Involuntary Displacement and Resettlement — Policy and ... - CEPA

Social and Economic Impacts of Resettlement onTsunami Affected Coastal Fishery Households inSri LankaAsha Gunawardena 1 & Kanchana Wickramasinghe 2AbstractThe economy of the fisheries sector was devastated by the 2004 tsunami inSri Lanka, most particularly the coastal fisheries sector, the focus of thispaper. It examines the impact of post–tsunami policies related toresettlement, such as land ownership and housing, and other resettlementdecisions made by fisher households and the government. The paper alsolooks at current issues facing resettled households and how they have beenaffected in terms of livelihood restoration, housing conditions, access toinfrastructure facilities and services, and access to social networks. Thepaper puts forward some policy options to minimize such issues.The study uses data from the Tsunami Census of the Department of Censusand Statistics to understand the pre-tsunami conditions of the fisherhouseholds. A follow-up survey was carried out in the six most tsunamiaffected districts in the Southern and Eastern provinces, in July 2008, toobtain data on the post-tsunami socio economic situation. In addition,1Asha Gunewardene is a Research Officer attached to the Environmental Economic PolicyUnit of the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) in Sri Lanka. She has researched and published onareas such as common property, natural resource management, coastal fishery management,poverty and distributional impacts of policies and development interventions in the land sectorand socio- economic aspects of tsunami affected households. Asha has an MBA from the Universityof Moratuwa on Technology Management and has received training from the World Bank,South Asian Network of Development and Environmental Economics (SANDEE) and CAPRInetwork of International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).2 Kanchana Wickramasinghe is a Research Officer working at the Environmental EconomicPolicy Unit of the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) of Sri Lanka. Her areas of interest includeenvironmental and natural resource economics and poverty. She holds a Master’s degree inEconomics from University of Colombo, and a post graduate diploma in ‘Universalizing SocioeconomicSecurity for the Poor’ from the Institute of Social Studies, The Hague, Netherlands.She has co-authored IPS publications on “Disaster Management Policy and Practice: SharingLessons among Government, Civil Society & Private Sector” and “Post Tsunami Reconstructionand Rehabilitation: Household Views on Progress and Process”.83