FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 30, 2004
Toronto, ON

TDND Canada: Tsunami Disaster Relief - Drinking Water
 
Transnational and Diaspora Network for Development, Canada (TDND Canada) is an international development organization is a registered charity committed to serve international community in despair. It was established with the interest of helping people in developing nations, who are affected by war, conflict and natural disasters. We do so by volunteering our knowledge, skills, networking, financial resources and collective voice in helping such communities.

Tsunami disaster is the worst natural disaster that had ever taken place in the Indian Ocean. This is the worst earthquake disaster in the last 40 years in the world. In several countries and islands, many towns and villages of the coastal areas were wiped out of the disaster and it caused immeasurable losses of properties and unaccountable human loss.

One of the most affected countries is Sri Lanka. The nation's one million homeless are in urgent need of shelter, drinking water and basic rations. The most important thing is the quality of water. There are reports of outbreaks of measles, diarrhea and other diseases and fears that they could develop into epidemics. Water purification tablets are being currently dispatched in large amounts and used for purifying water for drinking purpose. The devastation of Tsunami has caused contaminations to drinking water sources by polluting the wells with salt water, sewage and other putrefying materials.

The TDND Canada has in-house experts in the area of providing safe drinking water and has found out that an Aquarius system, extremely light and compact can be used effectively in this situation. The system can be easily fit into a small pick-up truck or in the trunk of a car is considered as a viable option to provide clean drinking water. This system can be easily set up by one or two people and simple to use. A 10,000 litre water bladder will fill to capacity in approximately 30 minutes.

With the interest of providing relief effort is being distributed fairly, TDND Canada intends to try out these Aquarius units one in each area, North, East and South of Sri Lanka. Each purification unit will cost $7,000 Canadian and taxes. The additional costs are the airfreight and the travel of at least one technical personnel. TDND Canada urges that the funding agencies such as CIDA or CIDA funded NGOs, community groups raised funds for relief effort, community members   and other sympathetic organizations and institutions support this effort by providing funds.

Successful results shall lead to implementation of this portable purification system in other affected countries and more units in Sri Lanka at various locations. Further, it will explore the possibility of various alternatives for providing clean drinking water during similar disasters in the future.

For more information contact:

Janaki Balakrishnan, P.Eng., M.A.Sc.
Secretary, TDND Canada
416 490 0276
info_tdnd@yahoo.com