Sri Lanka needs solution to preserve rain water instead of flowing into the sea
Floods caused by heavy rain is problem for the construction industry in Colombo while on the other hand, rain water flowing to the sea is a waste of a very valuable resource, according to Surath Wickramasinghe, President, Chamber of Construction Industries (CCI).
He says that the Government should take steps through the Irrigation Department to find a way of securing and saving rain water instead of allowing its flow into the sea.
Dr. Wickramasinghe was responding to questions by the media at the launch of the 5th edition of the CCI Construction Industry Trade and Business Directory held in Colombo this week.
He said that ways and means should be explored to divert this water into several areas in the land within Colombo and Western Province. He said that in Malaysia there is a tunnel several km long, built to divert flood water preventing it flowing to the sea direct. He said that in the dry season this tunnel is used for the vehicles to move across.
Dr. Wickramasinghe said that while there was a period when the construction industry slowed down, today there is a complete reawakening in the construction industry in the Colombo City, which is unprecedented and with these major developments in the construction industry, the industry is bound to face constraints. These problems could be the city’s drainage problem, the delays in obtaining building permits, drainage, parking space and road infrastructure.
He said that the construction industry is booming today and the number of large cranes that appear in the construction sites bear witness to this boom. He indicated that by one year or 18 months the Colombo Port City would be completed and then there would be a big change in the city.
More than 60 large construction projects have now been approved and there are towers, twin towers and they are huge and “even we do not know what there magnitude is,” he said. Investments in the building construction are made because they know that they could make money out of them, he pointed out.
Dr. Wickramasinghe also spoke about the volatile garbage issue. Quoting a BBC news item he noted that the garbage collected in Rome is transported through train to Vienna, Austria – dumped, processed and burnt and electricity is generated and provides electricity 170,000 households in Vienna. He said that likewise there are so many examples throughout the world to gainfully dispose garbage that could be adopted in Sri Lanka.
The Construction Industry Directory launched is its fifth publication for years 2017 and 2018. It is more comprehensive than earlier issues and comes with many new features. This latest issue includes more than 300 business establishments engaged in the construction industry which is a considerable increase over the previous issue.
The directory is uploaded on to the website – www.constructiondirectory.lk with advanced search facility. The novel feature introduced is the facility to replace the presentation of advertisements on a monthly basis in the Web Directory. The Web Directory is open to new advertisers to insert their advertisements.