Impacts of Tsunami on Groundwater, Soil and Vegetation in Sri Lanka
Sept. 19-23, 2005 .

IWMI has been actively involved in the evolvement of a series of workshops and a conference on ‘Impacts of Tsunami on Groundwater, Soil and Vegetation in Sri Lanka ’ during the week of Sept. 19-23, 2005.

The initiative was conceived briefly after the tsunami by scientists and experts from the USA within groundwater, soil science and water resources, lead by Prof. Tissa Illangasekara from the School of Mines, Golden , Colorado. Based on an initial fact-finding mission in February and a follow-up visit end of June, a collaboration and mutual funding scheme was set up to organize this one-week long set of events between the NSF (National Science Foundation) of Sri Lanka and the NSF of the USA . The program included a one-day workshop at the SSSSL (Soil Science Society of Sri Lanka) in Kandy, a 2-day field trip to the affected eastern coastal areas, a one-day workshop at the ITI (Industrial Technology Institute), Colombo and finally a conference and a press conference at the Galle Face Hotel, Colombo to present conclusions and recommendations. The honourable Minister of Science and Technology, Prof. Tissa Vitarana, showed his interest and commitment by his presence for the deliberation of the team’s preliminary findings and recommendations.

The objective of the initiative is to identify impacts of the tsunami on groundwater, soil and vegetation in Sri Lanka and to identify the science issues associated with these impacts and the needs in terms of capacity building, technology support and research infrastructure. The main emphasis of the meetings was the interaction between the scientists from the Sri Lankan side and the scientists from the USA in order to assess the major science issues, the major gaps and various potential and feasible means for addressing these through continued collaboration and a formalized framework for exchange of scientists, students and professionals between the two regions in the common interest of overcoming the impacts of the tsunami and building the required knowledge and technical capacity to confront the longer-term issues in water and environmental science and management. The report and associated information and background material, including the presentations given at the workshops, the list of participants, are available, or will shortly be made available, at the homepage of the initiative (http://tsunami.obeysekera.net/). IWMI presented its work on the east coast where a monitoring program from 2.5 months after the tsunami has generated data on the impacts of the salinization on wells and their rate of recovery during the dry season that followed the tsunami.

A couple of specific research activities related to the US-Sri Lankan NSF initiative have already been initiated through collaboration between IWMI and partners from Sri Lanka as well as abroad:

1. A Ph.D. project on ‘Impact of Tsunami on Groundwater in Sri Lanka’, as a sandwich program between I WMI and the University of Copenhagen, and involving the Colorado School of Mines, USA
   
   
2. A M.Sc. study on ‘Assessment of GroundwaterPollution Risk to Nitrate of Coastal Aquifers of Eastern Sri Lanka ’ between I WMI and the Utah State University

For more information, contact iwmi@cgiar.org

Group picture taken during the field trip and visit to the University of Ruhuna, Sri Lanka

Conference in Colombo. NSF Sri Lanka and the American team presenting findings and recommendations from the one-week visit and meetings

For more information, contact Karen Villholth, iwmi@cgiar.org