Drought is gripping much of Sri Lanka. Ancient reservoirs like this one at Kotawehera in North Western Province have dried up. The monsoon from October to December failed - therefore so will the year’s main rice crop. Photos and text: Charles Haviland.
KG Dayananda worked on all four of his acres this planting season but lost everything. The previous season was dire too. The drought "has destroyed our economy," he says. "When the crop died this time it took our livelihoods with it."
Dayananda’s rice plants yield just empty husks. Usually he would consume half and sell half. Now he has no money even to buy rice: "We’ve borrowed from banks, we still owe tractor rent and we’re heavily in debt."
In the reservoir bed, aquatic plants are like tinder. A government climatologist, Ranjith Punyawardena, fears the shorter rice crop, due in mid-2014, will also fail.
DM Premasiri cannot grow rice and has switched for now to watermelon plants. But three-quarters have died. "Rain is so unpredictable, we can’t plan for the future,” he says.
In the highlands Sri Lanka’s most renowned product, tea, is suffering from the drought. Tea plants like this one have died.
Ihithisham Meezan Mohideen says the crop is down by two-thirds in his company’s four estates near Kandy. He says it is the worst drought since 1993.
Unusually the female tea pluckers and male estate workers have become waterers. The pluckers are picking about 12 kg (1.8 stone) a day compared with the usual 35-40 kg.
And the water tankers are being regularly called in. Mr Mohideen says the total cost of watering is $250 (£150) per day. The World Bank has warned climate change may raise temperatures in Sri Lanka and increase the frequency of extreme heat.
Water levels are low in the modern reservoirs in the hills: One result is that hydro-electricity generation is right down, bringing the threat of power cuts.
