Post Disaster Waste Management Strategies in Developing Countries: Case of Sri Lanka

Abstract

ABSTRACT. Disasters cause substantial damage around the world. This causes serious environmental and economic burden on normal living conditions, reconstruction and general waste collection processes. Within this context, waste management has emerged as a critical issue in responding to a disaster. Thus, this paper addresses post disaster waste management strategies adopted in developing countries and applicability of best global practices in respect of challenges encountered. Comprehensive literature review and fi eld survey among national level institutes in Sri Lanka were conducted to gather information and semi-structured interviews were used as a method of data collection. The fi ndings revealed that strategies, issues and challenges are varying according to type of disaster, magnitude, location, country etc. Further, poor implementation of prevailing rules and regulations; poor standards of local expertise and capacities, inadequate funds, lack of communication and coordination are identifi ed as key issues encountered.

Disaster waste management: A review article

“…The US Army Corps of Engineers (Channell et al, 2009) and Ekici et al (2009) give broader reviews, but are still limited to the US context and to technical aspects of debris management. Karunasena (2009) proposes to review disaster waste management in developing countries with an emphasis on the Sri Lankan context. However, the majority of the literature cited is US based and there is no analysis of the contextual relevance of US derived practices in developing countries.…”

Building Information Modeling as a Tool for Enhancing Disaster Resilience of the Construction Industry

“…In the post disaster phase, waste generated in the post disaster phase endangers human health and can cause environmental degradation (Brown et al 2011;EPA, 2008;FEMA, 2007;JEU, 2010;Kourmpanis et al 2008;Karunasena and Amaratunga, 2016). For this reason, in the post-disaster phase, construction companies need to carry out effi cient and effective construction and demolition waste management which requires waste generated due to disasters, demolitions and reconstruction to be collected, transported, processed and disposed (Karunasena et al, 2009;Karunasena, 2011;Karunasena and Amaratunga, 2016).…”

Capacity Gaps in Post Disaster Waste Management: Case Study in Sri Lanka

“…National Council for Disaster Management (NCDM) established under Disaster Management Act No. 13 of 2005 is a high-level inter-ministerial body that provides direction to disaster risk management work in the country (DMC, 2005a;2005b;2006a, 2006bJayawardane, 2006;Karunasena et al, 2009;Karunasena et al, 2012a). Disaster Management Centre (DMC) is the lead agency implementing activities related to all phases of Disaster Risk Management (DRM) in the country within the Ministry of Disaster Management and NCDM.…”