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Flooding across Asia leaves 600 dead and hundreds missing
Torrential rains have triggered floods and landslides across parts of southern Asia, killing around 600 people.
Monsoon rain exacerbated by tropical storms caused some of the region’s worst flooding in years, with millions affected in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Sri Lanka.
Intense rainfall began on the Indonesian island of Sumatra on Wednesday. “During the flood, everything was gone,” a resident of Bireuen in Sumatra’s Aceh province told Reuters news agency. “I wanted to save my clothes, but my house came down.”
With hundreds still missing, the death toll is likely to rise. Thousands remain stranded, some awaiting rescue on rooftops.
As of Saturday more than 300 people had died in Indonesia and 160 in Thailand. There were also several deaths reported in Malaysia.
In Sri Lanka, which has been battered by Cyclone Ditwah, more than 130 people are dead and some 170 missing, officials said.
An exceptionally rare tropical cyclone, named Cyclone Senyar, caused catastrophic landslides and flooding in Indonesia, with homes swept away and thousands of buildings submerged.
Indonesia’s disaster agency said on Saturday that nearly 300 people were still missing after flooding devastated Sumatra.
“The current was very fast, in a matter of seconds it reached the streets, entered the houses,” a resident in Aceh Province, Arini Amalia, told the BBC.
She and her grandmother raced to a relative’s house on higher terrain. On returning the following day to retrieve some belongings, she said the flood had completely swallowed the house: “It’s already sunk.”
After waters rapidly rose in West Sumatra and submerged his home, Meri Osman said he was “swept away by the current” and clung onto a clothesline until he was rescued.
The bad weather has hampered rescue operations, and while tens of thousands of people have been evacuated, hundreds are still stranded, the Indonesian disaster agency said.
In Thailand’s southern Songkhla province, water rose 3m (10ft) and at least 145 people died in one of the worst floods in a decade.
Across the 10 provinces hit by flooding, more than 160 people have been killed, the government said on Saturday. More than 3.8 million people have been affected.
The city of Hat Yai experienced 335mm of rainfall in a single day, the heaviest in 300 years. As waters receded, officials recorded a sharp rise in the death toll.
At one hospital in Hat Yai, employees were forced to move bodies to refrigerated trucks after the morgue became overwhelmed, news agency AFP reported.
“We were stuck in the water for seven days and no agency came to help,” Hat Yai resident Thanita Khiawhom told BBC Thai.
The government has promised relief measures, including compensation of up to two million baht ($62,000) for households that lost family members.
In neighboring Malaysia, the death toll is far lower, but the damage is just as devastating.
Flooding has wreaked havoc and left parts of northern Perlis state under water, with two people dead and tens of thousands forced into shelters.
Sri Lanka is also grappling with one of its worst weather disasters in recent years, and the government has declared a state of emergency.
More than 15,000 homes have been destroyed and some 78,000 people forced into temporary shelters, officials said. They added that about a third of the country was without electricity or running water.
Meteorologists have said the extreme weather in South East Asia may have been caused by the interaction of Typhoon Koto in the Philippines and the rare formation of Cyclone Senyar in the Malacca Strait.
The region’s annual monsoon season, typically between June and September, often brings heavy rain.
Climate change has altered storm patterns, including the intensity and duration of the season, resulting in heavier rainfall, flash flooding and stronger winds.
[BBC]
With the objective of enhancing the living conditions of the agricultural community and increasing the contribution of the agricultural sector to the GDP, ‘Smallholder Agribusiness Partnerships Programme’ is being implemented with the financial contribution form the government and the International Fund for Agricultural Development.
The Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock, Lands and Irrigation is
implementing the program in collaboration with the Regional Development Department of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka. All recoveries from loans provided under the program shall be directed to a revolving fund titled the “Sustainable Agricultural Fund”, which shall be utilized exclusively for the provision of
agricultural loans. Using the said fund, it is proposed to implement an agricultural loan scheme titled the “Sustainable Agriculture Programme” for individuals and institutions engaged in agriculture and related activities.
It is expected that an amount of Rs. 800 million from the funds available in the Sustainable Agriculture Fund will be allocated for the implementation of the Sustainable Agriculture Program in the year 2026.
Accordingly, the Cabinet of Ministers approved the proposal made by the President in his capacity as the Minister of Finance, Planning and Economic Development to implement the “Sustainable Agriculture Program” loan scheme through the Participatory Finance Institution as an annual program from the year 2026.
The Ministry of Education, Higher Education and Vocational Education has entered into agreements with Sri Lanka Insurance Corporation General Limited to execute the Suraksha Student Insurance programme which is implemented with the objective of facilitating to maintain student education activities of students who experience disturbances to education due to numerous health issues without any interruption.
From this, approximately 40 lacks of students educated in government schools, government approved private schools, Pirivena and assisted special schools are covered under health
insurance, accident coverage, and life insurance categories.
Considering the issues recognized when implementing this programme, the Cabinet of Ministers granted approval to the particulars furnished by the Prime Minister in her capacity in the post of the Minister of Education, Higher Education and
Vocational Education that the ‘Suraksha’ Student Insurance Programme for the year 2025 / 2026 will be implemented including the following amendments and thereby actions will be taken to issue relevant circular instructions.
• Implementation of ‘Suraksha’ Student Insurance Programme until 31.08.2026 in relation to the year 2025 / 2026
• Amendment of the annual income of low income category considered at granting parent death benefit from rupees 180,000/- to rupees 240,000/-
• Granting benefit up to rupees 75,000/- for the Scoliosis Brace which is used for correcting distortion of the spinal code and Cochlea Equipment.
• Granting benefits up to rupees Rs. 20,000/- for students those who are taking medicine for longer periods for ailments in the category of critical illness category and another 07 identified ailments.
• Adding 05 more ailments as Pneumothorax, Encephalitis, Thalassemia, Hereditary Spherocytosis and Sickle Cell Anemia which are in the critical ailment category.
• From 01.09.2025, providing opportunity to handover the claim applications for obtaining benefits to any regional office of Sri Lanka Insurance General Limited.
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Establishment of Consultancy Boards for strengthening and promoting local production industries.
20 Consultancy Boards have been established by now covering the production industries field with the objective of minimizing the policy issues in industries and entrepreneurship development.
It has been recognized the requirement of establishing consultancy committees for another 07 special industry sectors that are not covered by the aforementioned consultancy committees.
Accordingly, the Cabinet of Ministers granted approval to the proposal furnished by the Minister of Industries and Entrepreneurship Development to establish Consultancy Committees for the following industry sectors comprised of not
more than 25 members representing experts in the state institutions, commercial boards / assemblies, institutions (Universities and Research Institutions) and experts in the respective industries sector.
• Indigenous medicine and traditional / hereditary medical sector
• Confectionaries related production industries sector
• Traditional handicraft industries sector
• Chicken related industries sector
• Ornamental fish and sea weed related industries sector
• Creative craft related industries sector
• Event management sector
Implementation of the loan scheme, “Sustainable Agriculture Program”
Cabinet nod to implement ‘Suraksha’ Student Insurance Programme in the year 2025 / 26
Establishment of Consultancy Boards for strengthening and promoting local production industries.
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