreign loan and aid agencies many
a time.

68
One of the authors who has wide experience in natural disaster studies
has warned of this type of occurrence first in 1977 in a study of upper
Mahaweli, funded by UNDP and Ministry of Plan Implementation and
as recent as 2002 March has submitted a long-term work programme to
the Government of Sri Lanka, SIDA and Sarvodaya and waiting for a
response.

As Hancock, Nyerere and Bala Usman have indicated in their writings,

the polity of natural hazard is that the relief is cheaper and profitable for
international agencies than the establishment of a long-term programme.
The relief creates an avenue for the policy makers and administrators to
get rich continuously as Bala Usman has observed in relation to
corruption discovered in the relief programmes of 1983 drought in
Africa, which involved some United Nations staff and Multinational
companies.

However, developed countries from where these organizations originate

have used draconian measures to organize the natural and settled
environment through application of laws and regulations and invested
heavily on canalization of rivers, control of household area erosion and
sedimentation and use of concrete, bitumen and other chemical layers
etc to control flooding and landslides.

Visits to their countries reveal that dams and weirs of various sizes and
designs and even laying of stones on river beds and banks have been
employed without much concern of the natural value of the area, but
making the riverside safe. They hide their large dams in the
mountainous areas fairly inaccessible to the visitor or cover it with a
scenic arrangement through reforestation. Research into culture and
financial management is important only if the living environment is free
of its most damaging natural disasters.

Though we cannot stop them we have the scientific knowledge to

control them and bring the impact to a level, which will not affect the
economy of a region or a country. As one of the authors has already
proposed since 1990s, a household based environmental conservation
programme must be initiated immediately to avoid more disasters of
this nature. The same author wishes to inform the policy makers and

public that the catchments of Maha Oya and Deduru Oya are also
seriously eroded in the upper reaches and sedimented in the lower
reaches.

69
A climatic occurrence similar to that which happened in the Denawaka
Valley moving across this catchment may cause a similar disaster. The
long-term data indicate the south-west monsoon is slowly shifting its
path in a North-North-West direction and this may bring a cloud mass
and block it between the Matale-Ambokka ranges and the lower ranges
of North-western plains resulting in a massive rain storm. This will
create a condition conducive to a major flood.

Recent research indicates that rainfall intensities in the intermediate

zone are increasing rapidly and North-easterlies are associated with
heavy rain in this region.

A recent 'Discovery' programme on the future has indicated a major

destruction of human civilization may arise from environmental
disasters than from a nuclear war. Floods, tornadoes, cyclones and
droughts in the range of 2 to 3 trillion US dollars have proved this
correct by the total damage to Europe and USA in the last decade. Are
we really heading for an environmental disaster of a mega proportion
was the final question of that programme.

We in Sri Lanka have to suffer heavy economic damage amounting to

about 30 billion rupees to bring back the areas to operational level and
according to popular news, it may take about one third of our budgetary
allocations this year to fully rehabilitate the damage over a period of five
years.

Will we be able to sustain this programme in case of continuing natural

disasters? The answer is no. We have to follow the scientific evidences
and be ready for the future.

All the developed countries have mega plans to face the impending
natural disasters. They have food, medical supplies and service stocks in
hand with disaster prediction, control and management organizations.

Please begin a long-term restructuring of environment in the hazardous

zones.

A proposal for a environment management plan for present linear

settlement system (H.M.M.B. and Siddhisena, K.A.P., Control of
Sedimentation of waterways through a household based programme,
Relating environment to Regional Development, Programme and
Abstracts, USJ-Sida/SAREC Research Cooperation Project and Ministry
of Environment and Natural Resources Joint International Conference ,
15 to 16th September, 2002, Trans Asia, Colombo)

70
The primary objective of this paper is to present the available
information on the value of household empowerment in the regional
development, with special reference to the problem of sedimentation and
its effect on regional and national development of Sri Lanka. The
secondary objective is to present the experiences gained in this area of
research and forms a strategy in the control of sedimentation, at the
household level. The alternative development as presented succinctly by
Friedmann (1992), indicates the importance of household in the modern
development process.

The household and the farmland are identified as the major sediment
supplier to the sedimentation system. Home gardens of Sri Lanka are
poorly organized to prevent the flow of sediments to the local network
of drains. In turn the authorities poorly maintain the local network of
drains responsible for the prevention of soil erosion.

The rapid increase in the population of the farming areas of Sri Lanka
has increased the housing density of these two villages by an average of
30 to 40 percent in the last decade, but the removal of excess water
produced by pavementation has not been considered important.
The paper will attempt to forward a long term program, which is aimed
at reducing the maintenance cost of regional authorities on roads, minor
irrigation works and increase the environment value through improved
water situation which is hoped to be achieved through household based
sedimentation control program.

The increased severity of climatic events has become a norm at present

and a new vision into disaster control has to be established. Can Figure
2.4 provide a better answer?

The people oriented disaster management system or PODS is expected

to

1. Gather information at local level and disseminate them through

a community based graduate personnel trained in
environmental management. Why environmental management?
One of the major failures in disaster control originates from
lack of understanding of the holistic view on disaster in the
existing system of disaster management in the developing
countries. Holistic view is the only way to understand better the
present conflict between man and environment, where natural
and societal hazards occur in a heavily built-up environment.
Environment is no more a physical unit as it is over-utilised to
provide food, shelter and clothing to rapidly increasing
71
 population. Therefore the societal organization of the
environment has become a major controlling variable in
disaster management. This holistic view is present only in
modern environmental management where societal factor is
taken into consideration as a resource both with strengths and
threats. In developing country scenario there are more societal
threats than strengths in the system of disaster management due
to problems related to socio-political corruption.
Community based graduate personnel should be allowed to
operate as a strength to the operational system if PODS is to be
a success. (Figure 3.4 next page)

For example these personnel will be attached to the District

Secretary’s office within the present administrative system of
Sri Lanka. Information gathering on individual settlement units
within the population unit selected can be conducted with the
aid of village officer (Gram Niladhari). However, the present
administrative and political authority may have some undue
restriction on the establishment system, which has to be
removed through new legislation. The collection of disaster risk
information has to be valued very high as economic losses
incurred by various types of disasters in Sri Lanka are on the
increase. As this book is written with the concept of disaster
extended to include an event resulting also from negligence due
to failure to establish democratic institutions, socio-political
corruption and non-adherence to scientific ways of
development, any undue pressures of from the existing system
of governance can become a problem to this new disaster
management system. Therefore, initial step in the
establishment of this system should call for better legal powers
to disaster management. Therefore all the steps forwarded in
this book on the PODS system are based on the concept that it
will be properly supported.

Figure 3.2 in next page indicate the composition of new disaster management

People oriented disaster management system (PODS)

72
 President

Emergency director

( Armed Forces) Government Agencies

Other security systems Local director

Academic system Local field Non-governmental system

Universities

Most important links in a disaster situation

The unit of operation under the community based local field ( a graduate in
environmental management) will report to a local director, will cover a
population unit of 10000 people or as restricted by any environmental factor and
specialty required. Under normal situations this unit will collect scientific and
other types of information from government and academic agencies on the
probable occurrence of disasters in the unit and the surrounding units which can
affect the unit. The unit can also collect information from NGO’s and any other
organizations involved in disaster management.

In case of a disaster the responsibility of this unit may be transferred to the

National Disaster management Military Command which will be decided by the
advice to the President.

Government Agency

This unit provides all material and financial resources required for the operation
of the unit. The financial support will also come from a unit insurance system
operated by the local directorate, which is funded by a monthly, seasonal or
annual levy from the people living in the unit, who will use the insurance system
in the process of rehabilitation after disaster. However, disaster may be a very
rare event in some units which can utilize their insurance funds for disaster
prevention and environmental planning.

73
Academic Agency
Academic agency is to provide a risk analysis of the unit on a regular basis with
reference to its natural and societal environment. This is primarily a task of the
university system which environmental science and management students will be
the field information collectors.

Chapter 4

Disaster management in Sri Lanka

Disaster management in Sri Lanka will be discussed in this
chapter within the context of understanding of environmental
change in developing countries, where there is a difficulty in the
application of holistic concept of disaster management. However,
the present situation of Sri Lanka will be evaluated within the
strict regime of scientific approach available to the researcher.

The present system of disaster management in Sri Lanka is

primarily a disaster response system, where the management
system begins to operate at the onset of disaster. However, there
are a few organizations which collect data and issue warnings on
impending disasters, but lack of application of scientific method
on disaster management and coordination between these
organizations prevents reducing the impact of disaster.

74
Research on scientific method

Developing countries of the world suffer continuously from non-

utilization of scientific method in development, which makes
them highly incapable of handling disasters. Development
scientists have presented many reasons for this weakness and lack
of democratic institutions has been noted as the main contributory
factor. Though there are democratically elected governments in
most of the developing nations these institutions are noted for
many corrupt practices which affect scientific management of
resources.
The scientific method of disaster management has to be operated
on many steps as presented below.

Management

Management provides the best possible way of reducing the loss

of life and property from a disaster. However, most of the
management practises recommended by the disaster manager will
not be applicable if the required infrastructure is not provided,
education programmes are not conducted and societal
participation is not activated.

Until such time PODS is operational communities can

collectively work for a warning system in their localities. The best
available organization is the village based Funeral Help Societies,
which are a highly successful system in collection and utilization
of local resources. Most of these societies are operated by people
with dedication to work and honesty, which helps the needy at a
serious time of crisis. However the identification, prevention and
control have to be conducted with the help of experts from nearby
universities and technical colleges. This connection between
experts and locality is now linked to a government institutional
system, which has only a very limited presence in the local area
due to their poor operation management system. For example
climatic disasters cannot be predicted properly as there is no
proper coverage of weather stations at district level and lack of
funding for collection of data. Further, the lukewarm attitude of
the governing authorities towards disaster control has also
reduced support for these services.

75
The basic steps in disaster management are given in Table 4/1 and 4/2 in summary form.

Table 4.1 Basic steps in disaster management -* risk level –

Management step Concurrent activity

Identify the hazard/s Use of scientific method to identify the disaster/ study the nature, recurrence/ risk level */
Research and Long term scientific data collection and monitoring/ listening to local sources/ listening to
monitoring traditional belief systems should not be forgotten/
Taking control and if Control –
possible preventive There are some control measures, which can be taken to minimise the risk of any type of
measures (remember no disaster. Most of the damages resulting from landslides, flood and accelerated erosion can
disaster can be fully be controlled through proper settlement and infrastructure planning. This will reduce the
controlled, but proper risk to less than 10 percent (Eg. All the developed countries have done this through
management techniques education supported by strict adherence to environmental law)
can be used to minimise Accelerated erosion, deforestation, desertification, flood and landslides can be controlled
loss of life and property) with – proper land management and settlement planning
Corruption, gluttony and sadism can be controlled by honest administration
Conflict, riot and war can be controlled by developing proper socio-political
understanding
Prevention – Most of the damages resulting from landslides, flood and accelerated erosion
can be prevented through proper settlement and infrastructure planning. This will reduce
the risk to less than 10 percent (Eg. All the developed countries have done this through
education supported by strict adherence to environmental law)

76
 Table 4.2 Basic steps in disaster management
Management step Concurrent activity
Preparation Preparation
Prepare the society to listen to warning system – radio/TV/ and local organisation mobile
telephone link or radio link/ rehearse evacuation plan/ select local immediate response team. In
here local social/ medical, engineering/ security resources must be used

Prepare the emergency supplies in the nearest possible place to the disaster – dry rations, clean
water, clothing, baby food, essential medicine and portable equipment required for search and
rescue ( in bunkers/ high ground shelters)
Security forces for immediate response
Search, rescue and medical aid
Relief supply system
Temporary shelters
Temporary communications
Armed forces on alert
Facing the disaster See below3
Rehabilitation (from Education, organisational frame work (specially the local societal organisations), financial
regional and national resources, evacuation, shelter
funding)
Recovery (from regional Education, organisational frame work (specially the local societal organisations), financial
and national funding) resources, evacuation, shelter
Stabilisation and (from Education, organisational frame work (specially the local societal organisations), financial
regional and national resources, evacuation, shelter
funding) rebuilding

77
Identification of disaster situation: Science and Signs

Scientific evaluation of possible disaster situations are conducted using the

available scientific knowledge. The type and amount of scientific
knowledge required for a disaster is decided on the type and
dynamics of a disaster. Collection and analysis of disaster data has
to be conducted by experts in the respective field of science. Most
of these facilities are available in the developed countries, but in
the developing world this system is yet to be fully established
(Table 4.1 and 4.2).

Each type of hazard is associated with its own set of signs, which have been
noted by the elders and kept in the community through storage in
folklore or myth. Some of these signs have been associated to
following systems which are not truly scientific, but has been
accepted by post modernity thinking as valuable and sometimes
valid.

Dreams – there is a belief that dreams indicate danger

Sense – there is a belief that telepathy and other unexplained super naturals
signal danger
Behaviour of other living beings – have to be taken seriously
Behaviour of underground water, rock strata and the surface is important
Astrological predictions are useful
Personal predictions may be valid
Warnings given by elders have value

There is a continuous struggle between science and belief in the modern

world in relation to disasters. Our primary investigation is based on
scientific concepts, but in the study of disaster and facing disaster in a poor
country like Sri Lanka value of the belief system cannot be forgotten. It is
because the information and recovery systems associated with disaster are
extremely weak due to non-adherence to scientific method.

Therefore this book is not only written as a text book for my students, but
also as an information system to all who wanted to believe that traditional
knowledge is valid at all times and can be added to existing scientific
knowledge to save lives and property in disaster.

78
 Table 4.3 Flood – identification of causative environment

Level Long term contributory Short term contributory factors

factors
Flood Unplanned forest
clearance
Unplanned settlement
Unplanned environment High intensity rainfall
Poor local drainage
Weir collapse
Landslide
Water mains burst
Water tanker accident
Reservoir collapse

79
Flood (Tables 4.3, 4.4 and 4.5)

Long term contributory factors – Rivers are the transporters of excess water
which cannot be stored in soil and rock at the surface of the earth.
Depending on the rainfall regime of its basin rivers have a set
system of flows, identified by hydrologists as low, average and
high. High flow is further divided into bank full, flood and
disastrous flood. In the warm regions of the world river basin is
used heavily for the establishment of settlements and farm land.

Rapid rise in population in the last 20 years have led to living on river banks
and lowlands around river. In the same period changes in global
and regional climate has increased rainfall intensity resulting in
short duration heavy rainfall. These two factors have increased the
disasters related to flood all over the world, but lack of proper
environmental planning and proper insurance systems has
increased the risk of flood in developing countries than in the
developed countries.

The risk of flood in developing countries is increased mainly due to lack of

proper environmental planning. Within this status unplanned forest
clearance is the major contributory factor as it guides excess water
rapidly to the river channel as lowering of forest cover prevents
proper storage in soil and rock. However, forests are an essential
part of human life and it is extremely difficult to protect forests
without a long term environmental plan as it is conducted in the
developed world. Concepts of protection, conservation and
harvesting are utilised in unison to protect forests in developed
countries. Therefore the developing countries have to follow the
success of developed countries utilising their scientific and
regulatory measures.

80
Table 4.4 Flood - Understanding long-term contributory factors

Long term Remedy Situation in Sri Lanka

contribu
tory
factors
Unplanned forest National environmental plan with proper scientific and Poor and destructive due lack of
clearanc regulatory measures. Forest harvesting with application in regulatory
e preservation of Strict Natural Reserves. measures.
Unplanned Risk analysis used in the selection of area for Poor and destructive due lack of
settleme settlement construction. Use legislation to application in regulatory
nt establish proper drainage. measures.
Unplanned Risk analysis used in the selection of area for Poor and destructive due lack of
environ settlement construction. Use legislation to application in regulatory
ment establish proper drainage. measures.

81
Table 4.5 Flood - Understanding short-term contributory factors

82
Short-term Remedy
contribut
ory
factor
High intensity Listen to advice of scientists engaged in research on climatic change, collect
rainfall data on regional and local rainfall in detail.
Poor local Plan drainage to suit changing climate and construction, provide emergency
drainage drainage system in all the settlements, keep all the drains and
sewers in working order, use legislation to establish proper
drainage.
Landslide Early warning systems for landslides, removal of rock debris from slopes and
stream beds, cleaning stream beds and strengthening of stream
banks, proper road designs. use legislation to establish proper
drainage.
Weir collapse Monitor weirs correctly, use legislation to establish proper drainage.
Water mains burst Monitor water mains correctly, use legislation to establish proper drainage.
Water tanker Monitor mechanics correctly, use legislation to establish proper drainage.
accident
Reservoir collapse Monitor reservoir system correctly, use legislation to establish proper
drainage.
83
Present status of damage from various types of floods in Sri Lanka is
extremely high due to not understanding the long-term and short-
term contributory factors. The special contributory factor for the
increase in disasters related to flooding results from nonchalant
attitude towards scientific knowledge and legislation. Further, very
poor environment literacy among the populace, non-utilisation of
graduates trained with proper field experiences produced by local
universities and domination of public disaster management by non-
scientists has led to continuing increase in disasters related to
floods.

Landslides (Tables 4.6, 4.7 and 4.8)

Landslide is the common name given too many types of slope failures which
is an essential part of nature in the construction of slopes. Therefore
they occur all the time and in recent years with an increasing
intensity as a result of climatic change and settlement and road
design failures.

Depending on the rainfall regime landslides have a set system of flows,

identified by geologists and geomorphologists as seasonal and
local. Seasonal flow is associated with heavy rainfall in the areas of
steep slopes... In the warm regions of the world mountain slopes
are used without proper stabilisation for the establishment of
settlements and farm land.

Rapid rise in population in the last 20 years have led to living on unstable
slopes and artificially constructed slopes. In the same period
changes in global and regional climate has increased rainfall
intensity resulting in short duration heavy rainfall. These two
factors have increased the disasters related to landslides all over the
world, but lack of proper environmental planning and proper
insurance systems has increased the risk of landslides in developing
countries than in the developed countries.

The risk of landslide in developing countries is increased mainly due to lack

of proper environmental planning. Within this status unplanned
forest clearance is the major contributory factor as it guides excess
water rapidly to the river channel and undercut slopes rapidly and
leads to rapid bank and rock collapse. However, forests are an
essential part of human life and it is extremely difficult to protect
forests without a long term environmental plan as it is conducted in
the developed world. Concepts of protection, conservation and
harvesting are utilised in unison to protect forests in 84 developed
countries. Therefore the developing countries have to follow the
 success of developed countries utilising their scientific and
regulatory measures.

Table 4.6 Landslide - identification of causative

environment

85
Level Long term Short term contributory
contribut factors
Table 4.7 Landslides- Understanding long-term
ory
contributory factors-
factors
Landslide
LongUnplanned
term forest
Remedy Situation in Sri Lanka
clearance
contribu
tory
Unplanned
factors
settlemen
t
Unplanned forest National environmental plan with proper scientific and Poor and destructive due lack of
clearanc
Unplanned regulatory
Poor knowledge measures.
of publicForest harvesting with application in regulatory
e environm preservation
sector of Strict Natural Reserves. measures.
Unplanned ent Risk analysis institutions
used in the on selection of area for Poor and destructive due lack of
settleme slopeconstruction.
settlement stability Use legislation to application in regulatory
nt establish
High proper
intensity drainage.
rainfall measures.
Unplanned Risk analysis
Poor localused in the selection of area for Poor and destructive due lack of
drainage
environ Usesettlement
of unstableconstruction.
slopes Use legislation to application in regulatory
ment establish
Blocked proper
stream bedsdrainage. measures.
Undercutting of river
banks
Poor road designs
Disregard for scientific
principles in
construction on
slopes 86
Table 4.8 Landslides- Understanding short-term contributory factors

Short-term Remedy
contribut
ory factor
High intensity Listen to advice of scientists engaged in research on climatic change, collect data on
rainfall regional and local rainfall in detail.
Poor local drainage Plan drainage to suit changing climate and construction, provide emergency drainage
system in all the settlements, keep all the drains and sewers in working
order, use legislation to establish proper drainage.
Use of unstable Listen to advice of scientists engaged in research on local geology climatic change,
slopes collect data on regional and local rainfall in detail.
Blocked stream Utilise modern systems of stream bed management, use legislation to establish
beds proper drainage
Undercutting of Utilise modern systems of stream channel management, use legislation to establish
river proper drainage
banks
Poor road designs Utilise modern systems of road designs, use legislation to establish proper drainage
Disregard for Listen to advice of scientists engaged in research on local geology climatic change,
scientific collect data on regional and local rainfall in detail.
principles
in
constructi
on on 87
slopes
Traffic accidents (Tables 4.9 and 4.10)

Traffic accidents are considered in this book as the primary disaster in Sri
Lanka, because damage from traffic accidents is the second most
damaging disaster in terms of lives lost and material loss after war.
As in all the other developing countries traffic accidents, in Sri
Lanka results primarily from institutional corruption as traffic laws
are not

Table 4.9 Traffic accidents and remedies

Action Percent Remedy

responsi
ble for
fatal
accident
s
collecte
d from
613
media
reports
for one
year
Speeding by big 41 Legal actions
commer
cial
vehicles

Illegal registration 19 Legal actions

of
vehicles

Poor road designs, 14 Proper planning

without
pedestria
n way
and
crossing
s under
or over
road in
busy
points
Poor driving 11 Legal actions
habits of
small 88
vehicles
 (Three
Wheeler
s and
motor
bicycles)
Use of pedestrian 08 Proper planning
area for
commer
cial
purposes

Pedestrian 07 Legal actions

nonchala
nce (not
followin
g road
rules)

administered properly by all the responsible authorities. This has led to a list
of miseries, and remedies are proposed in Table 4.9.

The surprising element in the analysis of traffic accidents in Sri Lanka is that
there is no relationship between observed literacy and driver
behaviour. Observed literacy of the population in Sri Lanka is
above 90 percent, but the density of fatal accidents (ratio between
number of vehicles: number of fatal accidents) is one of the highest
in the world. The institutional corruption is given as a reason for
this incompatibility by many researchers during informal
interviews. Field survey revealed that most of the drivers without
any base of education level commit many trivial mistakes in
driving, like irregular parking, park and chat on road, no proper
understanding of the capacity of vehicle, joy ride etc., which are the
four most common factors forming non-fatal accidents.

The only remedy for this serious threat to life and property has to be
controlled only through legal actions like it is conducted in the
developed world. Some developed countries have begun to use
video systems and unmarked police cars for the control of traffic
systems, which have drastically reduced the density of fatal and
serious traffic accidents in their countries. However, the belief of
many interviewed is that the traffic situation is related to inherent
corruption in the institutional system in Sri Lanka, which89 has not
shown any improvement in the last 20 years.
Table 4.10 Survey conducted with information from many traffic police
officers

Activity Description Mean/charged

percen
t out of
total as
remem
bered
for a
period
of 6
month
s
Irregular parkingParking which restricts free flow of 23
traffic
Park and chat on Park covering a side of road and 16
road have a chat
Capacity In taking curves and turn around or 12
knowled overtaking not using the
ge full capacity of the vehicle
Joy ride Ride slowly even when the road in 08
front of vehicle, because
having a chat or using a
cell phone

Drought

Drought is considered the most damaging disaster in the developing world as

it silently kills many people whose deaths are recorded under
medical reasons and forgotten. Impact of malaria, dysentery and
AIDS are strongest in the areas where drought has a permanent
presence. In addition low income drought affected communities
have a high prevalence of serious respiratory diseases (Seneviratne,
2003 and Discovery, 2006). Then it is believed widely suicide,
eloping of girl children and joining armed forces is also related to
low income generated by drought in the farming communities of
Sri Lanka (Seneviratne, 2003). Though there may be no direct
connection between drought and many sociological phenomena in
the dry zone of Sri Lanka, there is a visible relationship between
low income and many of the variables given in the above
discussion. The following case study is presented 90 for further
explanations.
CPA 5
A case of disease and environment:: Migrants of Mahaweli System C
(Senviratne, 2003 b) – effect of climate and poor planning

The area designated as System C is the largest single resettlement

programme in the Mahaweli Development Project in Uva, Eastern and North
Central Provinces of Sri Lanka, where malaria is endemic and many other
infectious diseases prevail due to poor quality living environment and
drinking water. The home villages are a group of rural settlements located in
the wet zone of Sri Lanka, which is comparatively healthy and malaria free.
The detailed statistical tests conducted on the two different environments
confirmed that the environment at Mahaweli System C is more hazardous
than the home villages (Seneviratne, 2003). Further this presentation will
reveal the effect of natural (climate) and man made hazards (corruption) in a
resettlement programme.
There were 20,674 farming families and another about 6000 non-farmer
families living within the boundaries of System C in 1998. The estimated
total population was 126,758 in 1998 with a gross per capita income of
Rupees 2134 and Rupees 102,000 gross income per household.
The System C area was settled in a sequence from south to north between the
Right Bank main canal and Mahaweli River. It was initially divided into five
zones, 9 blocks and about 90 villages. The zone 1 was comprised of the old
irrigation schemes under Mapakada, Dambarawa and Horabora tanks, which
was incorporated into the System C. The zone 2 was established in 1981,
zone 3 in 1982, zone 4 in 1983 and zone 5 in 1988. An additional zone was
established in 1989 in the north eastern sector of the System C.

Table 4.11 Major problem as given by respondents (multiple

responses)

Major problem No Percent

Market facilities 90 100
High cost of inputs 90 100
Drinking water 68 72
Difficulty of getting investment finance 57 60
Emergency medical facilities 34 36
Employment for Children 23 24
Alcoholism 22 23 91
Our poverty 19 20
Poor soil condition of the high land plot 17 18
Respiratory diseases 16 17
Lack of provision to cultivate what we want 14 15
Neglect by the Mahaweli Development Authority 10 11
and the government
War 5 5

As shown in Table 4.11, scarcity of drinking water, poor soil condition and
disease are directly related to drought in this region. An average of
33percent of the farmers has been affected by these three hazardous
situations continuously, which indicate that the drought has reached
the disaster status in their lives.

The return migration and new arrivals

The discussion on coping indicates that many have made a serious attempt to
adjust and adapt to the new environment, but some have not been able to
cope with the situation for many social and personal reasons. At the time of
the survey, the number of children schooling in the home village or having
left for employment recorded a value of 23 percent. The lack of immunity to
malaria and effect of chronic skin disease has resulted in keeping two
children and one wife respectively in the home village with the siblings.

Seven percent of the farmers, who could not cope with the difficulties, have
begun a life in two places. They have built a small mud house and stay at
System C during the planting and harvesting seasons and the family lives
permanently in the home village, where the wife and some of the children are
employed in various types of unskilled and semi-skilled jobs.

These families have built a small house on ancestral land, with the use of
income generated from the System C, as they have a very cordial relationship
with their siblings. Further the household heads in this category practise a
craft, which is valued in the home village. This group was represented by a
mason, carpenter, gem miner, farm terrace builder, construction site labourer,
a rubber latex tapper and ‘an edura’ (faith healer). The reason given for
securing land at System C was stated as to be given to a child or children.
Between the time of the beginning of the survey and the last visit in April
2000, three of these families have finally left after leasing their land for an
undisclosed number of years for sums varying between 150, 000 rupees to
230, 000 rupees. Though, this practise is illegal, the demand for land from
the children of the well established farmers at System C and the farmers
migrating from the war affected areas, have enabled this group of farmers to
92
receive a high financial gain.
The residents of System C believe that the high demand for land in the new
settlement originates from the consistency in water supply for farming and a
daily express bus linkage to all the home villages. Therefore, many
Mahaweli employees and civil servants have begun to acquire land and
become permanent residents. The discussions conducted with the officials
of the area revealed that about 300 to 400 working and retired minor officials
and some senior officials have obtained land for housing only or housing and
farming through lease, administrative and political support or on the
preferential allocation to former public servants. The researcher managed to
meet a senior official who has acquired land through preferential allocation
to former public servants and built a house and a shop unit with a view of
retiring at System C.

Social cost of coping: a limited evaluation

The data gathered from all types of survey methodologies indicate the social
and personal problems arising from resettlement at System C. The
continuing survey and the trust developed between the researcher and the
respondent enabled the researcher to collect a lot of private information on
the coping process. The one-month continuous stay during the third visit to
System C enabled the researcher to be part of their life. I have managed to
stay with them in their farms and sleep in their houses and offer a ride in my
vehicle. The observations made during these encounters indicate that the life
style of the resettlement farmer has not changed much from the researchers
own experience in 1963, but I have a notion that, the large scale settlement
plan of the System C area has definitely helped to construct a more complex
society than in most other resettlement units of the past.

It is clear that most of the continuing settlers have suffered heavily from
isolation, malaria and other infectious diseases like typhoid and viral
hepatitis, crop failure, but as they collectively indicate, that they have stayed
on, because they were strong enough to bear the suffering. Table 4.12
records the indebtedness of five farming families caused by ill health. These
farmers were not discouraged by the indebtedness and are working with
determination to succeed.

The human loss and social cost between the times of arrival to the time of
survey, as explained as a result of migration is listed in Table 9.10. The data
collected from home villages are also presented with a view to compare the
intensity of social disturbance due to migration.

Table 4.12 The indebtedness of the respondents due to disease

93 as
recorded during the survey
 Disease Expenditure Source of funding
Asthma About 300 Part-time mechanic
monthly
Cancer A total of Part of the wetland was leased
(died 25,000
during the
last visit)
Cancer A total of Private bank mortgage on the
40,000 wetland. The children have willingly
stopped schooling and cultivating
extra land to repay the debt.
Cancer About 500 Sons help the family to pay medical
monthly bills and have delayed their marriage.
One of the sons joined the armed
forces to support the family
Disability About 400 Part-time labourer
monthly

Suicides recorded among the mature adults in both areas were associated
with excessive alcohol consumption, which led to drinking of pesticide and
accidental hanging while heavily intoxicated with alcohol. One case of
suicide in the home villages of a 17-year-old female was related to a failed
love affair. Though there is no record of teenage suicide in the sample
population at System C, the researcher attended a funeral of a 19-year-old
female in a nearby village, during the field programme. The case of drowning
at System C occurred due to burial in quick sand, while the respondent was
wading across River Mahaweli on a hunting expedition.
The higher level of health risks at System C is clearly indicated in Table 9.10.
Most of these sicknesses are associated with malaria or asthma, which began
to occur among the respondents since their arrival in System C. The impact
of the higher social disturbance due to dislocation of the life pattern is clearly
shown in the data, with the categories of eloping of girl children, unwanted
marriage, divorce and eloping of wife record only at System C. This type of
social problems led to the identification of resettled people as a group of
relocated people by Sørensen (1996), who investigates some of the intricate
social disturbances in the resettlement programme in Sri Lanka. It is her
belief that these disturbances arise mainly due to isolation, lack of other
entertainment activities, unemployment of school leavers and excessive
alcohol use of the householder. A few older respondents related acute asthma
in children and increased number of cancers, which they refer to as special
sicknesses, to the rising level of air and water pollution in the home villages.
The majority of migrants utilise all the resources available to them to cope
with life at System C and establish a better health situation in the family.
Burdened with poverty of the nation and themselves, they have a limited
range of coping capability to overcome most of the problems of the physical
and human environment like endemic malaria, construction of good quality
housing, improve conditions of farming and social security. There are minor
94
differences between individual farming families and the overall scenario of
coping is similar to the strategies adopted by similar groups of people
elsewhere in the resettlement programme as observed by many researchers.

The ability to cope therefore is decided upon by factors like skills in auxiliary
employment, income generated by their children and loss of income through
sickness and disease. It is clear from the data presented those problems
related to ill health and disease has an important impact on the coping with
life at System C. Health has played a very important role as indicated by the
majority of the farmers in their attempt to cope with life at System C.

The coping with health and disease was troublesome at the beginning and
difficult at present. However most of the farmers have managed to overcome
the serious threat of disease principally aided by the reduction in the
incidence of malaria and increased availability of health service facilities
during the last 10 years. Though, the ability of the farming families to cope
with their health and other problems are primarily influenced by the
constraints formed by location and the institutional indecision on the
strategies of resettlement management, most of them have managed to live a
life of a poor farmer.

References

Amerasinghe, F.P. and Indrajith, N.G. (1994) Post-irrgation breeding patterns

of surface water mosquitoes in the Mahaweli Project, Sri Lanka, and
comparison with preceding development phases, Journal of Madical
Entomology, 31, 4.
Baker, V.J. (1999), A Sinhala village in Sri Lanka, Coping with uncertainty,
Harcourt Brace and Co., Fortworth.
Department of Health, 1996, Annual Health Bulletin, Colombo, Sri Lanka.
De Vroey, M. and Shanmugaratnam, N. (1984), Peasant resettlement in Sri
Lanka, Tri Star.
Farmer, B.H. (1957), Peasant Colonisation in Sri Lanka, Cambridge
University Press. Continental Center, Lonvai-La-Neave.
Lund, R. (1989) Women in the Mahaweli Area, A feminist Assessment, Paper
for CENWOR, March, Colombo.
Sørensen, B.R. (1996), Relocated Lives, VU University Press, Amsterdam

The details in the above presentation can be summerised as follows

1. Drought is continuous even after irrigated water has been supplied to
the area.
2. Drought cannot be averted without a proper environmental planning,
where crop diversification, forest harvesting and bio-energy
production can be utilised to diversify farmer economy.
3. It is only a long term (10 to 15 year) scientific environmental plan
and an employment diversification process will absorb the95additional
population in the area which will drastically reduce the effect of
drought.

96
Table 4.13 Human loss and social cost of migration to new settlement as compared with the home villages (multiple
responses)

Area loss of life with reason social cost with the occurrence
System C - n = 90 drowning - 1 eloping of children – 4
suicide 1 unwanted marriage - 2
sickness 1 divorce - 2
sickness due to change of
environment - 27

Home villages – n= 90 drowning - 0 eloping of children – 1

suicide – 2 unwanted marriage - 0
sickness - 4 divorce - 0
special sickness due to
environmental change - 3

97
 Table 4.14 Drought - Understanding long-term contributory factors

Long term Remedy Situation in Sri Lanka

contribu
tory
factors
Climatic change Scientific study Poor study programmes
Deforestation Application of scientific harvesting system Poor application
Spring recession Application of scientific harvesting system Non utilisation
Poor crop Application of crop diversification systems Non utilisation
diversifi
cation
systems
Poor employment Provision of marketing facilities Non utilisation
diversifi
cation
systems
Dependence on Provision of marketing facilities Non utilisation
outdate
d
econom
ic
measure 98
s
Non utilisation of Application of harvesting systems Non utilisation
environ
mental
plannin
g
systems
 Table 4.15 Drought - Understanding short-term contributory factors

Short term Remedy Situation in Sri Lanka

contribu
tory
factors
Poor water Inform the true situation and real application of Still at infancy
manage knowledge, with farmer participation
ment
system
Poor cropping Inform the true situation and real application of Very poorly conducted
systems knowledge, with farmer participation
Inefficient Utilise new harvesting knowledge Yet to be applied
agricult
ural
advisor
y
system
Corruption in Engage anticorruption systems
99in place Need a concerted effort
relief
systems
The other disaster which occur locally in Sri Lanka

Tornado
Cyclone
Thunderstorm

Tornado (Tables 4.16 and 4.17)

Frequency of tornadoes has increased in the last 10 years which can be

related to global climatic change. Therefore, the following
programme of work has to be installed for the reduction of damage
from tornadoes.

Table 4.16 Understanding long-term contributory factors

Contributory Remedy Situation in Sri

factor Lanka
Global climatic Study the Very few studies
change frequenc and
y and media
localities attention
most for
vulnerab preparati
le on of
society
Construction on Settlement Very limited use
leeward planning of
side of settleme
major nt
wind planning
streams
Construction on Settlement Very limited use
valley planning of
bottoms settleme
nt
planning

100
Table 4.17 Understanding short-term contributory factors

Contributory Remedy Situation in Sri

factor Lanka
Local multi-cell No remedy Most of these cells
cumulus develop
develop beneath
ment the
rocky
slopes
borderin
g the
central
highland
and a
detailed
monitori
ng
system
can be
installed
using
schools
Construction on Settlement Very limited use
valley planning of
bottom settleme
lowlands nt
and planning
wind , detailed
gaps in monitori
the path ng

101
 of multi- system
cell can be
cumulus installed
clouds using
schools

Cyclone (Tables 4.18 and 4.19)

Frequency of cyclones have not increased drastically, but low speed cyclonic
depressions, which bring heavy rain and localised strong winds
have begun to enter the weather scene of Sri Lanka recently. These
depressions bring large quantities of rain and finally the result is
almost equal to an effect of a cyclone. The October-November
deluge in Sri Lanka was due to a depression of this type, which
came in place of expected cyclone with a fourteen year recurrence,
which was predicted for end October by the author over Rajarata
Sevaya programme on environment “Malimawa”. The possibility
of floods of Maha Oya and Deduru Oya was also predicted by the
author in a presentation in 2003 (Seneviratne and Karunaratne,
2003).

Table 4.18 Understanding long-term contributory factors and damage

Contributory factor Remedy Situation in Sri

Lanka
El Ninio or La Nina Preparation of home Poor observation
gardens, and data
power gathering
transmissi , but
on lines, recently
telecomm more
unication attention
lines, has been
drainage paid to

102
 systems the
to absorb occurrenc
high e of
winds and cyclones
heavy and
overland depressio
flow in ns.
the most Educatin
vulnerabl g public
e areas. through
more
program
mes in
media.
Establish
ment of a
Cyclone
warning
system at
Eastern
and
Rajarata
Universiti
es
Global warming and More detailed Poor observation
increased research and data
intensity on effect gathering
of of global , but
Equatoria climatic recently
l change on more
Easterlies Equatoria attention
l has been
Easterlies paid to
. the
occurrenc
e of
cyclones
and
depressio
ns.
Educatin
g public
through
more
program
mes in

103
 media.
Establish
ment of a
Cyclone
warning
system at
Eastern
and
Rajarata
Universiti
es

Table 4.19 Understanding short term contributory factors and damage

Contributory Remedy Situation in Sri

factor Lanka
Increased surface Settlement Poor preparation,
turbulen planning data
ce due collectio
to poor n and
settleme heavy
nt damage
planning is
expected
in future
Increased risk Settlement Poor preparation,
from planning data
high collectio
velocity n and
winds heavy
due to damage
addition is
of trees expected
into in future
home
garden

104
 system

Thunderstorm (Tables 4.20 and 4.21)

One of the prime indicators of global climatic change is the increased

number and intensity of thunderstorms. A twenty year collection of
random set of data on thunderstorm occurrence in a village in the
intermediate zone of Sri Lanka showed that there is definitely an
increase in the intensity of thunderstorms since 1980s (Seneviratne,
2005). Most of the farmers who were interviewed on the increased
unreliability of rainfall also have indicated this increased power
(intensity) of thunderstorms. Thunderstorm is a short-term

Table 4.20 Understanding contributory factors

Contributory factor Remedy Situation in Sri

Lanka
Increased surface Settlement planning Poor preparation,
turbulenc data
e due to collection
poor and
settlemen heavy
t damage
planning is
expected
in the
future
Increased risk from Settlement planning Poor preparation,
high data
velocity collection
winds and
and heavy

105
 lightning damage
due to is
addition expected
of trees, in future
power
poles and
aerials
into
home
garden
system

Earth tremor/ Earthquake

Table 4.21 Understanding contributory factors

Contributory Remedy Situation in Sri

factor Lanka
Increased plate Use of new Poor preparation,
activity knowled data
around ge on collectio
Sri Settleme n and
Lanka nt heavy
land planning damage
mass is
expected
in the
future
Isostatic uplift Use of new Poor preparation,
knowled data
ge on collectio
Settleme n and
nt heavy
planning damage
is
expected
in the
future

Health disasters (Table 4.22)

106
Poverty and behaviour are the major causes of health disasters. Poverty
affects all the people of the low income group people in the developing
world. Behaviour is an individual factor and its impact is common in the
developed and developing, but higher care level reduces the impact of
behaviour on health in the developed world.
Ecology and behaviour are studied as causes of disasters in health in this
chapter.

Climate and animals are the two most important factors of ecology which are
responsible for creating disaster through transmission of deadly diseases.
Influenza, malaria and cholera are the most common killer epidemic forming
diseases which have resulted in millions of deaths. However some viruses in
Africa like Ebola and Avian flu in Asia have become a serious threat to
health.
Today malaria, cholera, encephalitis, schistosomiasis and onechorsiasis are
the diseases which cause disaster level amount of deaths in a year. This type
of disasters occurs generally in countries with large populations or in the
poorest parts of Africa and South America.
The tropical humid climate of Sri Lanka facilities the breeding of many
types of disease causing agents common to its south Asian neighbours, but
the severity of infection is reduced by cultural practices like use of traditional
antiseptics, low consumption of raw food and adherence to advice on health.
The breeding of agents causing dengue and diarrhoeal and respiratory
diseases are always associated with heavy rain, flooding and poor sanitation.
The high incidence of rabies in Sri Lanka can be related to nonchalant
attitudes in the rearing of dogs and the existence of a large rat population,
specially in the urban areas of the country where rabies has been identified as
a serious health risk (Ministry of Health, 1996).

Behaviour

Use of alcohol and other hard drugs, and sexual behaviour create disastrous
situations of health in human populations. Many research workers and media
publications identify alcohol abuse and alcoholism as two of the major
behavioural factors in the increase of health risks in men of Sri Lanka.
Hettige (1990) and Wickramasinghe (1993) have given some recent
information on this issue though many medical articles appear in the Ceylon
Medical Journal regularly. Hettige (1990), indicates that there is an
increasing trend of alcohol use in Sri Lanka, which has not been duly
recognized by the socio-political institutions. However, the diseases or deaths

107
originating from alcohol abuse are not recorded properly in the medical
records and therefore it is impossible to understand the true effect of alcohol
abuse in the Sri Lanka society. It is clear that most of the families with
extreme poverty in Sri Lanka are affected by the alcohol abuse of the
householder, but the status of the alcohol as a cause or effect cannot be
properly understood due to lack of detailed research.

AIDS is an example of effect of sexual behaviour on health, which has

become global level disaster today. Origin of the AIDS virus is still
unknown and care is yet to be found. Countries of the developed and
developing are equally affected by AIDS revealing that basic behaviour of
people are important in creating health disasters in the world.

Health disasters are formed through lack of clean water, contamination of

water and air with sewage and decaying corpses and transmitting diseases
downstream from the point of origin. However development of powerful
antibiotics have limited the effect of this type of disasters recently, but still in
some poorest countries of the world the risk of disastrous levels of epidemics
occur immediately after a disaster of natural origin like flood, landslide and
earthquake. In Sri Lanka this type of disasters are very rare due to rapid
response of the public sector health officials and low distant to any source of
disaster. This accessibility factor in a comparatively small island has actually
lifted Sri Lanka to a better health status than its neighbours.

Today Sri Lanka suffer seriously form the following health disasters due to
inefficient preventive services. However media reports reveal that health
illiteracy, lack of scientific environmental planning, non-implementation of
legislation is the major cause of epidemics in Sri Lanka (Table 4.22)

108
 Table 4.22, Disease and disease environment as reported in media and sometimes confirmed by health authorities*

Disease Cause
Cholera – 1998 Contaminated food from poorly kept hotel*
Rabies (continuous) Lack of enforcement of law on domesticated animals / environment illiteracy of society
and planning authorities.
Malaria (continuous) Lack of safe drinking water (due to corruption in development plans)and poor
preventive services* (Seneviratne, 2003) / environment illiteracy of society and
planning authorities
Dengue (continuous) Poor waste and waste water disposal system* in the wet zone urban areas/
environment illiteracy of society and planning authorities.
Meningitis (2006) Origin was traced to waste entering Ma Oya above Mawanella*
Unknown disease in Uva Not yet known
province
Sexually transmitted More than 30 percent of the patients indicate that they had no basic knowledge on
diseases transmission system of the disease* and had multiple sex partners.
Chikin Gunya Virus suspected to be originating from waste and town and city sewers
Hard Drugs Low conviction rate prevents drug control due to socio-political corruption

109
Ministry of health sources indicate that about 3 billion rupees are spent on
treating diseases which originate from low environment literacy in the
society as given in table 4.22.
The presence of disease at disaster level is linked to poverty and corruption
in the developing world. Countries with fair level of income have the
capability of maintaining a better health status than today, but financial
corruption prevents them from utilising scientific environmental planning to
obtain that better status. For example media reports reveal that the poor
health status is related to poor level of waste and drainage control as long
term plans for cleaner society are not followed in these countries.

Literature survey on the health status of developed world reveal that they
have carried out large scale filling or draining of wetlands to prevent
mosquito borne diseases and use massive quantities of chemical cleaning
fluids to clean the drainage system. Most of the researchers in health and
development agree (Senevirtane, 2003) that the better health status of the
developed is primarily a result of proper environmental planning and
enforcement of legislation on waste control.

There is a relationship between income and health in both developed and

developing but the infectious diseases and non-malignant chronic diseases
are a result of unclean environment.

Table 4.23 Understanding contributory factors

Contributory Remedy Situation in Sri Lanka

factor
Lack of clean Water resource Poor status, all public system
water planning water has to be
boiled if it is to be
safe.
Lack of proper Settlement Poor status, leading to many
waste planning bacterial and viral
disposal diseases abound
today heavy
damage is expected
in future
Lack of Efficient Poor due to lack of resources
observa monitori and corruption
nce of ng by
traffic law
regulatio enforce
ns ment

Corruption 110
Corruption is one of the most commonly present societal hazards in the
world, but its effect on economic development is widely felt in the
developing world. This is because the rate of corruption in public services in
these countries seriously affects economic growth and development. Further,

corruption rejects the scientific method of development which is the only

stable way of development. Therefore developing countries suffer
continuously from lack of balanced social development, which leads to
continuing damage to both natural and societal environment. This continuous
damage to natural and societal environment will increase the effect of
disaster in the developing countries, though the whole world is subjected to
an increase in natural and societal hazards in the next 50 to 100 years. Most
recent estimates indicate that most of the developing countries will suffer
serious disasters as they have not utilised environmental planning in their
programmes of development.

Special case : Man and the elephant in Sri Lanka

The man-elephant conflict in Sri Lanka is a result of poor environmental and

settlement planning. The following story of man and the elephant is
constructed from the field data collected by our students at Rajarata
University of Sri Lanka. One of them ( Herath, 2007) has lived
through an elephant attack on their schools, garden and house. Life
history records and official records were the major data collection
methods. Ratios were assigned to the intensity of the attack,
positioning of the attacking elephant, what people were doing when
they were attacked by the elephant, and the location of houses in
the village.

The research programme revealed the following

1. elephant attacks is a result of scarcity of food in the forest.

2. building settlements across elephant migration pathways have

increased the number of attacks.

3. most of the deaths occurred due to taking unnecessary risks

4. elephant attacks are increasing as elephants have develop a taste for

paddy and other home garden crops

5. elephant attacks are increasing because the authorities have no ability

to take remedial measures through a proper system of environmental
planning.
111
Environmental management approach to the problem of elephant
attacks

Present situation:
Elephants have been pressurised heavily from human activities: their food
supply is lowered and migration paths have been blocked.

Remedy
Humans have to provide food for the elephants and open their old migration
paths or construct new paths.

Possibility
Environmental Management students of the University of Rajarata, Sri
Lanka, can work with any organisation for constructing a plan and
implementing. Only a detailed environmental plan will be able to solve the
problem and not a disintegrated system of various departments and
authorities working on this matter. 2006 reported about 60 deaths from
elephant attacks and about 80 elephants were killed by humans. This
disastrous situation is bound to increase dramatically in the next 20 years as
dry zone will be seriously affected by drought resulting from climatic change

Understanding and living through disaster

This is an area with very limited research in disaster management because

1. One disaster is different from an another
2. People always have the belief that disaster will happen to someone
and not to self
3. It is extremely difficult to collect experiences as the experiences are
associated with trauma and pain.

However, disaster managers have managed to construct some systems in

understanding and living through disaster taken mainly from accident
investigations conducted in the developed world.

One disaster is different from another

One disaster is different from another due to many factors. 112

Firstly the differences begin from the wide ranging differences in physical
and social space (Table 4.23). For the people in developing countries post-
disaster recovery is not continuous

as the social security system is not capable of full rehabilitation and

reconstruction. For example the recovery from Katrina in USA is almost
complete by the time this book is going to print, but recovery from the
Puwakgahawela landslide is yet to be stabilised where only a few farming
families lost their livelihood as compared to loss of about 60,00 businesses
were reported from Hurricane Katrina. In both disasters the loss of a family
member, relative and a friend is felt in the same way and it brings grief and
trauma, but in the developing world grief and trauma stays longer as the loss
is always attached to economic loss or traditional belief system.

Socially, culture plays a great role in differentiating between spaces in which

disasters occur. For example in developed countries where disaster
management is well established the occurrence of disaster is fairly well
predicted and its scientific base is understood by the people who are
subjected to disaster. For example in these countries places where disaster
can occur are always under surveillance and many scientific measures are
taken to reduce the impact of disaster. Once the disaster occurs the necessary
management services become active with full force within a short period of
time reducing the impact on lives. This is because, public authorities have
installed food and medical security before the onset of the disaster season or
time with the help of scientific method on disaster management. Developing
countries are yet to establish this scientific system of disaster management
and suffer heavily from disasters they can reduce damage beforehand. Some
examples from Sri Lanka are given below to show the disasters which have
occurred due to poor evaluation of disaster capability in the last few years.
Tsunami is not included as Sri Lanka had no capability to know of its
occurrence due to its extremely low probability given by scientists. However,
the author pointed out in his book in 1977 that stories of high wave exist in
folk lore in Sri Lanka.

113
Table 4.23 Difference in disaster

Disaster Factor for high level Level of Available

of destruction scientific knowledge
at the time of
disaster
2003 Floods and Unplanned Adequate scientific
landslides – Kalu, construction on information was
Gin and Nilvala flood plain – available, but
(damage estimate 30 settlement planners
billion rupees) have disregarded
this information.
2006 floods and Unplanned Adequate scientific
landslides and construction on information was
landslides steep slopes, poor available, but
road design and settlement planners
poor roadside have disregarded
drainage – (damage this information
estimate 60 billion
rupees)
Flash floods in Unplanned Adequate scientific
towns and cities of construction and information was
Sri Lanka poor drainage – available, but
damage estimate settlement planners
/annual 5 to 6 have disregarded
billion rupees) this information
Road and Roadside Blockage of drains Non-enforcement of
destruction in Sri and culverts (annual legislation to
Lanka repair cost –about 5 maintain drains and
billion rupees) culverts

Therefore management of space makes one disaster different from another

as some societies are not vigilant and ready to manage its probable disaster
scenario as given by scientific information system.

People always have the belief that disaster will happen to someone and not to
self.

Story 21
In the class of 1974 author was questioned by a student on building on the
114
coast, because this student was residing only about 50 meters from the beach.
Author responded with the scientific notion on Tsunamis and explained that
Tsunami is a possibility in any coast as Plate Movement is a continuing
activity. Author further said that “ coasts of Sri Lanka are situated between

two major plate boundaries with Carlsberg Ridge in the west and Pacific-
Indo Australian subduction zone in the east, which can propagate powerful
earthquakes resulting in Tsuanmis. The student was not convinced and later
he has commented to his fellow students that “ how can Tsunamis occur in
Sri Lanka that it is so far away from these areas of activity and the author is
only being highly theoretical.” This student and his wife lost their lives in the
20041226 south Asian mega Tsunami as his house was completely destroyed.
Story 22

When author was conducting the radio programme on hazards and disasters
(Seneviratne and Jayantha, 2005a), one grand mother who had the habit of
listening to the programme regularly indicated that she decided to remove
some tall trees from her garden in fear of tornadoes, because the author has
warned of increased intensity of winds in her area. She further informed the
author that her neighbour suffered a sizable damage from falling trees,
because neighbour did not remove the tall trees adjacent to her house as
instructed.

Stories 21 and 22 indicate the different approaches to warnings given by

scientists on disasters in a developing country. Stories of 20041226 Asian
Mega Tsunamis and Hurricane Katrina are full of stories of this nature. The
warnings given of possible Tsunamis in Thai coasts led to the removal of the
head of meteorological department and about 1000,000 people in New
Orleans did not evacuate after the warning of a category 5 or 4 hurricane
warning respectively. After the warning of a powerful hurricane was issued,
CNN showed a lady in New Orleans responding to their news reporter, and
saying “ I have got groceries, I have got water , pray for us” . this is the
difference between self in responding to disaster prediction and disaster.
However, disaster has to be considered as a serious threat to life today,
because of following major factors.

a) We are living in an era of rapid climatic and geologic

change than we have experienced before.

b) We are living in densely populated areas and the flow of

water and wind is different from our past experiences.
This is because planning is yet to account for the recent
changes in intensity and vigour of these events.
c) Predictions are more reliable than in the past due to
rapidly developing scientific knowledge 115
It is extremely difficult to collect experiences as the experiences are
associated with loss of equipment of the scientists and trauma and pain in the
people succumbed to disaster.

Collecting information on disaster is one of the major problems of disaster

management. This is because most of the disasters carry massive forces of
nature or human action which are difficult to be collected using standard
machinery or survey methods. For example the National Weather Centre in
USA lost their radar and wind wane during hurricane Mitch and was unable
to collect the highest wind speeds. Flood warning systems are useless when
levees are not properly maintained. However, science is advancing rapidly
towards documenting disaster and many developed countries have installed
many valuable and reliable systems incorporating equipment with local
societal support systems. Universities in these countries are in the forefront
of disaster management with the use of their experts and students in
collecting data and preparing predictions. However developing nations are
yet to implement these advanced systems mainly due to low acceptance of
scientific knowledge in daily life. Most of the developing nations do not
identify the experiences of their traditional system as a valid form of science,
which removes a massive knowledge base from disaster management. For
example there is a massive knowledge base of disaster in our ancient
Rajarata civilisation, which we have not utilised for present day disaster
management. During the time of ancient civilisation settlement was
scientifically planned, weva or the reservoir was kept in pristine condition,
catchment area was well preserved through a system of environmental
management which limited destruction and loss. This knowledge base has to
be accepted because the present day system of human settlement in the
developed countries is formed on the ideals similar to that of our ancient
civilisation, which reduced disaster to an acceptable level (Refer to CS 1).

Trauma and pain of the disaster is the part which cannot be removed from
people for a long period of time or until they live. However, what is
remembered during the time of facing disaster is highly valuable to
emergency services in planning to face the next similar disaster event.
Most of the landslide survivours talk of a massive thunder just before the
occurrence of the slide. This is the process of massive shear failure, which is
today used by scientists to warn of the oncoming slide.
The following statements were taken from CNN/BBC/Reality TV/National
Geographic TV/ Discovery Channel/ Rupavahini.

The 9/11 attack on Pentagon taught us that strengthen glass can save many
lives in strategically important buildings (USA).
Low and wide concrete walls made compulsory by Malaysian tourism
authority saved many lives during the south Asian Mega Tsunami in their
country (Malaysia). 116
Listening to the elephants saved many lives in one tourist resort in Thailand
(Thailand).
Listening to one school teacher saved many lives in eastern Sri Lanka. No
large animal in Yala National park was lost to south Asian Mega Tsunami
(Rupavahini).

The survival in a Tsunami depends on your ability stay afloat (women in

Thailand).
If your are in the sea deeper than 3 meters dive to the bottom and wait for the
wave to pass (4 survivours from Sri Lanka).
Do not build on the side of a valley which is clogged up by debris, because
these are the areas with high landslide probability ( Swiss expert on CNN).
Clean the debris filled mountain streams regularly (Swiss expert on BBC).

Disaster is part of human civilisation and learning about disaster requires all
types of knowledge and experience. Next a study of risk is presented to the
reader.

117
Table 4.24 Difference in space in disaster

Types of physical Percent Impact on Developed world – Developing world - where long
space susceptibility livelihood where long term social term social security is not available
(based on White, security is available-
1979)
Extremely risky Over 75 percent Extreme Felt personal loss with Felt personal loss with heavy
heavy loss of income, income loss to the family,
but recovery is possible sometimes leading to life time
poverty.
Highly risky 50 to 74 percent High Felt personal loss with Felt personal loss with income loss
some loss of income to the family, with long term
poverty.
Moderately risky 25 to 49 percent Moderate Only personal loss is Felt personal loss with income loss
felt as public support is to the family and long term poverty.
available
Low risk Less than 25 Low Only personal loss is Felt personal loss with income loss
percent felt as public support is to the family and long term poverty.
available

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Risk analysis

Risk: risk is present in all activities we pursue in our daily lives. Risk of
environmental disasters cannot be fully calculated because the nature of
occurrence varies from one incident to another. Further, the level of risk of an
occurrence changes from one society to another. For example people living
in coastal areas are generally not fearful of the sea, but inland living people
fear sea. In addition people do not think about risk unless there is a
threatening situation around and sometimes they think that though there is a
risk, it may not be life threatening. These types of attitudes make the
scientific value of risk not universally applicable. However the concept
behind the scientific notion of risk is to construct a generally acceptable
concept of risk using statistical probabilities.

In relation to environmental hazards, risks can be categorised as involuntary

and voluntary (Smith, 2000).

Involuntary risks are the risks, which are undertaken without knowing the
severity of the hazard. Living in an earthquake zone or landslide area makes
the person to know about the risk, but he cannot fully estimate the risk. This
is because the occurrence of these types of events is not fully predictable and
they do not occur all the time. Most of the geological risks are in this
category.
Voluntary risks are the risks taken with a full knowledge of the hazard. For
example living on the bank of a river which floods every year makes the
resident aware of the risk, but because of lack of land in a safe area leads him
to live in a high risk area. All types of societal hazards can be put into this
category.
Statistical analysis of risk is based on theories of probability and simple
equation of

R= p x L can be used to calculate risk of an event

R is risk
p is the probability of the event
L is the loss

To calculate probability of an event there are many statistical and

mathematical procedures, which can be taken from books on statistics.
Probability is the chance of occurrence of an event. For example probability
of a disastrous flood in Kalu Ganga valley can be calculated from the
following information.

119
Floods in Kalu ganga valley are an annual event and some times there may
be two to three minor floods, which submerge the perennial swamps around
the river bed and some areas very close to the bank. The probability of these
events is therefore

Pmf = 3/ 365 once in 121.6 days of the years

If these floods stay on for a total of 12 hours (3 minor flood stay for a total
time period of 12 hours) the probability in hours under flood is

Pmfh = 12 / 365 x 24

=12/8760

= .001 or only once in a thousand hours (.001x1000 gives 1).

The easiest way to understand for the society is once in 120 to 130 days a
minor flood will occur in the catchment.

Then the maximum height of the minor flood can be calculated using the
probability and average height of flood.

P (probability) is once in 121 days and the average minor flood level
calculated for Rathnapura town is around .5 meters above bank full level.
Then the probability of the minor flood of 0.3 meters above bank full level is
same as the probability of the flood, which is once in 121days.

High flood is where the flood level of 0.4 to 0.6 meters above bank full level
is reached. A disastrous flood is where the flood level rises to 1 meter above
bank full level. The probability of that even is known to hydrologists through
the analysis of hydrological data of Kalu Ganga catchment. The flow
characteristics of Kalu Ganga between 1956 and 2006 indicate that it has the
following flood characteristics (Table 4.24).

Table 4.25 Recurrence of flood at Rathnapura town

Flood type Recurrence interval

Minor - 0.5 ms above bank Every 121 days
full
High - 0.4 to 0.6 ms above Every year
bank full
Disastrous – above 1 m. Once every 25/50/100 years

120
Then the disaster management plan for Rathnapura can include a system of
settlement planning to minimise destruction and damage. The present status
is that the authorities and people have not followed any scientific plan and
they will continuously suffer from flood damage.

The damage expected in the next disastrous flood which may occur in 2028
or will occur earlier than that due to effect of climatic change can be
calculated from the data on value of property and life on the floodable area.

The damage to life and property in 2003 flood can be taken as a basis for
these calculations.

Lives lost – 64
Property damage 12 billion rupees

Expected rise in the population to 2028 – 1.2 percent (national average)

Expected property construction on floodable land to 2028 – 12 percent (this
rate was calculated on the basis of field work carried out by students)
Then without any environmental plan in action the lives lost in the next
disastrous flood will increase by 1.2 percent to about 77 and property damage
by 12 percent to 13.4 billion rupees at present rupee value. Implementation
of a scientific environmental plan over a period of about 5 years in the area
will cost about 10 billion rupees, which will reduce the effect of a disastrous
flood by about 5 to 6 billion rupees, and negligible damage by all other types
of floods. Then within the time period where a disastrous flood is expected,
the authorities have the capability of managing the environment to minimise
the impact of disaster.

The probability value therefore gives the expected value and variability of
disaster, which is the most important scientific aspect of disaster
management. This information is constantly used in business and three stages
of risk are available to societies.
1. Risk aversion
2. risk neutral
3. risk loving

1. Risk aversion

This is the preference of a low risk environment to a high risk

environment. The developed countries are situated in this level, with a
highly organised system of disaster prevention and control, which has
reduced their loss of life and property damage by about 60 to 70 percent.

121
2. Risk neutral

Almost all the developing countries are in this category with risk is
considered as a distant factor, which may or may not affect them. This
has led to a massive destruction of life and property in these countries in
the last 10 years as global climatic change and geological changes have
begun to affect these countries heavily. It is estimated that the developed
countries have managed only to save 20 to 30 percent of the lives and
property exposed to disaster in their countries. The total estimated
damage from disasters indicates that the economies of developing
countries have suffer heavily in the last ten years due to lack of
environmental planning and poor settlement planning.

The case of Sri Lanka is also discussed under risk neutral. Disaster
management system in practice in Sri Lanka indicates that majority of
the people and institutions are in the category of risk neutral. This is a
stage of being indifferent to risks. Recently this attitude has advanced
further with the establishment of a free enterprise and experiences of war.
Free enterprise without proper legislation has initiated a “ money chase”
environment where corruption is abound and majority of the people feel
helpless against risks around them as most of these risks originate due to
inefficiency of the application of legislation or order. Though these
drawbacks are reported daily in media and in many other information
systems high rate of institutional corruption prevent the establishment of
a safe environment.
Living with war for about 25 years has installed fear in the populace but
recently they have developed apathy towards many disastrous situations.
The inability of the security forces to stop dangerous material flow is
mainly a result of societal corruption where a set of highly corrupt
officials, politicians, traders, armed force personal and NGO's have sold
their fellow citizens for a few rupees. These two situations are common
in all the developing and rarely occur in the developed world.

The experiences of the developed world and the countries of the fast
developing like Malaysia and China indicate that only by use of strict
legislation and taxation these risks can be reduced.

3. Risk loving

This is normally present within the domain of personal behaviour in

association with events like investment, job selection, and selection of
sex partners, spying and adventure.
Living in high risk places under disaster conditions is very rare in literate
societies, however when environmental literacy is poor people and some
times societies can live under these conditions. This type of existence is
122
very common in the developing world where risk is neglected either due
to poverty or lack of environmental planning.
In Sri Lanka situations like poor road conditions, traffic accidents, delays
in government offices, bribe taking and treason can be related to risk
loving behaviour. The quantity of media material available in the news
papers of Sri Lanka indicate that these activities are on the increase and
effect of these activities are felt seriously on the economy. For example
risk loving nature of drivers with low literacy in large vehicles cost about
75 percent of the lives lost and about 3 to 4 billion rupees damage to
property and machinery annually.

Risk made simple

Simple analysis of risk of a disaster in stages is presented below with an

aim of simplifying the understanding of risk.

Risk is the thought of getting damaged, injured or dead. For example

when a child attempts something which is difficult the mother or the
adult will tell the child “NO”, “DON’T” , which is the first command a
child receives on risk. Through the constant contact with the mother
child learns to identify risk and risky work. This provides the child with
various risk levels of various types of environments, work and play.
However, child will forget most of the past experiences with risk until
the age of 10 or 12 and repeat many risky works and get injured or
damage property. The risks which will be faced at this stage are mostly
homebound or at school connected to school going.
The adolescence brings a child closer to environmental risks outside
home and school as the child begins to move among is peer group more
than his home people. This is also the great age of experimentation and
media reports indicate that a fair amount (about 35 to 45 percent) of
children die of risks taken without full knowledge of the disaster during
this age. Drowning, bicycle accidents, motor cycle accidents and
adventure in the wild are the major causes of these deaths.
The youth brings the society closer to a person with many peer groups
mixing at work, high school and fun. This is the age of dual
responsibility where the self begins to plan for the future, fall in love,
help parents and family and keep a constant contact with friends. Youth
begins to take environment more seriously than before but experiences
with anti social activities or adventure can bring risks closer to the youth.
In addition to risks related to high mobility, drugs, alcohol and sex enter
the life of a youth.

123
However in comparison to adolescence only about 12 to 15 percent of
youth die of exposure to high risks. The highest risk for youth is brought
about by conflict, terrorism and war which amount to about 87 percent of
all deaths in youth. Today it is estimated that about 100 to 150 youth
loose their lives daily use to conflict, terrorism and war. The adventure
takes the next place in death of youth as youth is identified as the age of
adventure.
At adulthood man is guided to stay away from risks as his
responsibilities to home and society becomes more valuable. Except for
adults working in risky enterprises like industry and security services the
rest have very low level of risks. However, adult whom have not grown
out of their youth remain vulnerable to risks related to anti-social
activities, drugs and sex. Towards the latter part of adulthood people are
exposed to high amount of health risks as they have worked harder and
wasted or comfort has made them suffering from chronic diseases.
Once people pass their adulthood into old age risk of disease becomes
well noted in their lives. Then it is clear that the concept of risk is highly
related to life cycle and immediate living, working and pleasure
environments. Learning to evaluate these variables makes someone
better equipped to deal with risks in life.

Reducing risk

Diversification, insurance, actual fairness and utilisation of complete

information system are the best ways of reducing risk. Taken from
business systems these methods of reducing risk are highly valuable to
any study of risk reduction. However all these actions require the
efficient operation of a planned work programme. Then the developing
countries have many difficulties in conducting these actions as they have
no efficient institutional framework.

Diversification can be applied to settlements which are affected by

natural disasters through removal of construction to a safer site.
Corruption can be limited by decentralising the financial authority to
village level officers. Traffic congestion can be minimised by
cancellation of right to park on highways.

Insurance is an asset to all in facing disaster. The developed world has a

well established long-term insurance system, where people can benefit
during disaster. The developing world is yet to establish universal
insurance systems which can benefit its populace and attempts to
establish such systems are hindered by inefficient taxation systems in
them.

124
Actual fairness in governance and management is a distant truth to
developing countries as they are yet to establish good governance. Lack
of good governance in developing world has led to an increase of natural
and societal disasters in them. War and terrorism in most of the
developing countries is primarily a result of poor economic status and
equality. The use of complete information system in disaster
management is activated only through actual fairness.

Personal Glimpse

Author thinks that he should present his personal glimpse into risk as he
has lived in many types of environments in Sri Lanka, Africa, Europe
and travelled widely all over the world covering about 47 countries and
worked under modern and traditional systems. Further author believes
that the only way to reduce risk is to follow the combined scientific truth
of traditional and modern understanding of environment and
development. Author was under care and guidance of his parents where
he learned early to control risks and live safely. However, the author had
two major engagements with death during adolescence, once a close
encounter with drowning in Kalu Ganaga and another close encounter
with a lepored, walking in the Samanla forest. The learning of breathing
helped the author to escape drowning and lessons on mountain hiking
learned from his father led him to escape from the lepored.

Youth and adulthood brought a great period of exploration to the author

with constant engagements with mountain climbing and trekking in all
the major mountain ranges of Sri Lanka, Europe and West Africa
between 20 and 35 years of age. Many close encounters with death were
experienced during this period of travel, but author managed to stay alive
as he managed to practise principles of disaster control.

Entering his old age author has managed to continue his climbing and
trekking and at the age of 56 he has managed to climb the highest
mountain in Northern Europe (Gladdhopigen in Norway), trek through
Arctic Circle and the highlands of Northern Norway at the age of 56.
most of his climbings and treks were conducted on solo basis and his
advice to all adventurers is “do not take unnecessary risks” .

Risk in relation to immediate living environment is assessed below

Natural disasters

Stage 1- when you are building your house/ commercial establishment

check for the possible disasters around

125
Find out the pattern of occurrence or probability of occurrence. Use
available scientific information. Details of these are available with
researchers in Universities. Older people in the area can give you some
information. Folk lore may be helpful. Information given by older people
and folk lore has to be presented to a disaster analyst for valuation.
Remember that natural disasters can be activated by man through
building improperly. Landslides can begin when the slope is cut into
steeper than natural/ flood level can rise in the valley when some parts of
the plain is filled and raised to construct.

All major road projects in the highland of Sri Lanka activate rock and
landslide of small to medium scale – total extra expenditure on road
repair between Gampola and Paradeka was estimated to be about 1 to 2
million rupees. This expenditure has to continue until slopes are settled
which means that for another about five to ten years an annual damage of
about 1 million is expected. In addition danger to traffic remains a
serious problem. Similar damage continues to occur in Mathale- Kandy
highway every year since its construction.

Filled flood plain diverted flood water to unexpected areas in all the
floods of 2003 and 2006. it should be remembered the flood plain is
constructed by the river to hold its flood waters during major recurring
floods of 50 and 100 years. These floods are hardly noticed by man, but
they arrive on schedule only with one or two year shift from the exact
date of occurrence. Therefore man should not forget that the nature has
its calendar and if man is to alter the environment man should be ready
for disaster.

Stage 2
Identify the possible disasters in your area/ their time of occurrence/ their
nature over the last 10 years/ take maximum precautions to save life.

In terms of landslides the answer is slope stabilisation with proper

foundations, which can hold until the lives are saved. With reference to
flooding avoid areas with flash flood and built with maximum resistance
to flood.
Time of occurrence of disasters like landslides and flood are seasonal and
observation of the environment will save lives. This type of observation
can be conducted with the aid of public services and when they are
ineffective the community can contact a higher research body like
university for help.

126
Stage3

The evaluation supplied by the scientists has to be followed and the

recommendation has to be implemented. However it should be
remembered that most of the predictions of natural disasters may be not
very accurate and the people affected should not be discouraged by the
failure of prediction.

The adherence to this type of response system will minimise the risk of
death from natural disasters.

Societal disasters –

These disasters occur mainly due to increased density of settlement,

roads and high mobility of people. In addition when man begins to
forego ethical behaviour in community development, corruption is
created. Increased road and building density increases the risk of traffic
accidents, if the settlements are not properly planned. Fro example the
high rate of fatal accidents on Sri Lanka roads are due to non-provision
of pedestrian ways, non-provision of legal facilities to punish errand
drivers and locating housing areas at the side of highways.

Social corruption leads to anti-social behaviour, which increases conflict

in the community. Conflict leads to a crisis in law and order. Socio-
political corruption in developing countries are noted as the most
damaging factor in economic development and some of the global
funding authorities have stopped direct monetary allocations to them.

This sad situation is not only supported by local socio-political situation ,

but also by some corrupt elements in the developed world financial
system, which allow illegally gained wealth of the elite of the developing
world to be saved in the banks and investment companies of the
developed world. This system of corruption is identified by many
(Usman, Sen and Scudder) as the major reason for poverty in the
developing world.

Societal risks are kept under control in the developed countries through
application of legislation and continuing education. However, there is no
possibility of controlling societal disasters in the developing world and

The occurrence of disaster in Sri Lanka is generalised in Map1, which

can be used as a basis of understanding in future.

127
Tables 4/22/1 to 4/22/4 show signs to be watched if there is no general
warning given by public authorities. The information given here is based
on the collection of life stories from various sources such as field work,
global TV channels (Discovery , BBC, CNN, Reality TV, National
Geographic, Animal Planet etc.). however, the procedure given here is
highly generalised, but will save lives.

Facing disaster

People at risk should be educated continuously through the use of local

information network, national and regional radio and television
networks. Media system in operation should have a compulsory time slot
at least thrice weekly for the purpose of preparation for the disaster.

128
 Table 4/26/1 During disaster (2 major geological environmental disasters affecting Sri Lanka)

Type Immediate action Secondary Living through

action
Earthquake Go for cover, if you are When shaking Do not return until all the after shocks are over. Help the
in the house go under stops run out to victims as much as you can. Get the community together.
strong furniture (table, clear area Beware of unknown visitors. Stay with known people.
bed)
Flood Do not wait for the last Stay in high Stay in high ground until water recedes. Help the victims as
minute ground much as you can. Get the community together. Beware of
unknown visitors. Stay with known people together

129
 Table 4/26/2 During disaster (2 major geological environmental disasters affecting Sri Lanka)

Type Immediate action Secondary Living through

action
Cyclone Go for cover, if you are Go out when wind Help the victims as much as you can. Get the
and tornado in the house go under a stops community together. Beware of unknown
strong furniture (table, visitors. Stay with known people together
bed) do not go out to see
the wind
Landslide Run away form the path Stay away from Help the victims as much as you can. Get the
the path community together. Beware of unknown
visitors. Stay with known people together

130
Table 4/26/3 During disaster (four major societal environmental disasters affecting Sri Lanka)

Type Immediat Secondary Living through

e action action
Corruption Try not to Organise Continue campaigning (but take care
support societal as the corrupt may attempt to harm
action you)
Traffic accidents Try help Calm the Continue campaigning for safe driving
victims environment (but take care as the corrupt may
attempt to harm you)
Sadism/ Inefficiency Try not to Organise Continue campaigning for efficiency
support societal and good governance (but take care as
action the corrupt may attempt to harm you)

131
Table 4/26/4 During disaster (Health disaster)

Type Immediate action Secondary action Living through

Epidemic Follow medical advice Organise societal action Follow medical advice until the
declaration of safety by
authorities
Emergency after any natural Try to give first aid, Organise societal action to Follow medical advice until the
disaster bring seriously injured find any medicines left in declaration of safety by
to the nearest transport the vicinity authorities
point
Traffic accidents Try help victims, try to Calm the environment Continue campaigning for safe
stop bleeding with any driving (but take care as the
method known to you corrupt may attempt to harm you)

132
The following schedule is prepared for developing countries including Sri
Lanka

At the onset of the disaster (Tables 4/26/1, 4/26/2 and 4/26/3)

1. Evacuate at the moment of warning

before evacuating collect essential food items, medicine, water and
clothing for hard wear
2. Always follow the advice of a security personal or an elder in the
Community in the process of evacuation
3. Use all your ability and strength to keep people away from danger

During disaster

1. Disaster will pass quickly (see time line of natural disaster causing
elements and factors tables 4.27 to 4.36, (Seneviratne, 2006b), but it
will be extremely difficult to bear.
2. if you survive without serious injury, try to help people who are
seriously injured or need medical attention

First hour to 12 hours after disaster

1. Outside help will not be able to reach you in disasters which involve
natural forces and if you are not seriously injured try to help the
seriously injured and weak and feeble. Conserve all food and water
available. Try not to be afraid of dead. Looting may begin and be
cooperative with any force as the looters may kill you.

13th hour to 24 hours after disaster

1. Outside help may come in trickles and you may or may not get food
and
2. Water and fear will grip you. Therefore be brave and keep on
working with injured. Looting will continue and be cooperative
with any force as the looters may kill you.

25th hour and after

1. Outside help will arrive and you can handover relief work to others
and
133
 become a helper to them.

Always remember that the disaster is a time of opportunity for anti-

social elements and they may even kill to achieve their objectives, in
the absence of proper law enforcement agencies.

134
 Table 4/27 Living pulses of the earth – EARTHQUAKES and VOLCANIC ERUPTION releasing pressure of
the earth’s interior
Types of breathes and shakes
Earth tremor/ Volcanic
tremor
Earthquakes below
4.5Richter scale/
volcanic gas burst
Earthquakes 4.5 to 5.4
Richter scale/ volcanic
pyroclastic flow
Earthquakes 5.5 to 6.4
Richter scale/ low
level volcanic
explosions
Earthquakes 6.5 to 7.4
Richter scale/
moderate level
volcanic explosions
Earthquakes 7.5 to 8.4
Richter scale/ high
level volcanic
explosions
Earthquakes 8.5 to 9.4
Richter scale/
disastrous
volcanicexplosions
* 1 Hiroshima bomb (atomic) is equal to about 500,000 claymore mines.
Table 4/28 Living pulses of the earth - LANDSLIDES - moving masses of soil and rock
Energy release Time period Result
1 Hiroshima 1 – 5 Seconds with 1 after Shake
bomb shock
2 to 3 Hiroshima 3 –7 Seconds with 1 to 2 after Shake and break
shocks
bombs
2 to 4 Hiroshima 3 – 10 Seconds with 1 to 2 Shake and break – temporary buildings, vehicles speeding over 100km/hr
bombs after shocks can be thrown out of the road
20 Hiroshima 3 –15 Seconds with 2 to 3 Shake and break – temporary buildings, some weak well constructed
bombs after shocks buildings, vehicles speeding over 60 km/hr can be thrown out of the road,
mud slides and landslides can be generated
200 Hiroshima 5 – 20 Seconds with 3 to 4 Shake and break – temporary weak and even some well constructed
bombs after shocks buildings, vehicles speeding over 40 km/hr can be thrown out of the road,
mud flow, and landslides and small Tsunami can be generated
2000 Hiroshima 10 – 20 Seconds with 4 to 5 Shake and break – all buildings without earthquake proofing, vehicles
bombs after shocks parked can be thrown out of the road – mud flow, landslides and Tsunami
can be generated
10,000 Hiroshima 20 – 30 Seconds with 5 to 6 Shake and break – all buildings without earthquake proofing and even
bombs after shocks some earthquake proofed heavy buildings, vehicles parked can be thrown
out of the road, mud flow, landslides and Tsunami generated
135
Types of Time Velocity Material involved Result
breathes period
and
shakes
Landslide Seconds 60 to 150 km/hr Soil, rock, gravel, mud, Destruction of any human construction on its path
to few vegetation and water
minutes
Mud slide Few to 90 to 300 km/hr Mostly mud and sand and few Destruction of any human construction on its path
many rocks and vegetation
seconds
Gravel Few to 30 to 70 km/hr Mostly gravel, rocks and Destruction of any human construction on its path
slide many vegetation
seconds
Rock fall Few to 150 to 400 km/hr Mostly large blocks of rocks Destruction of any human construction on its path
many and some soil
seconds
Creep Few 2 to 5 cms/hr Mostly large blocks of soil Destruction of any
minutes to and regolith. Sometimes human construction on
many rock and boulders are its path
days and embedded in it.
some
times
many
years
Flow Few 30 to 60 km/hr Mostly small quantities Burial of any human
seconds to mud, sand and gravel construction on its
minutes path

136
 Table 4.29 Living pulses of the earth - STREAMS (smaller than 5 meter of channel width) and RIVERS (5 meter or
bigger than 5 meter channel width)

Types of Time period Velocity Material involved Result

breathes and
shakes
Low flow Vary on 3 to 6 km/hr Water, mud and sand Gentle flow - enjoyable
rainfall
Medium flow High rainfall 5 to 10 km/hr Water, mud sand and Moderate flow – be careful
vegetation
High flow Very high 20 to 30 Water, mud sand, gravel High flow – be very careful
rainfall km/hr vegetation and
settlement debris
Flood flow Extremely 30 to 50 Water, mud sand, gravel Flood – be extremely careful
high rainfall km/hr vegetation and
settlement debris
Catastrophic Extremely 30 to 70 Water, mud sand, gravel Raging Flood – stay away from the stream or
flood high rainfall km/hr vegetation and river
settlement debris

137
 Table 4.30 Living pulses of the earth - WIND

Types of breathes Time period Velocity Material involved Result

and shakes
Gentle wind 80 to 90 percent of the 2 to 5 Dust and light objects (paper and polythene bags) Enjoyable
time km/hr
Moderate wind 8 to 20 percent of the 4 to 7 Dust, fine sand and light objects (leaves, paper, paper bags, Manageable but discomfort to women as
time km/hr polythene bags and heavy plastic bags and bottles) long dresses and hair shaking, cycling
becomes difficult, kites can fly
Strong winds 1 to 2 percent of the 8 to 15 Dust, fine sand, coarse sand, light objects leaves, paper, paper Difficult to manage discomfort to women
time km/hr bags, polythene bags and heavy plastic bags and bottles, twigs as long dresses and hair shaking, cycling
and dry branches. Dust rises above the head. becomes very difficult, kites can fly high,
felt by motor vehicles. Difficult to carry
umbrellas.
Light Gale force Less than 0.3 percent 15 to 30 Dust, fine sand, coarse sand, light objects leaves, paper, paper Very difficult to manage serious
winds of the time km/hr bags, polythene bags and heavy plastic bags and bottles, twigs discomfort to women as long dresses and
and dry branches. Dust rises above the head. Weak branches hair shaking, cycling becomes extremely
break. Some temporary housing and bird’s nests will break. difficult, kites will tumble, felt strongly
by motor vehicles. Cannot carry
umbrellas.
Strong gale force Less than 0.1 percent 30 to 60 Objects leaves, paper, paper bags, polythene bags and heavy Dangerous to be outside. Low visibility
winds of the time km/hr plastic bags and bottles, twigs and dry branches. Dust rises and limited flying
above the head. Weak branches break. New branches break,
weak trees fall, weak roofing fly. All temporary housing and
bird’s nests will break. Children less than 10 kilos will fall.
Cats and dogs will have difficulty in staying upright. All
animals will go into hiding
Cyclonic/Hurricane/ Less than 0.01 percent Over 60 All objects not built from reinforced concrete or steel is All humans and animals can die. Low
Typhoon/Tornado / of the time and up to subjected to damage or destruction. All human and animal life visibility and No flying
Khamsin type winds 300 km/hr is in danger.

138
 Table 4.31 Living pulses of the earth – CLOUDS

Type of Time period Velocity Size , location in the sky, Material involved Result
formation
Cirrus 1 percent 5 to 10 km/hr Small – above 1000 m, Ice particles Dry weather
Stratus - 2 percent 10 to 15 km/hr Small above 1000 m, Ice particles and some water droplets Dry weather and sometimes
cirro dew
Stratus - 3 percent 10 to 20 km/hr Moderate to big, above 1000 m, Ice particles and some Dry weather and sometimes
cumulo water droplets dew
Stratus 20 to 25 percent 6 to 20 km/hr Moderate to big, form over oceans above 1000m , drift to Wet weather and some times
land, Water droplets long duration gentle rain
Strato - 8 percent 10 to 30 km/hr Moderate to big, form over oceans above 1000m drift to Wet weather and gentle to
Nimbus land, Water droplets moderate rain
Strato – 4 percent 10 to 30 km/hr Moderate to very big, form over warm oceans above Wet weather and gentle to
Nimbus – 1000m and drift towards land, large from 200 square strong rain of long duration
depressional kilometres to 3000 square kilometres, Water droplets
clouds
Cumulus 50 to 60 5 to 30 km/hr Moderate to big Water droplets, form at 3000 to 10000 Wet weather and some times
percent meters above ground and drift down to about 1000 meters long duration rain
Cumulo- 11 percent 10 to 40 km/hr Big to very big, form at 3000 to 10000 meters above Rain to short duration heavy
Nimbus ground and drift down to about 1000 meters, Water rain with lightning
droplets
Double Cell 0.2 percent 20 to 60 km/hr Big to very big, Water droplets form at 3000 to 10000 Rain and high intensity rain.
Cumulo- meters above ground and drift down to about 1000 meters Low visibility and No flying
Nimbus
Multiple 0.01 percent 40 to 300 km/hr Big to very big, form at 5000 to 10000 meters above High intensity rain and winds
Cell ground and drift down to about 1000meters, Water Cyclonic and Tornado. Low
cumulus droplets visibility and No flying

139
 Table 4.32 Living pulses of the earth – RAINFALL/ SNOW FALL / ICE FALL

Types of Time period Velocity Size , Material involved Result

breathes and
shakes
Slight rain/ 10 to 20 minutes 0.2 to 0.3 0.005 mm to 0.001 mm, water Water droplets snow and ice flakes these can make the ground
Snow drops meters per droplets, snow flakes and ice flakes slippery.
second
Moderate 10 to 30 minutes 0.4 to 0.6 0.003 mm to 0.01mm, water droplets, Water droplets and large snow and ice flakes these can make the flow
rain/ Snow meters per snow flakes and ground slippery
fall second
Heavy rain / 10 to 45 minutes 0.4 to 0.8 0.01 mm to 0.5 mm, water droplets, Water droplets and snow flakes.
Snow fall meters per snow flakes
second
Torrential 20 to 45 minutes 0.4 to 1.0 0.01 mm to 0.5 mm, water droplets, Water droplets and snow flakes. Low visibility and No flying
rain/ Snow meters per snow flakes
Storm second
(Blizzard)

140
Table 4.33 Living pulses of the earth – DUST STORM

Types Time Velocity Size , Material involved Result

of period
breathes
and
shakes
Dust 1 to 10 20 to 30 km/hr Small (1 meter square) to Flying dust at high speed. Health hazard and
devil minutes large (5 meter square) traffic hazard
Dust 20 10 to 30 km/hr 20 square kilometres to 2000 Slowly drifting dust for long periods of time.
storm minutes to square kilometres Health hazard and traffic hazard. Low visibility
3 days and No flying
Sand 10 15 to 150 km/hr 5 square kilometres to 2000 High speed dust flow with very low visibility
storm minutes to square kilometres Serious health hazard and traffic hazard. Low
45 visibility and No flying.
minutes

141
Table 4.34 Living pulses of the earth – Glaciers (ice rivers)

Types of Time Velocity Size , Material Result

breathes period involved
and
shakes
Glacier Geological Few centimetres per Ice, snow, Maintenance of rivers, lakes and supply of cool water to the
climatic year rock debris, ocean. The rapid melting of ice sheets are causing flooding
change soil and drop of ocean temperature, which can result in dry
climates globally.

142
Table 4.35 Living pulses of the earth – Sea and Ocean Waves

Types of Time Velocity Size , Material involved Result

breathes period
and
shakes
Gentle 99.8 4 to 6 km/hr 10 to 50 square meters – Gentle sea and enjoyable beach
waves percent of water and light organic
the time debris
High 0.18 10 to 15 km/hr 100 to 200 square meters – Rough sea and dangerous to be in the beach
percent of water and light to heavy
the time organic and inorganic debris
– can shake a canoe
violently
Streaming 0.02 Above 20 km/ hr 500 to 1000 square meters – Dangerous to be at the beach, can drag a human being on the
percent of water and heavy organic and splash and take out to sea.
the time inorganic debris can throw a
mechanised boat

143
Table 4.36 Living pulses of the earth – OCEANIC CIRCULATION AND DEEP SEA CURRENT

Types of Time period Velocity Size , Material Result

breathes involved
and
shakes
Tides Diurnal and 1cm/ minute Millions of cubic Coastal areas are washed and cleaned
Seasonal kilometres, sea water,
plankton and fish
Surface Seasonal 5cm/ minute Millions of cubic Coastal areas are made more wet or dry
currents kilometres, sea water,
plankton and fish
Deep Continuous 1 cm /day Billions of cubic Earth’s air conditioner, cool the tropics and warm the
sea kilometres, sea water temperate areas
current and chemical
deposits

144
Chapter 5

Modelling disaster
Disaster management depends on modelling for testing safety,
response and recovery systems.

Hazard management provide the system of understanding of

control and manage hazards. But disaster management has to be
ahead of hazard management as it has to incorporate the response
to a destruction arising from a hazard. Then disaster and risk of
disaster has to consider the hazard, effect of hazard on people
through time and space and the varying degrees of vulnerability to
the hazard event (Wisener et al, 2004).

Risk is an expected damage and vulnerability is potential for

exposure to damage. For example living at Peradeniya slump site
was a risk, but people living in and around it refused to believe it is
a risk. However after strengthening the soil cutting people who
occupied the area thought that they have nothing to fear. This is to
think that they are not vulnerable, but they forgot that science
cannot be cheated and they were vulnerable. Once the disaster
occurred there was physical and psychological destruction and
some of the social relations were useless and others were lost and
they have to now depend on external resources for recovery.
Two models based on PAR and ACCESS type of models (Wisner et
al, 2004) are presented here.

PAR model is based on the vulnerability and the level of impact of

the disaster is decided by the intensity of the hazard and
vulnerability of society to the hazards which it is subjected to. To
reduce the impact of the disaster the vulnerability has to be
reduced. In this model three systems indicate the growth of
vulnerability. They are root causes, dynamic pressures and unsafe
conditions.

Under root causes

1. limited access to power, structures and resources
2. political systems and economic systems ideologies are
given.

145
Dynamic pressures are identified as lack of required facilities and
macro-forces. Under lack of required facilities,
1. local institutions
2. training
3. appropriate skills
4. local investments
5. local markets
6. press freedom
7. ethical standards in public life are given.

Under macro-forms
1. rapid population change
2. urbanisation
3. arms expenditure
4. debt repayment schedules
5. deforestation
6. decline in soil fertility are given.

The unsafe conditions formed by these two factors are listed under
Physical environment, local economy, social relations, public
actions and institutions

Under physical environment

1. dangerous locations
2. unprotected buildings and infrastructure are given.

Under local economy

1. livelihoods at risk
2. low income level are given

Under social relations

1. special groups at risk

2. lack of local institutions are given

Under public actions and institutions

1. lack of disaster preparedness

2. prevalence of endemic diseases are given

When disaster occur the risk of disaster is given as

RISK= Hazard x Vulnerability

146
Hazards and disaster are identified under all the sectors of natural
and man induced categories with the inclusion of disease as a
category. Virus and pests are considered an important category
(Figure 5.1).

Figure 5.1 PAR (Generalised)

GEO POLITICAL ENVIRONMENT

DYNAMIC PRESSURES

UNSAFE CONDITIONS

RISK

HAZARD /DISASTER

The width of arrow indicates the pressure on vulnerability in the

developing countries where the geopolitical environment is
constantly harassed by unethical standards in public life.

ACCESS model is built on an expanded analysis of PAR with

inquiring into the economic, social and political processes behind
vulnerability and risk. Within this model hazard sometime intensify
vulnerability and reduce power to recover from disaster. Therefore
the ACCESS model can also be called the Environmental Model of
Disaster Management and closely associated with PODS.

The ACCESS model investigates the primary or surface cause,

secondary or underlying cause and tertiary or hidden cause of

147
disaster and has the capability to explain an event in much more
detail than in a direct systems analysis. This is because most of the
disasters are not natural in occurrence, as most of the disastrous
happenings of the present day world occur because people have
selected to live they way they live and forget scientific base of
disaster.

For example in Rathnapura Floods of 2003

Flood was expected, but not listened to scientific advice and land
on the river bank was utilised without proper safety system, people
never thought that the river has its natural cycle of major floods,
drainage was not considered important etc.

However these models have failed to explain the role played by

political and social institutions in the developed world in not
controlling their undue financial influence on the developing which
lead to most of these unethical standards among political and
administrative elite in the developing world. In addition models so
not account for allowing the development authorities to use funding
from the developed countries on unscientific land use, which
accelerates the strength of disaster.

The ACCESS model can be utilised well for all the detailed studies
on impact on households, specially in developing countries.

Access model

Begins from the secure system of social structure and social

relations where normal life is available with social protection in
place.

Unsafe conditions can form within this secure system due to

influence from lack of readiness to disaster

Specific hazard with its spatio-temporality triggers the disaster and

penetrates the protected society

This will begin the first round of impacts on normal life, leading to
coping, adaptation and interventions

The experiences will take the society to the next disaster with
actions of disaster reduction, which will feed the unsafe

148
conditions with scientific information and raise the level of social
protection

Evaluating the factors in the model

The factors in the model are taken out for a basic valuation for the
primary disaster management. The values 1,2 and 3 are given for
each stage of assessment.

Score 1= weak and high risk

Score 2 = fair and risky
Score 3 = good and low risk

Factor Score = 1 Score = 2 Score = 3

Limited access to
Power 1
Structures 1
Resources 1

Factor Score = 1 Score = 2 Score = 3

Ideologies
Political Systems 1
Economic Systems 1

Factor Score = 1 Score = 2 Score = 3

Lack of following
local institutions 1
training 1
appropriate skills 1
local investments 1
local markets 1
press freedom 2
ethical standards in 1
public life

149
Factor Score = 1 Score = 2 Score = 3
Macro forces
rapid population 2
change
urbanisation 1
arms expenditure 1
debt repayment 1
schedules
deforestation 1
Decline in soil 1
productivity

Factor Score = 1 Score = 2 Score = 3

Physical
environment
dangerous 1
locations
unprotected 1
buildings and
infrastructure are
given

Factor Score = 1 Score = 2 Score = 3

Local economy
livelihoods at risk 1
low income level 1
are given

Factor Score = 1 Score = 2 Score = 3

Social relations
special groups at 1
risk
lack of local 1
institutions

150
Factor Score = 1 Score = 2 Score = 3
Public actions
and institutions
Lack of disaster 1
preparedness
Prevalence of 1
endemic diseases
are given

Evaluation – add all the scores and check with the following chart
for the level of risk and vulnerability.

Sri Lanka’s score is 24 and referring to the risk chart for

developing nations show that Sri Lankan’s lives are at the level of
very high risk in terms of disasters of natural and societal nature.

Risk Chart

Score Level of risk/vulnerability

Over 75 Very low risk (death possible 10
percent of the time)
65 – 74 Low risk (death possible 20 percent
of the time)
50 – 64 Moderate risk (death possible 30
percent of the time)
40 -49 High risk (death possible 40 percent
of the time)
30 -39 Very high risk (death possible 50
percent of the time)
20 -29 Very serious risk (death possible 75
percent of the time)
Below 20 Deadly (death is possible at any
time)

Scores for Sri Lankan situation –some examples-

Activity Score
Corruption 30 -39
Traffic accidents Below 20
War 20-29
Natural disasters 30-39

151
ACCESS model provides access to capabilities, assets and
livelihood opportunities to reduce vulnerability and avoid disasters.
For this purpose the disaster should be watched from the following
stages of observation.
1. identification of trigger event
2. vulnerability generated form the event
3. impact unfolding
4. role and agency of society involved
5. occurrence of impacts
6. coping system
7. developing recovery strategies
8. interaction with security services, owners of assets, local,
regional, national and international agents.

This system of observation involves the use of sustainable

livelihoods (Chambers and Conway, 1992; Drinkwater and
McEwan, 1994; Leach et al, 1997, Moser, 1998, Scoones, 1998:
Carney, 1998; Bellington, 1999: Haghebaert, 2001) and capabilities
approaches (Sen, 1981 and 1999) to disaster management. The
first publication of RISK by Blaikie (1977) and Blaikie (1985b)
have also noted a similar approach.
This indicates that the complex relationship of disaster in the
developing countries can be well accommodated in the ACCESS
model and PODS presented in this book is derived from that
experience.
Disaster has many relationships to its environment and the status of
environmental management in operation in the locality of disaster.
This is because, disaster is connected to space, time, literacy,
beliefs, ethics and sometimes factors like gender, ethnicity and
personnel behaviour.

152
Table 5/.1/ 1 to 5/1/8 Examples of relationships – (not all possible
relationships are given, only the most important are stated)

Table 5/1/1

Factor Trigger Disaster

Space 1 Plate tectonics Earthquakes
Volcanic eruptions
Subsidence
Tsunami
Landslides
Space 2 High intensity rainfall Landslides
Flash floods
Lightning
Road cutting
Overloading

Table 5/1/2

Factor Trigger Disaster

Time Climatic Flash floods
change Landslides
Crop failures
Pest invasions
Diseases
Traffic accidents
War
Conflict
Anti-social behaviour
Loss of Ethics

Table 5/1/3
Factor Trigger Disaster
Literacy Non Loss Environmental control
establishment leading to flash floods,
of rule of law landslides, loss of water
resources and drought
Traffic accidents
War
Conflict
Anti-social behaviour
Loss of Ethics
Economic failures
153
Table 5/1/4/

Factor Trigger Disaster

Beliefs Non-utilisation of Loss Environmental control
scientific systems leading to flash floods,
landslides, loss of water
resources and drought
Traffic accidents
War
Conflict
Anti-social behaviour
Loss of Ethics

Table 5/1/5

Factor Trigger Disaster

Ethics Unethical actions Loss Environmental control
leading to flash floods,
landslides, loss of water
resources and drought
Extremism

Table 5/1/6

Factor Trigger Disaster

Gender Unethical Loss Environmental
actions control leading to
flash floods,
landslides, loss of
water resources and
drought
Suffering of women

154
Table 5.1.7

Factor Trigger Disaster

Ethnicity Unethical actions Loss Environmental
control leading to flash
floods, landslides, loss of
water resources and
drought
Extremism
Conflict
war

Table 5/1/8

Factor Trigger Disaster

Personnel Unethical actions Loss Environmental
behaviour control leading to flash
floods, landslides, loss of
water resources and
drought
Extremism
Conflict
Riot
War
Drug addiction
Sexual molestation, rape,
serial killings

The relationship between factor, trigger and disaster in the above

tables is more applicable to developing world situations where
environmental planning is at a low utilisation level. Therefore
impact of disaster and recovery is much slower in them than in the
developed countries.

Figures 5/1/1, 5/1/2 and 5/1/3 show the change of environmental

elements and factors in Sri Lanka and developing nations in
general, vertical axis indicate risk level from 1 to 3/ 1 low damage,
2 moderate damage/ 3 high damage (based on White, 1974 and
Seneviratne, 2007)

155
Figures 5/1/1 Change in Rainfall, drought and flood situation

Figure 5/1/2 Change in population (people), ethics, ethnicity (level of

increased tension) and conflict (level of conflict)

156
Figure 5/1/3 change in literacy ( general literacy), environmental literacy
(literacy on managing environment) and disaster damage

157
Figure 5/1/4 Disaster damage situation in developed and developing
nations 9 developed nations ahve managed to reduce the impact of
variables given in Figures 5/1/1, 5/1/2 and 5/1/3 by employing better
environmental, management systems (law and regulation) and
increasing environmental literacy

Figures 5/2/1, 5/2/2 and 5.33 is based on generalised data from

many developing countries, based on the authors experiences in
many African and Asian countries including Sri Lanka between
1966 and 2017. They indicate that there is no relationship between
literacy and disaster as expected in these countries, which may be
due to loss of ethics and rising conflict in them. Serious loss of
ethics and degradation of local belief systems are the two major
factors responsible for this decay, which is suspected to have
originated from the colonial mentality of the leadership of post
independence period in these countries. Figure 5/1/4 show the
results of better environmental management in developed nations.

The utilisastion of the concepts of sustainable livelihoods and

capabilities approach are also hindered by the same type of
mentalities where locally generated knowledge is still rejected by
many attempts in disaster management. Then the use of ACCESS
158
model as in developed countries is urgently required in the
developing countries.

Kalu, Gin and NIlwala floods of 2003, floods and landslides of the
2006 October-November season which are responsible for a
minimum damage of about 100 billion Rupees (media publication
total) Rathnapura floods of 2003) further strengthens the concept
that literacy has not managed to reduce vulnerability and avoid
disaster as in the ACCESS model due to low level of use of
scientific understanding in disaster control. a close inspection of
the sites affected with the Field Class of the course Environmental
Hazards, 2006 revealed that more than 80 percent of the casualties
and damages occurred due to lack of proper scientific
understanding on the environment by planning or construction
authorities (non utilisation of PAR or ACCESS models).
Future looks bleak without proper modelling in Sri Lanka
therefore it is high time the ACCESS model and PODS are utilised
in any future disaster management system.

What to do for people without disaster warning

Cause of Signs to watch Activity recommended

disaster
Landslide Heavy rain Watch for extremely muddy
water in the streams
Heavy rain continue If murkiness (mixing of mud)
increases and water turns
dark then watch out for some
noises like thunder in the
higher slope
Slopes are all oozing Carefully go to the higher
out with water slopes to investigate the level
of saturation
If there are loose soil Leave the path immediately
and rock on the slope
Hear massive thunder Get out of the valley and run
like noise look out towards the high ground and
towards the higher wait until someone confirms
slopes all OK

Training required for this type of work can be provided to

volunteers at Rajarata University if they contact the Author through
the Vice Chancellor.
159
Flood

Cause of disaster Signs to watch Activity recommended

Flood Heavy rain Watch for the pattern
of water flow in the
low lying areas.
Media reports on Watch for the river
rain in up river overflowing
Flood confirms Get out of the low
lying areas early
If living by the Watch for bank
bank collapse constantly
If living on land Watch for water flow
fill
leaving Take all women and
children to high ground
when water level
reaches 2ft or 60
centimetres.
Do not trust any Do not attempt to cross
flowing flood without help
water more than 70
centimetres. Or 2
and half feet deep.

Training required for this type of work can be provided to

volunteers at Rajarata University if they contact the Author through
the Vice Chancellor.

160
 Cause of Signs to watch Activity recommended
disaster
Traffic Stopped on road and Advice the people to get
accidents talking/buying/repairing out of the road, but most
/ of the time they will abuse
you, as this type of drivers
are illiterate – it has
happened to the author
about 100 times in his life
time in Sri Lanka as the
author has to collect data
on response, if the vehicles
belong to any security
service do not interfere,
because they can molest
you.
Speeding bus Advice driver, but be
ready to be abused by the
driver/ conductor. Some
passengers as most of
these people are illiterate
and speeding buses are not
checked properly by the
police as there is some
connection between Police
and Buses.
Errand motor Advice driver, but be
bicycle/three ready to be abused by the
wheeler/bicycle driver/ conductor. Some
passengers as most of
these people are illiterate

Training required for this type of work cannot be provided to

volunteers at Rajarata University, because in this respect we have
to deal with illiterate and elitist organisation which can harm you
and your family. Political corruption is also a serious threat to
operation of road traffic law in Sri Lanka.

The activities which can be prepared for the three primary disaster
generating triggers were listed above and any additional
161
information is available in the Department of Social Sciences/
Environmental management, Rajarata University of Sri Lanka.

Chapter 6

Business of Disaster Management

Disaster management in business began with the introduction of
safety laws in industry and commerce. Later in the twentieth
century environmental protection legislation was also included in
this category of enactments. The international and national
enactments on safety can be obtained from international
organisations like UN, ILO, EU, NAFTA, WTO and many other
agencies responsible for safety in business. The best internet site is
UN and ILO. National safety enactments are available from
ministries of Labour and Environment. This chapter aims to present
the procedures of disaster management in relation to business in
general and the operational systems of disaster management with
special reference to a developing country like Sri Lanka.

The identification and research into disasters in business is almost

similar to that of environmental disasters as the business
environment is part of the built environment. Therefore chapters 1
to 4 in this book apply to business disaster management systems
and the information base required for each type of business has to
be extracted from them. The theory of new environmental
management and modern disaster management is applicable to
162
business as global, national and local businesses operate within the
accepted norms, legislations and ethics of society.

It is stated in chapter 4 that disaster management in developing

countries is at its infancy due to many scientific and societal
reasons. The following stories, which are based on author’s
personal experiences in working with various types of businesses,
will provide an insight to the reader with necessary facts about
disaster management in business in the developed world and
developing world.

Story 1
Country – Norway – 2000
Business – Super Market Chain

Super markets are the most visited commercial establishments in

the developed world and they have to be ready to open at 7 or 8 am
and close at 9 pm. They have to be stocked after closing and
cleaned before opening. Therefore a team of part time workers
enter the shop in the morning at 4.30 am to clean with their own
keys which are attached to a code numbered lock. At this time the
streets are deserted and these workers work alone until about 6.30
when the floor manager arrives for primary checks on cleaning,
stock and receive daily supply of perishables.

The cleaners work alone in the shop for about 2 to two and a half
hours guarded by video control anti-burglary devices. The worker
is insured against any danger within the working hours and police
will arrive within five minutes of the ringing of the alarm manually
or if it is activated automatically by an attempting forced entry. The
same alarm system will collect information on the worker
behaviour through a set of open and hidden video cameras.

Before I began my work I was informed by my employer that the

manager is moody and not very friendly. On the fifth day at work I
came across an open drawer with cash resting on a cashier’s table
and when reported it to the manager he thanked me and no further
discussions were held on the matter. When I casually mentioned
this incident to my employer he commented “that was a test that
manager does to check you out”. About a month into my
employment manager slowly became friendly and we had many
discussions on the purpose of my stay in Norway and my family.
The he began to inform me about the losses incurred due to shop
lifting by customers and cleaners and commented “I like you to
work with me as long as you are going to be here”. According
163 to
manager the store looses about 4 to 5 percent of its income through
shop lifting and all type of people from staff, delivery people,
customers and cleaners have been caught in camera. Before the
introduction of the camera system the losses were in the range of
10 to 15 percent and the installation of an additional security
system at accost of about 500,000 US Dollars in mid 2000, when I
was working there saved another 3 percent by the end of the year.
The total income of the shop which was the city centre unit was in
the range of 5 to 10 million US Dollars a year.

My security advice was issued on the first day at work. They were
1. do not touch any material on the shelf at any time. If by
accident any item is disturbed put it back where it was or
leave on the counter.
2. check you bag for any prohibited matter any unopened
purchases are prohibited to carry into the shop in the
morning.
3. if there is an attempt of forced entry noted, call 113
emergency services.
4. do not allow any of your visitors to accompany you to
work without prior permission from manager.
5. when you leave you have to leave from the workers door
6. between 4.30 am and 7 am you are fully insured to be
inside the shop.
7. then the manager showed me where the emergency doors,
fire doors, emergency telephones, fire safe (if suddenly fire
blocks the doors, this is the place to enter and wait for you
to be rescued by firemen)
8. I was warned of the ice at the door step during winter.
9. finally I was warned of stiff penalties for shop lifting.

During my stay at work in the establishment as a part time

worker for about 2 years, auto alarm was sounded three times
and police arrived within five minutes. Once police arrived
with the manager to check the status of the of the security
system. Twice some strangers made an attempt to
communicate with me through the main door, which was
refused. No loss of material was reported during the period of
my work, though about 3 staff of the shop was dismissed for
shop lifting.
Twice during the work period my employer had to transport me
to work as there was deep snow on ground. I was commended
at the end of my stay at work with them and was asked to come
and work for them when ever I am in Norway.
164
Table 6.1 relationship between advice and disaster

Security Probable disaster

advice
number
1 Caught in camera and suspected of shop lifting
2 suspected of shop lifting – societal disaster, I may be
deported ( people were deported or ordered to leave
without extension to visa in 200 for shop lifting)
3 You cannot control the situation and wasting time may lead
to loss of your life –most dangerous societal disaster
4 You may be implicated in an error committed by your
companion
5 Your insurance was on that route only – no compensation if
something happens to you if you leave by any other door
-disaster
6 Free mind to work, no worry of disaster
7 Most important in case of disaster
8 Most dangerous natural hazard and falling on ice can be
deadly – natural disaster
9 Most important personal information

Country Sri Lanka – 2005

Private Software Company (International)

Instructions very similar to that was issued to the author in Norway
are in practice.

Country – Sri Lanka -2005

Private Software Company (local)
No specific disaster scenario instructions are issued, some security
risks are given as information

Country Sri Lanka – public Services

No specific disaster scenario instructions are issued, some security
risks are given as information

Country - Sri Lanka 2005-2006, Mihinthale

Following hazards were encountered during the period, some of

which have reached the level of health disaster. These were notified
to the authorities, but no action was taken.

165
1. Storage of mattresses with chemical smell near living area which
led to three residents seeking medical attention. Case was reported
to the authorities and it took the about 4 days to remove and the
occupants had to endure chemical smell for that duration. Then
again freshly painted steel cupboards with paint smell were stored
in the same area and it took another complaint and about three days
to remove. The storage of tyres and furniture is still around with
many smells reaching the living area.

2. Leakage of water from a waste water pipe not attended since

reported about a year ago – bad smell and a health hazard

3. Water supplied has many types of sediments –chlorides/silt/clay

and cannot drink – common hazard leading to the disaster of Renal
failure in North central Province.

4. Most of the safety lights are not working for the last about six
months and 1 big snake, two vipers and a snake skin was found
within the living area.

The situation at Mihinthale site is disaster prone due to low literacy

and poor planning respectively. The storage problem is a result of
low environment literacy and others are due to poor planning. The
occupant of the area has to be extremely vigilant all the time and
his free movement is restricted due to these hazardous situations.

The system of disaster preparedness in business Sri Lanka are not

at acceptable level of operation due to non-adherence to legislation,
which is not properly governed by the public authorities. However,
multi-nationals working in Sri Lanka have some concerns of
disaster preparedness.

Between 2002 and 2005 average annual loss of life due to lack of
safety in business operations is estimated at about 310, without
taking into account the fatal accidents caused by drivers in
business. About 94 percent of the fatal traffic accidents are caused
by commercial vehicles, where there is no driver code. A survey
conducted on the convicted drivers indicate that 78 percent of the
returned to work immediately after the payment of fine without any
retraining by the employer or the company. A van driven by a
driver of a reputed private company who has been driving about 11
hours continuously crashed into author’s car. The cause of the
accident was sleeping on the wheel.

166
Fires related to commercial and industrial businesses have killed
about 34 people in the last year and about 30 of these people were
killed because of lack of disaster preparation by the employer. Most
common cause of ire was electrical short circuit or gas explosion
and most of these establishments had no proper safety measures in
place before the disaster. The total property damage estimated
using news paper reports and television reports amount to about 20
to 30 billion rupees. The global annual deaths resulting from
business related disasters is about 250,000 (not including traffic
accidents) and damages from business disasters (including
insurance payments) is about 2 billion US Dollars. It is noted that
there is a sharp decline of business related disasters in the
developed world and a sharp rise in the developing world. This
sharp rise in the developing world results from the use of old
machinery, poor safety systems in operation and environment
illiteracy. For example though the general literacy rate in Sri Lanka
is about 92 percent (2005), a survey conducted in seven provinces,
which are not affected by conflict indicate that the environment
literacy is well below 25 percent.

System disasters in business

System disasters in business study the financial, personal and

service type disasters. In here the managers must understand their
role in a rapidly changing world. The concept of environmental
change is applicable here as business operates within the living
environment of human beings. In some situations they are in
changes created by the outside forces and another time the
manager’s job is to promote change and create progress. Therefore
in modern business management should utilise adjustment or
creation or both to succeed.

Change is inevitable phenomena of management and the new

managers should understand the complexity and inescapability of
change if they are to be successful in their respective ventures.
System disasters in business can be avoided only through the
understanding of these changes in modern and post-modern
business. Firstly changes in knowledge, information and techniques
have to be understood by the manager. Behavioural sciences have a
great influence on management today and cooperation and control
should be combined in the new management process. However,
machines have also advanced and their role has to be understood
well by the modern manager. This indicates the value of scientific
thinking which will only reveal the intricate relationship of
business and customer, where business rests. For example most of
the financial disasters are activated by the breakdown 167of the
relationship between customer and business. The present failure of
public transport system in Sri Lanka is a result of lack of properly
qualified managers and competitiveness in the work force.
Likewise almost all the public services suffer from a lack of
scientific management approach in them and undue interferences
from elitist and political authorities. The private public transport
system is also not profitable as it is expected to be because of
exploitation of the customer, which lead to loss of income through
seeking alternative systems of transport. Further, not understanding
the scientific system of public transport due to low literacy of the
operators contributes to its low profitability. This is result of non-
utilisation of knowledge, information and techniques as given in
the modern management systems.

Secondly, scope of management is also changing rapidly as

managers are specialising in their fields and talking to people who
were considered not important in the past. For example women,
retired with experience and young enthusiasts are all considered as
manager in the new management thinking. Disaster study is given
to scientists in the universities and disaster managers are selected
from the military. Hurricane

Katrina taught USA that in disaster beyond state level should be

handled by a military personal with field command experience.
Former meteorology head who was sacked earlier for predicting on
tsunamis damage on Thai coast was reinstated to look after
Thailand’s Tsunami warning system. Former FEMA (USA) director
resigned after his failures at the handling of hurricane Katrina.
However, the use of older experienced, young enthusiast and
women has to be carried out with caution in the developing
countries. Many women who were given responsible positions in
Sri Lanka have become corrupt and some are hiding abroad. Older
and experienced or young enthusiasts hired in Sri Lanka for some
responsible posts have not performed as expected due to either
political pressure or lack of understanding of concept of change
which is new to them. Some of the media stories on their
performances indicate the presence of inert corruption.

Thirdly, the change in population, culture and market has to be

understood if a business to avert financial disaster. The age old
tradition of faithful customer and market size are not going to be
stable factors in future businesses. Further environmental pollution
and environmental management are going to be critical factors
168 for
business in this millennium. Business has to adjust to face the
changing physical, cultural and organisational frame work if it is
survive competition in the millennium.

Disaster plan for business

There cannot be a single prophetical disaster plan for business as

business ids the most varied system of operation in the world. The
nature of business varies from Multi-national, Trans- national,
regional and local to Mafioso. systems of operation. All the multi-
nationals, trans-nationals and Mafioso businesses have properly
made disaster plans for their businesses. The most vulnerable are
the regional operators and local trader. In Sri L there average of
about 20 regional operators are stepped down or declared bankrupt
in a year and about 2300 local businesses go out of circulation.
Within a given year about 10 regional businesses and 1450 local
businesses are newly registered. These middle and local level
businesses have no disaster plan other than depending on family or
friendly support they can gather in case of financial, technical or
human resource emergency. However, there is an emerging
scenario of re-leasing systems in Sri Lanka which is at its infancy.

The best disaster plan for businesses of regional or local level is to

use of a plan of prevention with reference to financial, technical
and human resources.

The effect of natural disasters is also having a considerable impact

on business in Sri Lanka. The total damage caused to business in
Sri Lanka by south Asian Mega Tsunami is estimated at about 6
billion rupees. Loss of income over the next five years was
estimated at 250 billion rupees. The effect of 2003 floods was
estimated at about 6 billion rupees and the 2006 floods and slides
have caused about 13 billion rupee damage to businesses. The
damage to businesses from natural disasters are on the increase in
Sri Lanka is mainly due to their indifference to scientific advice on
site and drainage.
(Use details from the discussion on risk in Chapter 4)

169
Chapter 7

Summary and Conclusions

Disaster management is an essential requirement of any society

today because loss of life cannot be replaced, valued and there is no
answer to trauma of loss. Further as science and technology has
become a part of our daily lives there is a possibility to utilise
knowledge to minimise damage and loss from disaster. For
example Malaysia managed to reduce its Tsunamis damage by
about 80 percent by utilising the best possible wave breakers in the
holiday beaches. Further most of the properly built hotel structures
and hotels with a good security system were able to save most of
the lives. The accurate warnings on hurricane Katrina saved about
10,000 lives as most of the knowledgeable people of the heavily
damaged area have willingly evacuated on the first advice given by
the authorities. This is because the damage level of the modern
disaster is closely related to the ability to evaluate the warnings
given by the disaster management authorities and facilities
provided for evacuation.
Inability to give warnings is considered foolish in disaster
management today as there are many prediction systems which can
provide a fairly accurate warning on most of the serious170 disasters
faced by humans except for earthquakes, though their reliability
may vary from place to place and time to time.

At the end of this book the first call made to the public authorities
in 1998 and 2003 is made again “We in Sri Lanka have to suffer
heavy economic damage amounting to about 30 billion rupees to
bring back the areas to operational level and according to popular
news, it may take about one third of our budgetary allocations this
year to fully rehabilitate the damage over a period of five years.

Will we be able to sustain this programme in case of continuing

natural disasters? The answer is no. We have to follow the scientific
evidences and be ready for the future.

All the developed countries have mega plans to face the impending
natural disasters. They have food, medical supplies and service
stocks in hand with disaster prediction, control and management
organizations.

The technology and expertise required for a fairly reliable

prediction is available in Sri Lanka, specially in the university
departments on which the management authority can rely on for
prediction and spatio–temporality of disaster. Low cost scientific
monitoring and recording systems are available in disaster study
systems of the world. However, the missing link in the developing
countries is will to utilise the scientific system of disaster
management in the prediction and the identification of spatio-
temporality. This type of failures is associated with governance and
planning in the developing countries which must change if impact
of disaster is to be reduced in the developing world.
The developing world situation can be generally applied to Sri
Lanka, where scientific environmental planning is yet to be fully
established and disaster management is developed as a scientific
project.

Recommendations

There is no need for a detailed list of recommendations as many

times in the past many scientists and project reports on disaster
management have produced many sets of comprehensive list of
recommendations. However, the effect of flooding, landslides and
unsafe roads have not reduced to an acceptable minimum. This is
mainly due to low scientific knowledge of the impending disasters
171
and socio-political corruption which has not installed any
environmental management plan for the country. The call made in
2003 is made again

“Please begin a long-term restructuring of environment in the

hazardous zones”.

In this process

Apply PODS in Sri Lanka and

1. Construct a detailed environmental management plan for the

nation
2. Involve university researches and departments as regional offices
of disaster management
3. Employ environmental management students qualifying from Sri
Lankan universities in their respective home areas as disaster
observation officers.
4. These will form the backbone of future disaster managers, who
will have a better understanding on local situations.
5. Reduce socio-political corruption to a level which will not affect
environmental management planning.

Note to humanity

Disaster cannot be stopped and it can only be controlled. Disaster

management based on modern environmental management is the
only way to reduce risk from disaster and disaster control. The
value of this approach is confirmed by the status of disaster control
in developed countries, where impact of disaster is reduced to a
possible minimum. For example, disaster control in developed
countries has managed to reduce the impact of disaster by about 60
to 70 percent of the expected loss in the last 5 to 10 years. The
impact of disaster in developing countries is rising at an alarming
rate of about 10 to 20 percent each year and the impact reduction in
them is only capable of reducing loss by about 5 to 10 percent.
Non-utilisation of environmental planning, non-adherence to
scientific knowledge and political and bureaucratic corruption are
constantly given as major reasons for heavy loss in disasters in the
developing countries. Therefore the able in the developing
countries have to resort to private enterprise for help through
insurance and investment, but the poor suffers heavily during and
aftermath of disaster. However, information on disaster situations
can be obtained from universities on request and listening to media
where university academics write on future of disaster.
172
Chapter 8

Future disaster environment – Sri Lanka

Natural Environment

Scientific analysis of present day natural environment of Sri Lanka

indicates that it is in a “chaotic state”.

Predictions and recommendations for the next 30 years ( extension of

prediction based on Seneviratne, 2005, which has proven true in
most cases)

Geological

Prediction

Increase in geological (landslides related) activity with slope destabilisation

due to weathering of basement complex gneiss and related rock
strata (calc gneiss).

Recommendation
173
Establishment of local disaster identification system with locally placed
trained personnel. Universities in the regions can be used as
trainers and supply of man power through their field work
programmes, which have financial allocations. At present
universities and other public and private research organisations
have no priorities related to probability of disaster and spend
their allocations without any national direction.

Rainfall

Prediction

General decrease of rainfall from monsoon type and cumulus activity.

However, most of the available water is wasted due to public sector
inefficiency and corruption and lack of management and control
of water sources.

Recommendations (Appendix B)

Reengineering the storage system to adjust to new climatic environment,

where probability of sufficient rainfall is low, but total rainfall is
sufficient if the flow systems are properly managed.

Reengineering

Establishment of proper storm drainage systems

Cleaning and redesign of water ways, weirs, ela (canals), storage reservoirs
and weva (tanks).

Construction of ponds or small storage reservoirs to store rapid flow from

high intensity rainfall in the urban surfaces (towns and cities).

Heavy forceful control on water wastage

Water Recycling

Artificial rain making

Drinking water quality is serious problem, which require immediate action.

Poor quality drinking water is partially responsible for present
174
 high prevalence of gastro- intestinal disorders in Sri Lanka. The
highest prevalence is recorded in the low and low-middle income
groups of people as rest, including politicians and administrators
and rich usually consume bottled water. The author spent 12 years
at Rajarata University and his water bill for bottled water was
240,000 rupees. Author has attended 37 conferences and seminars
and about 200 other types of meetings, where he consumed
bottled water. Once in a conference on water quality author
challenged the participants and audience to drink from the tap
water supplied by the NWSDB, which became laughing matter.
The response confirms that though we have 94 percent general
literacy our public authorities and general public are unable to
accept that all have failed as a nation to establish a quality supply
of clean drinking water.

Forest cover reduction

Prediction

Present system of forest and wild life management has failed due to
insufficient legal power of the controlling authorities and public
sector corruption

Recommendations

All land areas above 1450 meters above sea level has to be treated as
protected watersheds and any existing settlements and cultivation
has to be phased out in a 50 year plan.

For example all constructions and cultivation in and around Nuwaraeliya

town and surrounding area, Pattipola and Ambawela areas have to
be relocated to lower ground ( below 1400 meters) in a 50 year
resettlement plan. Access to Horton, Moon and Elk plains,
Sinharaja forest reserve, Smanala Range and upper Namunukula
range have to be closed except for research. Income generated
from the above mentioned areas at present is less than 0.02
percent of the GDP, population is about 400,000 but the cost of
environmental damage based on loss of spring water, soil erosion
and sedimentation, landslide and flash floods is in the region of
about 5 percent of GDP.

In general, a management system based on community responsibility and

public sector authority has to be established to plant, manage and
market forest products.
175
 Forest and wild life has to be managed with a view of harvesting its
products

Samples of each forest and wild life type has to be protected with no public
or any administrative access except for research, which can be
monitored by the respective universities in the region. Illegal
entry into these reserves has to be punished by heavy fines and
prison sentences.

Some new societal disasters developing into serious disasters last 10

years
Disease Cause
Rabies Lack of enforcement of law on
domesticated animals / low environment
illiteracy of policy maker and society. All
the religions advice that pets have to be
properly treated. However, lack of proper
understanding of religion by a small
minority of people and the low literacy on
pet care of the policy makers,
administrators, religious bodies and media
in Sri Lanka has resulted in large number
of stray dogs and cats.
Dengue Poor waste and waste water disposal
system mainly in urban areas
Traffic Low driving literacy, low mannerisms,
accidents poor road designs and corruption
Renal failure Poor quality drinking water and poor early
detection facility
Solution
Employ the existing laws on pets,
with registration and ability of the
owner to keep pets. Some owners in
the low income group cannot get a
decent meal a day, but try to rare pets
and when they acquire disease or
have litter they dispose the pet and
litter to the road.
Polcy makers inability to conduct
proper policy planning and low
environmental literacy of a minority
who have no concern for others.
Polcy makers inability to conduct
proper policy planning and low
environmental literacy of a minority
who have no concern for others. Most
of the roads have no proper
pedestrian areas which makes people
to walk on road. Poor road designs
(unnecessary curving and improper
cambering) and drainage on roadside
leads to breakages, which affect
traffic flow.
Poor policy on water supply and
health management

176
Ministry of health sources indicate that above disasters result in rising
health expenditure in the last 10 years.

The presence of disease at disaster level is linked to poverty and corruption

in the developing world. Countries with fair level of income have the
capability of maintaining a better health status than today, but financial
corruption prevents them from utilising scientific environmental planning
to obtain that better status. For example media reports reveal that the poor
health status is related to poor level of waste and drainage control as long
term plans for cleaner society are not followed in these countries.

Literature survey on the health status of developed world reveal that they
have carried out large scale filling or draining of wetlands to prevent
mosquito borne diseases and use massive quantities of chemical cleaning
fluids to clean the drainage system. Most of the researchers in health and
development agree (Senevirtane, 2003) that the better health status of the
developed is primarily a result of proper environmental planning and
enforcement of legislation on waste control.

There is a relationship between income and health in both developed and

developing but the infectious diseases and non-malignant chronic diseases
are a mainly a result of unclean environment.

Corruption

Corruption is one of the most commonly present societal disasters in the

world, but its effect on economic development is widely felt in the
developing world. This is because the rate of corruption in public services
in these countries seriously affects economic growth and development.
Further, corruption rejects the scientific method of development which is
the only stable way of development. Therefore developing countries suffer
continuously from lack of balanced social development, which leads to
continuing damage to both natural and societal environment.

Financial corruption retards development and leads to poverty. Poverty

results in all types of social ills. People look for avenues to fight corruption.
They take the paths of religious extremism, ethnic identity or regional
separation and establish protest and terror groups. At the moment of
finishing the second edition of this book ISIS, Al Qaida, Bokoharam and
many other groups in the developing world are at war with state forces
indicating that they have to establish a religious control over population to
solve problems. In total about 100 to 200 people die and thousands are
displaced (internally or externally) due these activities weekly. These
groups have become a threat to the developed world and there is continuing
war. Refugees from war and drought attempt to migrate to better 177places.
Daily news reports indicate many die on their way to new destinations.
Refugees have become a serious problem to USA and Europe as they avoid
autocratic states of Russia and peoples Republic of China. Most nations
like Australia and Japan have very strict rules on the acceptance of
refugees. Corruption has managed to destabilise the whole developing
world.

There is heavy out migration of educated and rich from Sri Lanka as the
nation is becoming more and more inefficient and unable to provide
employment to educated and business opportunities to rich who like to
conduct business. Business related activities suffer from serious
inefficiencies in the state system known as (red tape). Educated suffer from
neglect of ability and talent in state service and state affiliated services.
Therefore financial corruption has become a serious social disaster in Sri
Lanka.

This continuous damage to natural and societal environment will increase

the effect of disaster in the developing countries, though the whole world is
subjected to an increase in natural and societal disasters in the next 50 to
100 years. Most recent estimates indicate that most of the developing
countries will suffer serious disasters as they have not utilised
environmental planning in their programmes of development.

Financial corruption has reached an alarming level in Sri Lanka. Daily

media reports, policy announcements, judicial decisions indicate that
financial has become the most damaging societal environmental disaster in
Sri Lanka leading to slow pace of development and increase in
environmental damage.

Are the public, offices of politicians and administrators are ready to manage
and minimise the occurrence of hazards and disasters? Are the
people ready to manage and minimise the occurrence of hazards
and disasters?

At the time of finishing the 2nd edition of this book in 2018, April the
answer to both questions asked above is NO. Even the general
public which boasts a 94 percent literacy rate rarely follow
disaster avoidance advice. Therefore, disasters emanating from
the present disastrous environment (societal and natural) will
continue in the next 20 years, eroding the nation’s wealth.

Immediately prepare and activate a scientific National Strategic

Development Plan, not sector strategic plans by various public
institutions and authorities
178
Mobilise society and policy makers by employing rule of law

People

Development is a scientific process. Therefore a nation has to mobilize as a

whole to achieve development and a good living standard. This is
conducted with mobilization of physical and societal resources.

People on their own will never develop a nation and it is the scientifically
organized leadership and governance which has to guide the populace to
development.

People settle in their ancestral land or land acquired from government

on request.

If it is a hilly or mountainous area people will make foundations on slope

by cutting a wedge on the slope. These wedges have a tendency to weaken
the stability of slope, therefore have to be secured by strong retaining walls
and storm drainage. Sometimes, the instability of the wedge may be
indicated by a crack in the construction or in the ground where building is
situated. Further, regional rock instability created by earth tremors, quarry
blasts and overloading from construction can create cracks in the wedge.

However, the low and middle income people have no capacity to install
proper retaining walls or storm drainage and in rainfalls of more than 150,
with 80 millimeters/hour intensity the wedge area may collapse in a form of
a slide. Sometimes the upper part of the wedge can collapse into the house.
The field programme of the Department of Social Sciences, Environmental
Management sector, Rajarata University of Sri Lanka, conducted between
2005 and 2015 indicated that most of the landslide damage were noticed on
houses built on above mentioned types of wedges.

When a settlement is established at the foot of a hill or a mountain slope

there is a probability of landslide flowing through the settlement. Therefore
all settlements on this type of locations have to be surveyed and the
probable slide path have to be established. Once the probable slide path is
established housing have to be located about 600 meters away from the
path. Beragala, Naketiya, Puwakgahawela, and Aranayaka slides indicate
that the mudflow resulting from the landslide has spilled over the main
stream channel and covered about 500 to 600 meters of the right and left
banks. An observation made on old settlements of the hill and mountain
areas of Sri Lanka indicated that people have never built on the areas liable
to mudflow, and only recently (30 to 40 years ago) people have begun to
construct along unsafe stream lines utilising concrete walls and
foundations. They did not have any estimation on the extent of a slide flow
along the stream and its capacity to destroy. In here, the authorities
179
responsible for issuing permits for construction have had not conducted any
investigation into probability of landslide damage or the people have not
followed the advice given.

A similar situation exists in relation to flash floods and floods in Sri Lanka.
Low and middle income group people living on flood plain never believe
that there may be flash floods and floods which occur in a cyclic form in
the flood plain. Therefore, they settle anywhere they like and construct with
concrete foundations, not knowing that flood can lift and destroy many
light weight foundations. Expansion of large cities and small towns along
river and stream banks is common in Sri Lanka as there are no proper plans
to establish settlements with lowest risk from floods and flash floods.

Therefore people cannot plan their settlement, it is the responsibility of

the public authorities to provide safe areas for people to settle.
However, as the public authorities of Sri Lanka have no National
Strategic Development Plan, people will be subjected to floods and
flash floods for many years to come.

The cycle of suffering of landslides, floods and flash floods in Sri Lanka

Heavy rainfall – warnings from Disaster Management Centre - NBRO

and Ministries involved in Disaster Management - Landslides, floods
and flash floods – Media reporting with people crying- Armed forces
mobilised – private and public Relief operation begin – temporary
shelters – disaster situation is over – continuing complain of lack of
relief to recover- sittings and protests – fade away – wait for the next
(in case of floods and flash floods the same area will be subjected to the
same disaster next year or in 2 to 3 years time – cycle repeats --Damage
level is continuously increased affecting local, regional and national
development.

Further, generally floods and flash floods come in cycles of 3 to 10 years

and people have decided that it is a rare event and continue to live in a high
risk area. The public authorities will provide some relief to them when
disaster occurs.

Mobilization of the populace is also an essential part of the development

process. Highly developed nations with varying population numbers, like
Japan, Norway, UK, Australia, USA and Canada, show that mobilization
through proper payment of tax is an essential part of development and
establishing a good living standard.

180
Developing nations have not managed to establish this status of
mobilisation through payment of taxes and therefore remain poor and
undeveloped. Research and media information indicate that it is financial
corruption and poor governance which retards development in all
developing nations. Therefore corruption and poor governance is the
primary cause of human suffering and poverty.

Hard drugs

Hard drugs have been a serious societal hazard and disaster since the
beginning of modernity. Development of modern technology led to rapid
transport systems, which facilitated the transport of hard drugs away from
production areas to new markets. New markets were born in the rich urban
areas of the developed and developing world. High profits made from sales
led to involvement of all types of public and private sector in the drugs
trade. Many national figures and sometimes the heads of state have also
joined the drugs trade as a media for accumulating wealth for political
gains and personal wealth.
Today it has become one of the major destructive forces in the society
affecting all types of families, rich and poor. It has links to prostitution,
people smuggling, pornography and arms trade. There is no special
character in people who get addicted to hard drugs, but people with some
mental developmental problems are more vulnerable than others. Major
path way to drug use is peer influence.

A research conducted on 100 drug addicts between 2005 and 2015 in Sri
Lanka indicate that 84 percent were addicted through their school friends or
the associates of the school friends. The media indicate that there is a
serious case of hard drug addiction among school children in Sri Lanka.
Research on 1000 school children over 14 years of age, indicate that about
1 to 1.4 percent of them are addicted to a drug. About 78 percent of them
children will leave the addiction by the time they reach the age of 20, but a
very few stay on and become serious addicts.

Annually, on average about 5 to 6000 cases of drug overdose is reported to

public health outlets in Sri Lanka, with about 100 to 250 deaths.

Only nations which are successful in managing drug problem are the
nations with death penalty for drug possession and trade. There are about
20 points of origin of hard drugs in Sri Lanka, which is calculated on the
information coming from Media reports (electronic and print) during the
period 2015 and 2016. During the same period the customs seizures worth
about 2 billion rupees was given by media reports. Hard drugs are
generally discussed in association with socio-political corruption in Sri
Lanka. 181
It is time to begin death penalty for drug traders and transporters in Sri
Lanka.

Summary

All the above recommendations given are based on the principles of

environmental management practised in the Ancient Rajarata
civilisation and present day scientific environmental management
principles.

However, disasters cannot be fully controlled, but they can be managed to

minimise damage to about 30 percent of present impact rate.
Primary requirement is the National Strategic Development
Planning (NSDP), which coordinates all sectors of the nation into
a single aim of establishment of a standard of living with
minimum level of poverty, hazards and disasters. About 25 highly
developed nations have shown that this act of minimising natural
and societal disasters is possible through scientific NSDP
constructed in amalgamation with rule of law. All the developing
nations are without NSDP’s, though they have Strategic Planning
Programmes (SPP) or Strategic Planning Policy Documents
(SPPD) on a sector basis. However, these sector plans cannot
succeed as shown by failure of development process in all
developing nations and in Sri Lanka.

Within a NSDP, research, primary identification and information

dissemination and even planning of programmes of disaster
management can be conducted by universities in the region with
the use of student field work and staff research programmes as
organised in most of the developed nations.

All developing countries and Sri Lanka have shown that their leadership is
incapable in constructing and executing NSDP’s, thus they
continue to live in underdevelopment and high damage from
natural and societal disasters.

The ethnic, religious and other cult (tribal, cast and region) related
problems are also major societal disasters in Sri Lanka. Once
economic stability is achieved and rule of law is established all
the above problems will be automatically managed to a level
which will not destabilise the nation, as shown in nations with
economic stability and higher standard of living. Therefore it is
the non-existence of NSDP which makes Sri Lanka evades socio-
political stability and development.
182
This incapability of the leadership makes the general populace to behave
erratically, acquiring inefficient and corrupt practises, which lead
to increase of impact of natural disasters accelerated by human
activity.

For example most of the slide damage (about 80 percent) reported during
heavy rains in Sri Lanka are due to non-existence of storm
drainage on constructed space or steep slopes covered with
cultivation.

Above show the result of a not properly managed ( no storm drainage at the
top of the road cut to divert extra water to the nearby stream
which is about 300 meters away or at the foot of the slope,
therefore water flow over the slope and undercut the slope
resulting in weakening of the holding capacity of the slope, which
allows the boulders to fall) road side slope cut, resulting in a rock
fall, the road builder has not followed the instructions given in
disaster management and the road was allowed to function by the
political and administrative authority.

Damage by naturally occurring slides are a few and occur occaisionaly

(Puwakgahawela and Samisara). However at Puwakgahawela,
residents reported of illegal gem mining and forest burning at the
upper reaches of Puwakgahawela ela, which occurred 183 for many
 years before the massive landslide. At Aranayaka area there were
sites of chena cultivation on steep slopes, some quarrying and the
rubber plantation on the mountain slope had no proper storm
drainage system.

Place of origin of Puwakgahawela landslide 2002

The red circles show where some people living in the area indicated that
there was illegal gem mining and forest burning.
People refuse to leave as they want to stay in their former land and not
properly compensated (even after many years people at a slide site in
Padiyathalawa are not fully compensated according to a survey conducted by
2006 field class, Environmental Management students, Rajarata University of
Sri Lanka in 2010).

The victims indicate that they did not know of the danger.

This is the circle of disaster occurrence in a developing country like Sri

Lanka.

184
Developing nations and Sri Lanka is in this vicious circle of inefficiency –
no proper environmental planning- inefficiency and continue to
face the increased effects of natural and societal disasters.

Governance has to be efficient and accountable and must mobilise its

resources including people properly to reduce the impact of
disasters. People will not listen when they notice that the public
officials and politicians are not honest and efficient in attending
to their problems. Investigating the nations with lowest damage
from disasters indicate that they have very low socio-political
corruption and proper taxation (Norway, Sweden, Finland,
Iceland, Switzerland, Austria, Canada, Australia, Germany,
France and UK).

The high damage from disasters is in the developing world where socio-
political corruption is high and no proper taxation. Sri Lankan
polity and people are noted for tax avoidance and engage is tax
avoidance like all other developing nations. Therefore, increased
disaster damage is a factor of poor governance and individualistic
social values.

As one victim indicated “they” (public officials and politicians) only

promise, “they” have no concern for proper rule. Just come when
a calamity happens, promise heaven and never seen. They misuse
funds, media remains active for a few days and they forget poor
easily”. This is because of non-existence of a scientific national
strategic development plan

The future of disaster management in a country like Sri Lanka remains a

dream due to non-adherence to scientific advice and high level of
public and private sector corruption. There are more than 30
tertiary organisations engage in research, which have to be
coordinated and use for management of disasters. Damage from
disasters will increase; occurrence of disaster will increase with
increased number of death and property damage in the next 3
decades.

Environmental Management in the time of Smart Technology and Artificial

Intelligence

Smart technology (ST) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) has begun to

facilitate the maintenance of low hazard and disaster levels from natural
and societal hazards and disasters. The ST and AI enables the planner in
study, research, predict and manage natural and societal hazards and
disasters more efficiently and scientifically.
185
High powered sensors have successfully predicted tornadoes, cyclones,
tsunamis, landslides and flash floods in the developed world since the
utilization of ST and AI. They have managed to reduce risk to human lives
and enabled correct evacuations. Further, they have supported better
construction systems for settlements, making settlements safer to live.
However, most of the advantages of ST and AI are yet to reach the
developing nations.
Mainstream and social media networks with ST and AI have helped to
uncover risks emanating from violation of morality, financial corruption,
human rights violations and gender related abuses. Political and social elite
of the developed world are under observation for above mentioned
violations and there is a rise in the number of convictions leading to
resignations, fines and prison sentences. Some very powerful financial
institutions, multinational companies and societal organizations have been
subjected to heavy fines, with removal of their chief executive officers.
The process is still slow in the developing world where inefficiency and
corruption is still high, but social media is initiating some deep inquiries.
Some serious cases have been taken to International Courts of Justice
through these reports with good results. However, the true strength of ST
and AI is yet to be realized in the developing nations .

Final Note

Over population and poor governance are the two major factors responsible
for increased threat from environmental disasters in Sri Lanka.

Sri Lanka is over populated by about 10 million people at the end of 2017
and population planning is required to stabilise the economic development
of the nation.

Governance has not reached the required efficiency levels as scientific

environmental planning is neglected. Therefore, environmental disasters
will increase in the next decade resulting in many social problems.

186
Appendix A

Some other Disasters

Fire: Any fire occurring, regardless of ignition sources.

Poor health/general sickness: over and beyond expectation and

directly due to a particular external cause of causes.

Contamination of food products or water or the environment that

result in deaths or injuries.

War/conflict/terrorism. Armed conflict is defined as a political

conflict in which armed combat involves the armed forces of at
least one state (or one or more armed factions seeking to gain
control of all or part of the state), and in which at least 1,000
people have been killed by the fighting during the course of the
conflict.

Workplace violence where the cause of the injuries and/or deaths is

directly linked to the working environment of those affected.

Technical Disasters
Danger originating from technological or industrial accidents,
dangerous procedures, infrastructure failures or certain human
activities, which may cause loss of life or injury, property damage,
social and economic disruption or environmental degradation.
Technical disasters include:
 Power cuts and communication failure.
 Explosions involving domestic, industrial and non-
industrial buildings or structures.
 Oil spills and chemical spills. An accidental release
occurring during the production, transportation or handling
of disastrous chemical substances.
187
  Nuclear-reactor failures, chemical mishaps.
 Breakdown of computer networks.
 Gas leaks.

 Poisoning of atmosphere or water courses due to industrial

sources.
 Cooling/heating/ventilation system failure.

According to ISDR, technical disasters can be classified in three

groups: industrial accidents, transport accidents and miscellaneous
accidents.

Industrial accidents include chemical spills, collapses of industrial

infrastructures, explosions, fires, gas leaks, poisoning and
radiation.

Transport accidents include air, rail, road and water transport.

Miscellaneous accidents include the collapse of domestic and non-
industrial structures, explosions and fires.

188
Appendix B

Seneviratne, H.M.M.B. (2017) Drought and the “Rajarata Innovative” –

Development of Dry Zone of Sri Lanka, NCUMUD , Rajarata University of
Sri Lanka, Abstracts, 33-43

Rajarata Innvoative

Droughts of short term and long term scale are an essential feature of the
dry zone region of Sri Lanka, since the establishment of settled agriculture.
However, the “Ancient Rajarata Innovative” was capable of limiting the
effect of drought to a minimum with proper strategic development planning
operated by the ancient kingdom.

The traditional “Rajarata innovative” in Hydrology and Water

Resource Management

“In the realm that is subject to me there are, apart from many strips of
country where the harvest flourishes mainly by rain water, but few fields
which are dependent on rivers with permanent flow or on great reservoirs.
Also by many mountains, by thick jungle, and by widespread swamps my
kingdom is much straitened. Truly in such a country not even a little water
that comes from the rain must flow into the ocean without being made
useful to man. Except at the mines where there are precious stones, gold
and in all other places the laying out of fields must be taken in hand”
(Paranavithana,1959: 555)

The value of rain water/ permanent rivers/reservoirs arranged in that order

and understood – innovative thought on the major resource

Then to the sources mountains/thick jungle and swamps – understanding

the value of springs

The way it should flow to the ocean – strategy

189
Except at the mines – trade and wealth creation

Plan for laying out of fields – major activity of the populace is well planned

Present day “Rajarata innovative” in Hydrology and Water Resource

Management

Present day “rajarata innovative is based on the rhetoric of “not even a drop
of rain should be allowed to flow to the ocean without being used for a
purpose”, without its traditional management principle.

Here we have reduced the innovation process and strategic importance of

the concepts of hydrology and planning by simplification of the phrase of
King Parakramabahu the Great.

“Rajarata innovative” ( the innovative thinking and constructions within a

properly mobilized society of the Rajarata civilization is here referred to as
- Rajrata innovative- ) has many answers, which can be used to form the
new system, but neither policy makers or general public has shown any
interest in the hydrology of the “Rajarata innovative”.

There is sufficient research evidence to indicate that a combined innovative

technology of “Rajarata innovative and present day “ make, create
innovate” can be amalgamated to solve to control wastage of available
water and increase water capacity of weva (tank is a wrong term for the
multi-purpose reservoir) system.

Weva is the prime rhetoric in the “rajarata innovative” and treated as a

static unit of operation today. Rajarata weva is a micro/macro part of
“mega environmental management innovative of the Rajarata civilization”,
constructed through engineering the landscape. This weva system was built
in a much wetter environment than today (Bryant, 1997). Now this
landscape is about 1000-2000 years old. Within this period, nature and man
has changed resulting in coming of another type of unplanned reengineered
landscape. But, we are still trying to keep the weva in the same form and
same place, which is definitely impossible. We have to change the weva
and its engineered landscape to suite the changed climate ( reduced rainfall)
and culture (immobilized socio-political organization).

190
Some weva have to be closed/ some enlarged/some deepened/ flow lines
rearranged etc. Author has witnessed in Switzerland, Norway and Israel,
methods of changing the flow patterns, stream characteristics and storage
without environmental damage.

Where to go

We have a good understanding of the nature, intensity and distribution of

the drought effect, as the builders of ancient hydraulic system look to the
future with the support of available and possible technology.

As the leaders of the hydraulic civilization have mobilized the population

and engineering systems, we have to utilize present day reengineering
systems, which are sustainable, if supported by proper policy and
mobilization. Since the beginning of modernization process in 1960’s,
leadership of Sri Lanka has failed to understand that development is a
scientific process and political process can only provide guidance. Since
1960’s leadership has failed to understand that development can only be
achieved, only through proper mobilization (efficient and accountable) of
societal forces.

As the leaders of the hydraulic civilization manage to properly mobilize

their population and build the system to suit the ancient requirements, we
have to properly mobilize present day population (efficient and
accountable) and redesign the hydrological and reservoir system to suit the
present and future day requirements

We can utilize the modern concept of innovation, “make create innovate” –

as the resurgence of “Rajarata innovative”

Mean annual rainfall has reduced, temperature and evaporation has

increased leading to a new weather and climate in Sri Lanka. Rainfall
pattern and intensity is rapidly changing and cycle of dry periods and heavy
rain periods a norm of weather and climate. This change will intensify in
the next 30 to 50 years.

If we conduct environmental management exercise properly utilising new

techniques and methodologies, the effect of environmental hazards
including drought can be reduced by 70 percent. This is because modern
hazard and disaster models can reduce effect by about 70 percent, as
explained by Federal Emergency Management Authority (now Homeland
Security Organisation), USA. (Seneviratne (2010).

Appendix C
191
Risk

Risk: risk is present in all activities we pursue in our daily lives. Risk of
environmental hazards cannot be fully calculated because the nature of
occurrence varies from one incident to another. Further, the level of risk of
an occurrence changes from one society to another. For example people
living in coastal areas are generally not fearful of the sea, but inland living
people fear sea. In addition people do not think about risk unless there is a
threatening situation around and sometimes they think that though there is a
risk, it may not be life threatening. These types of attitudes make the
scientific value of risk not universally applicable. However the concept
behind the scientific notion of risk is to construct a generally acceptable
concept of risk using statistical probabilities.

In relation to environmental hazards, risks can be categorised as

involuntary and voluntary (Smith, 2000).
Involuntary risks are the risks, which are undertaken without knowing the
severity of the hazard. Living in an earthquake zone or landslide area
makes the person to know about the risk, but he cannot fully estimate the
risk. This is because the occurrence of these types of events is not fully
predictable and they do not occur all the time. Most of the geological risks
are in this category.
Voluntary risks are the risks taken with a full knowledge of the hazard. For
example living on the bank of a river which floods every year makes the
resident aware of the risk, but because of lack of land in a safe area leads
him to live in a high risk area. All types of societal hazards can be put into
this category.
Statistical analysis of risk is based on theories of probability and simple
equation of

R= p x L can be used to calculate risk of an event

R is risk
p is the probability of the event
L is the loss
To calculate probability of an event there are many statistical and
mathematical procedures, which can be taken from books on statistics.

192
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Sedimentation
Erosion

Commercialised media and its cultural impact leading to hazards

and disasters

Generality of hazards and disasters

Nature has geological oscillations and changes

Rock weathering, climatic oscillations and changes

Society
Poor and inefficient governance leads to corruption

Neglect of geological changes resulting in acceleration of flash

floods and landslides

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Generally about 2 to 4 percent are misbehaving openly
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