Photo retrieved from: www.southasia.oneworld.net
“The Eastern Baticaloa district is in a region that was ravaged by war for three decades. The government is now building water supply sanitation projects both in the East and the North.
Sri Lanka provides safe drinking water to 92.5 percent of urban households but only 39.0 percent of rural population.
In some areas people have to walk long distances to get safe drinking water.
Sri Lanka has a rich history in hydrology and has thousands of man-made reservoirs called ‘tanks’ dotting the country from the time the island was ruled by ancient kings.
The island has with 2,400 irrigation canals and some 3,500 deep water tanks and over 4,500 kilometres of rivers. The country also has natural wet lands. But not all water is safe drink.
L Siriyawathie a mother of one, and a wife of a rice farmer, walks nearly four kilometres to collect water.
“I have only one child,” Siriyawathie “I leave him alone in the home when I am going somewhere. I had to bring the water and keep at home before I leave anywhere which takes so much of time. But I don’t have any choice.”
The problem worsens during the dry season.
Siriyawathi is just one amongst the thousands villagers who face this predicament each day. Experts say to a large proportion of population in Sri Lanka’s war torn and neglected East coast access to drinking water is luxury.”
Read more: LBO
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