FAO Sri Lanka and the Maldives Newsletter - Issue 16

July-September 2013 | Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations | Sri Lanka l ISSN no:1800-4601

Inside this issue:

UN-REDD Launched in Sri Lanka Mitigating global warming through strategic forestry initiatives in Sri Lanka

Hon. Minister speaks on the importance of

international support for forestry initiatives

UN-REDD was launched in Sri Lanka on 7 June

2013 joining a global effort of 45 countries to

combat global warming. The Honorable Susil Pre

majayantha, the Minister of Environment and

Renewable Energy inaugurated the programme.

The United Nations collaborative

Programme on Reducing Emiss-

ions from Deforestation and Forest

Degradation (UN-REDD) is an

effort to build capacity of

developing countries to preserve

forests and combat effects of

climate change.

As a signatory to the UN

Framework Convention on Climate

Change (UNFCC), Sri Lanka is

committed to addressing climate

change by increasing the resilience

of its people and ecosystems

through adaption, and decreasing

CO2 emissions through mitigation

practices.

The country’s post-conflict

economic growth phase has placed

enormous pressure on its forests of

two million hectares in view of

expansion of development process

led by the State. Demand for land is

among the most pressing socio

economic challenges whereas the

State has to accommodate from its

80% of ownership.

Sri Lanka is one of Asia’s smallest

and most bio-diverse countries and

much of this diversity lies in its

unique forests. FAO, UNDP and

UNEP are collaborating with the

Ministry of Environment and

Renewable Energy (MoE) to plan

and implement UN-REDD

initiativess through an inclusive and

consultative process that includes

forest dependent indigenous

people.

UN-REDD Launched in Sri Lanka 01 Farewell to Mr. Patrick T. Evans 02

Arrival of New FAO Representative 02

FAO Commemorates World Environment Day: “Think-Eat-Save” 02

Meet our Interns 03

FAO Rehabilitates Irrigation Infrastructure and Facilitates Integrated

Livelihood Development in Mullaitivu and Kilinochchi 03

UN - AIDS Raises Awareness 04

RFLP of FAO - A Happy Ending 04

Rejuvenated Mango Trees Reap Bigger and Quality Fruits 05

Open Access Publishing Using Open Journal System 05

Staff Spot Light 06

Joining the FAO Sri Lanka Team 07

Useful Links 07

Arrival of New FAO Representative

Ms Beth S Crawford assumed duties as FAO Representative for Sri Lanka and Maldives on 31 July 2013.

Ms Crawford, a national of the United

States of America, was born in

California and grew up in the

Netherlands. She holds a BSc. in

Psychology from Santa Clara

University, California, and a Masters

degree in Public Administration

(MPA) from Robert F Wagner

Graduate School, New York

University, New York.

Ms Crawford began her career in

1984 as a US Peace Corps volunteer

in the Democratic Republic of

Congo. She subsequently worked as

a Study Abroad Adviser for the

University of Maryland and as a

Programme Associate in the

Philanthropy Department of Chase

Farewell to Mr Patrick T Evans

Patrick T Evans, FAO Representative in Sri

Lanka and Maldives left the shores of Sri

Lanka in August 2013 on completion of his

assignment in the country. He arrived in Sri

Lanka in July 2008 at the height of the 30

year old civil war. Mr Evans spereheaded

many projects in the country including

projects in the North to uplift the lives of the

farmers during the rehabilitation and

recovery process.

.

FAO commemorates ‘World Environment Day’ : Think-Eat-Save

The World Environment Day celebrated

in June 2013 challenged students

across Sri Lanka to think about the

impact of their food choices.

The event was co-organized by FAO

and the British Council. The occasion

involved activities that focused around

the theme ‘Think-Eat-Save’. FAO

organized student workshop focused

around this theme and sent

representatives to Kandy to facilitate

discussions.

The workshop focused on aspects

such as not taking more than one can

eat, reusing items in order to reduce

waste and demonstrating small steps

that can be taken to reduce one’s

waste.

At the end of the workshop, the

enthusiastic students stood proudly to

give presentations of posters created

around the theme. The students gave

detailed accounts of why they chose

certain catchphrases and how the

posters would influence viewers. The

session ended with a quiz on various

aspects of the theme. Both educators

and students felt the overall

experience was immensely useful and

productive.

Manhattan Bank, New York,

before moving to Rome in 1993

with her husband who was working

for the World Food Programme

(WFP).

She joined FAO in 1997, where she

has worked at the headquarters in

Rome in the areas of strategic

planning and budgeting. Her

position before moving to Sri Lanka

was Principal Officer (Deputy

Director) of the Office of Strategy,

Planning and Resources Manage-

ment.

Ms Crawford is married with two

children, who are both university

students in London.

We wish him the best in his new

assignment. Mr Evans is now FAO Representative

for Pakistan.

Students in Kandy create informative

posters about food waste

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On a filed visti to Killinochchi Addressing staff at the fairwell party

Meet our Interns

This summer, the FAO Sri Lanka office

hosted two students from Cornell

University (USA) as interns. Jamie

Johnson is graduating in International

Agriculture and Rural Development and

Communications. Yash Gharat graduated

this spring with a degree in Natural

Resources and is now working in Zambia

on sustainable coffee production. Jamie

worked as the Communications intern and

Yash as the Monitoring and Evaluation

intern at FAO in Colombo for three

months.

Their internships are part of FAO’s new

field intern series, which is seeking to

connect FAO country offices with various

universities across the world.

This initiative offers a unique

opportunity to college students and

recent graduates to work with FAO’s

field offices and help FAO to build

partnerships with individuals and

universities.

“This is an incredible opportunity - it

gives me experience in the fields I

am interested in. It is humbling to

see the work FAO does in Sri Lanka,

especially in the post-conflict zones

in the north,” said Jamie.

Yash agreed and added, “It has truly

been a learning experience and

when I leave, it will be with a better

idea of the type of work and kind of

organization that I would want to

work with”.

Yash and Jamie on a field

visit toJaffna.

FAO rehabilitates irrigation infrastructure and facilitates integrated livelihood development in

Mullaitivu and Kilinochchi

Seven thousand farmers are expected

to diversify into OFC and vegetable

cultivation, use improved seed

varieties and learn better water

management and cultivation practices.

While multi cropping of Groundnut and

Chilli has been introduced to 170

farmers during Yala 2013, procurement

of improved Seed-Paddy, Green Gram,

Black Gram, Cowpea, Sesame and

Finger Millet for Maha 2013/2014 is

already in progress.

FAO will use a participatory approach

in irrigation management ensuring

farmer participation at all levels of

irrigation design, development and

management. FOs were chosen

through a competitive bidding and

selection process, to construct

irrigation infrastructure under this

project.

In its efforts to support socio-economic

integration and development of agric-

ultural communities in the Northern

Province, FAO is implementing a LKR

550 million EU funded ‘Integrated

Irrigation and Agricultural Livelihood

Development’ Project in the Kilinochchi

and Mullaitivu Districts. The project will

improve water resource utilization and

restore livelihoods through sustainable

food production for 17 200 vulnerable

farming families. Seventytwo minor

tanks supplying water to 2600 ha of

irrigable farm land and 1200 ha of

abandoned land will be rehabilitated to

increase crop production. Two hundred

and twenty Farmer Organizations (FOs)

will be trained on tank operations and

maintenance, financial management,

conflict management, construction

management, contract administration

and collective crop production.

FAO will improve the capacity of

government implementing partners

such as the Department of Agrarian

Development, Provincial Irrigation

Department-Northern Province,

Mahaweli Authority of Sri Lanka and

the Department of Agriculture to

ensure sustainability of production,

irrigation maintenance and rehabilita-

tion activities.

A happy groundnut farmer with

his harvest

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focal points from 19 countries.

The week-long workshop

taught the basics of HIV

prevention, transmission,

treatment and care and the

United Nations policy on HIV

and AIDS in the workplace.

The UN Cares initiative aims

to give all UN employees

access to information, tests,

contraceptives and adequate

medical treatment with regard

to the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

The workshop stressed the

severity of the AIDS epidemic

while counselling participants

that the UN has no tolerance

for discrimination against

those living with the disease.

RFLP of FAO - A happy ending

The Regional Fisheries Livelihoods Programme for

South and Southeast Asia (RFLP) was a Spanish-

funded regional project of FAO. It was completed in

August 2013 after four years of work with successful

outcomes that directly benefited small-scale fishers,

their families and communities, along with the

government and non-government organizations which

supported them. RFLP’s support included in-kind

assistance and training to fishers, institutional capacity

building and amendments to the Fisheries Act.

The Ministry of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources

Development was the government counterpart of

RFLP. The implementation of RFLP in Sri Lanka started

in 2010 with the objective of improving livelihoods and

reducing vulnerabilities of small-scale fishing com-

munities in the Negombo, Chilaw and Puttalam Districts

in the Western and Northwestern Provinces of Sri

Lanka.

The project targeted around 15000 small-scale fishers

with direct benefits delivered to over 10000 fishers

including women.

This included support to establish co-management mechanisms

for sustainable use of fisher resources, improve safety at sea,

create alternative income generation, enhance post-harvest

measures and facilitate access to micro-finance.

RFLP has produced a large number of reports and publications

of use in research and development of the fisheries sector. RFLP

reports and publications are available on a CD and a copy can

be obtained from the FAO Sri Lanka Representation. Reports

and publications of other RFLP countries can be downloaded

from the RFLP website: www.rflp.org

Fighting the spread of AIDS by fostering awareness and understanding within the United Nations

Alternate

livelihoods

assistance to

small - scale

fishing

community

Nalini Sellappa, FAO Sri Lanka’s finance and

administrative assistant, was chosen to be Sri

Lanka’s focal point for the UN Cares programme at

a workshop in Bangkok attended by forty seven

focal

Participants of the UN-Cares Workshop in

Bangkok

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Nalini said, “the workshop helped

me to obtain a current global and

regional overview of the UN Cares

programme against the backdrop

of the global vision of ‘Getting to

Zero”.

A few of the many standard

services include providing male

and female condoms, Post

Exposure Prophylaxis HIV (PEP)

starter kits and insurance for

medical treatments of HIV/AIDS. A

PEP starter kit is comprised of a

combination of drugs that reduce

the chances of infection after

exposure. The UN Cares

programme is not only an

important cause but a model for

addressing HIV/AIDS in the

workplace.

Rejuvenated mango trees reap bigger and quality fruits “To get bigger and quality mango fruits you need to manage your mango trees properly.”

Mango is grown in the dry zone and is a

popular fruit crop in the North of Sri

Lanka. There are over 75 000 mango

trees in Jaffna and each household has

about 2-6 trees depending on the space

available, and over six varieties are

popularly grown. “The trees are often not

properly managed. They tend to outgrow

and form fruits at the top branches. In

such situations, fruits are left on the trees

and wasted” said Mr. Sivadasan, FAO

beneficiary of the Mathelawappu Village

Society.

FAO in partnership with the Department

of Agriculture (DoA) trained 40

unemployed youth from Jaffna to prune

5000 mango trees. Village societies were

provided with pruning tools and

equipment and the trained youth were

engaged to prune trees.

Removal of unwanted branches reduced

the height of trees and enabled more

sunlight to penetrate through, which in

return made way for more buds, more

fruits and easy harvesting.

The youth trained on handling chain saws

and safe working methods charge a fee of

approximately Rs.1,500/- per tree with a

team of three youths pruning two to five

trees per day. Growers are enthusiastic to

register their names to get their mango

trees pruned. The programme has

provided training to participants on better

management of trees such as improved

harvesting methods, minimal fruit losses

and techniques to control height of trees

to increase yield. It has also facilitated

income generation activities for the village

youth.

Training Workshop

Open Access Publishing Using Open Journal Systems

Office (RAP) in collaboration

with the TOT academy to

promote Coherence in

Information on Agricultural

Research Development

(CIARD). This is repeated in

the region, with partners such

as APAARI, GFAR, SAARC

and SPC. The main objective

of the training was to

demonstrate how to open a

journal system for wider

access. The Availability,

Accessibility and Applicability

(AAA) of agricultural research

outputs are the key to

addressing a range of issues

related to food security. The

CIARD

Malika de Mel, Information Resources Associate,

attended a training on Open Access Publishing Using

Open Journal Systems in Thailand from 26-30 August

2013. The training was organized by the FAO Regional

Participants at the Open Access Publishing workshop

initiative assists National

Agricultural Research (NARS)

to make available their

research outputs in ways that

can be consumed by a variety

of stakeholders enabling them

to make informed decisions.

This was one of the series of

trainings organized by RAP

together with other partners

for regional NARS to make

their research publications

open to the wider public. The

training brought together 10

participants from four

countries in the region.

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Staff Spotlight

The Spotlight on this issue falls

on Mr. Nalin Munasinghe who

was the Programme Associate

in the FAO Representative’s

Office from 2002 to August

2013. Now he has taken up a

new position as National

Programme Manager of the UN-

REDD Programme in Sri Lanka.

Nalin holds a BSc. Degree in

Agriculture from the University

of Peradeniya, a Master’s

Degree in Economics from the

University of Colombo and a

Post-Graduate Diploma in

Marketing from the Chartered

Institute of Marketing, United

Kingdom.

On the eve of his departure

from the FAO Representation

Office, we had an opportunity

to interview him. Excerpts of

the interview are produced

below:

implementing partners (3 UN agen

cies + the Government counterpart)

good coordination is a must for t the

success of the project. In addition,

the project also needs to address

the priorities of the Civil Society

Organizations and the Indige-nous

Community as well. Hence coming

to consensus at everybody’s

satisfaction will no doubt be a

challenge.

Furthermore meeting deadlines,

attending to different national and

international consultants’ needs and

demands, best use of project

resources, and delivering results

would also be challenges to

overcome.

I consider the basic approaches

such as participatory planning and

decision-making, following the set

standards and guidelines for UN-

REDD programme implementation,

continuous and close monitoring on

the quarterly and annual work plans,

together with adopting a learning

and sharing culture would help in

overcoming the above challenges to

a great extent. It is also important to

have the correct guidance and

efficient assistance from the leading

agencies.

Q1 :Tell us briefly about the UN-REDD Programme which you have joined as the National Programme Manager.

The UN-REDD Programme is the

United Nations Collaborative initiative

on Reducing Emissions from

Deforestation and forest Degradation

(REDD) in developing countries.

The Programme was launched in

2008 to assist developing countries

prepare and implement national

REDD strategies, and builds on the

(UNEP).

.

convening power and expertise of the

FAO, the United Nations Development

Programme (UNDP) and the United

Nations Environment Programme

(UNEP).

The overall objective of the UN-REDD

programme in Sri Lanka is to support

the Government of Sri Lanka in

catalyzing the establishment of key

national mechanisms and support the

development of capacities required to

implement REDD.

The project was launched in June

2013, and I am leading the

Programme Management Unit under

the direct supervision of the National

Programme Director and the FAO

Representative.

Q2 : How do you see your transition from your position as Programme Associate to your new position?

Well, it’s really challenging. But I feel it

is worth taking this challenge and I

consider this as an opportunity to

expand my career in to the managerial

grid after serving for more than 10

years in the general service category.

There will be a set of new

responsibilities which I have to

undertake in achieving the

expectations of a multi-stakeholder

audience.

Q3 :What challenges would you expect in your new position and how are you planning to overcome these challenges? One of the key challenges would be

the overall coordination of the work.

As this is a project with four major

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Indika Ranasinghe Driver/Messenger

(UNREDD)

A.M.G. Jayarathne

Office Assistant

(UNREDD)

Thushara Perera Project Secretary

(UNREDD)

Dinanji Karunaratne Finance Assistant

(UNREDD)

Nanda Senanayake Administrative

Assistant (UNREDD)

Joining the FAO Sri Lanka

Team

Save Food Asia Pacific (Face book) - https://www.facebook.com/SaveFoodAsiaPacific

World Food Day - http://www.fao.org/getinvolved/worldfoodday/en/

Food and Nutrition Publication – Eating Well for Good Health www.feedingminds.org/fmfh/nutritionlessons

Forestry information - http://www.fao.org/forestry/infonews/en/

Useful Links

Q6: What will you miss most at the FAO Representation Office?

Certainly there is an opportunity cost.

I miss my team, lost the fixed-term

position which is enriched with

several attractive fringe benefits and

also the fine working environment.

Anyway it’s a new way of working,

with a team headed by me. Nalin at work in the field

Chryshaine

Guneratne

Asset Management/

Comms. Assistant

Q4 : What are the best

aspects of your work?

Working with a wider stakeholder

audience is the best part of my

work. In addition, I also like the

nature of work, which is related to

environment and climate change,

forest monitoring, mapping and

capacity building. I always value

teamwork which generates synergy.

FAO Representation : Tel: + 94 11 2588537/2580598 / Fax: + 94 11 2587990 / Email: FAO-LK@fao.org

“For a world without hunger”

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