Sri Lanka intends to seek international assistance to prepare for future drought conditions, Environment Minister Dr. Dammika Patabendi said on Thursday, and will apply to a fund the United Nations desertification body is expected to establish.
Patabendi said the matter was discussed at the UN conference on drought and desertification held recently in Mongolia, NewsFirst reported. Sri Lanka will seek support through a fund expected to be established by the organisation, he said, with the money going toward infrastructure and other facilities needed to handle future droughts.
What is new here
The minister made Sri Lanka’s case at UNCCD COP17 in Ulaanbaatar in August, where he argued that drought planning must begin before conditions harden into a crisis and asked for adequate and predictable finance for developing countries.
Thursday’s statement moves that from a negotiating position to a stated intention to apply. The significant qualifier is that the fund is described as expected to be established — it is not yet operating, and the minister did not say when it might be, how much Sri Lanka would seek, or on what terms.
The domestic backdrop
The request is being framed against a drought the government has already said it expects to be severe. Sri Lanka is in what the Meteorology Department has called the strongest El Niño in 75 years, and forecasters expect heavy rain through to December to be followed by a pronounced dry period in the early months of next year.
The state has so far been paying for drought after the fact rather than ahead of it. The government released Rs. 3 billion in insurance compensation for affected farmers in August — the reactive pattern Patabendi himself described to the Mongolia dialogue.
Separately, UN Resident Coordinator Marc-André Franche met Defence Secretary Air Vice Marshal Sampath Thuyacontha (Retd) this week to discuss strengthening disaster preparedness, including El Niño-related water scarcity — a parallel track to the financing Patabendi described.
A note on sourcing: NewsFirst, which renders the minister’s surname as “Patabedi,” was the only verified newsroom to carry these remarks. The report did not say where or in what setting he spoke.
