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| Sunday, 20 February 2005 |
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Construction chamber wants major role by Elmo Leonard Very little reconstruction has been carried out in five weeks following the massive damage the nation suffered in the Asian tsunami of December 26 the Chamber of Construction Industry Sri Lanka (CCI) SL's president, Surath Wickramasinghe said. The solution to this drag-of-the-feet is to tap to the maximum CCISL's expertise in the diverse disciplines of the construction industry, Wickramasinghe said. In this regard CCISL had written to President Chandrika Bandaranaike Kumaratunga. Even human resettlement involves intricate planning. For instance, Hambantota which has been severely affected carries vast reserves of land while Kalmunai in the Ampara district bears a dearth of terrain. Almost 75 percent of the nation's 800 miles of coastline has been affected and physical damage has been caused to infrastructure, houses, hospitals, tourist hotels and commercial buildings. Reconstruction is a massive task to accomplish within a limited period of time, Wickramasinghe said. The CCISL membership encompasses the National Construction Association of Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka Institute of Architects, Association of Consulting Engineers, Institute of Quality Surveyors Sri Lanka, Institute of Valuers Sri Lanka, Institute of Town Planners, Sri Lanka, Survey Institute of Sri Lanka and Insurance Association of Sri Lanka. In the case of displaced persons, they now live in refugee camps, schools, and temples and are in a psychologically unstable state. The pattern of resettlement should not be ad hoc while CCISL has the expertise to plan and execute solutions to the underlying problems. Human resettlement should be done in a comprehensively planned manner similar to townships with easy access to schools, medicare, shopping, playgrounds and other facilities. There could be several donors wanting to build houses and they could all be incorporated within the township in separate settlements. In this way the utilities provided could be effectively, efficiently and economically shared by all, Wickramasinghe said. The problem of such massive reconstruction will involve many other aspects. For instance, when reconstruction gets into its stride, the cost of building materials will rise by at least 20 to 30 percent, adding to the economics of sudden mass-scale building. One way of countering price increases brought on by the factor of demand would be to manufacture material needed at local level and reducing the cost of transportation of such material. An example is to use pre-cast concrete instead of timber, which is in short supply. Training centres should be set up to train skilled labourers, using high
technology equipment and machinery also at local level. |
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