The presenter Nimal Gunawardena is a Senior Professor of Agricultural Engineering at the University of Peradeniya (UoP), Sri Lanka. He has obtained M.Sc and PhD in Soil and Water Engineering from Cranfield University in UK. He has been involved in capacity building activities in Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) since 2002 with the introduction of IWRM postgraduate programme at the Post Graduate Institute of Agriculture at UoP. He was the first country coordinator of the CapNet, a UNDP project on capacity building in IWRM and later became the Executive Director of South Asian Consortium for Interdisciplinary Water Resources Studies (SaciWATERs) in Hyderabad, India and the Project Director of the Crossing Boundaries Project, a regional capacity building project on IWRM, Gender and Water. As a consultant, he has undertaken various assignments in Sri Lanka for the IUCN, USAID, ADB and FAO to translate research into practice. He also served as an international consultant to the UN/ESCAP and UNOPS.
The presentation covered the international developments in the water sector during last two decades and possible future scenarios, especially with regard to Sri Lanka. He would also discuss the possibilities of making alliances with global partners in the water sector for capacity development to meet the local demand.
This talk was organised by the Institution of Engineers Sri Lanka Northern Provincial Centre in collaboration with the Department of Civil Engineering of the Faculty of Engineering University of Jaffna, Jaffna Managers Forum and Jaffna Science Association Section B. This talk was held at the Faculty of Engineering on 3rd November from 2:00pm to 4:00pm.