Colombo: Nearly 400,000 workers have been affected by Cyclone Ditwah in Sri Lanka, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said on Tuesday. The cyclone that hit the island nation in late November killed over 640 people and damaged crops, tea estates and critical transport infrastructures, including roads and bridges. In a brief, the ILO said that the population living in areas affected by the cyclone’s devastation accounted for approximately 1.7 million people, nearly 7.5 per cent of Sri Lanka’s total population.
Approximately 374,000 workers are located in affected areas of the cyclone devastation in the island
nation, placing livelihoods and household incomes under strain, it said. The estimated affected workforce consists of 244,000 men and 130,000 women. “At the sectoral level, these figures translate to 85,000 agricultural jobs, 125,000 industrial jobs and 164,000 service jobs,” it said.
“The scale of potential monthly earnings losses USD 48 million a month underscores the urgency of income stabilising measures, particularly for informal and low wage workers,” it said.
The floods and landslides triggered have put some 16 per cent of the national GDP at risk, valued at around USD 16 billion, with impacts concentrated in a limited number of districts.