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CURRENT
SITUATION OF NATURAL DISASTER MITIGATION IN
SRI LANKA
Report to be submitted
to the
Parliamentary Select Committee to Recommend Steps to Minimize the
Damages from
Natural Disasters
Landslide
Studies & Services Division
National Building Research Organisation
Ministry of Housing and Construction Industry, Eastern Province
Education and Irrigation Development
99/1,Jawatte Road, Colombo 05,
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NATURAL
DIASTERS IN SRI LANKA
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1.1.
OVER VIEW OF NATURAL DISASTERS OF SRI LANKA
Many types of natural disasters affect Sri Lanka every
year. Until the Tsunami divested the coastal areas of the country
on 26th December 2004, floods, landslides, drought and coastal
erosion were the major disasters that affect country both physically
and economically.
The rural population largely depends on agriculture-based livelihood
whereas the urban population mainly depends on secondary and
tertiary sector jobs. When this population density is considered,
natural disasters affect the community in different aspects.
Here in this case, it is important to address the problems faced
by urban community due to the following reasons,
• Number of people affected will be high due to concentration
of population.
• Damages to infrastructure are higher than that in rural
areas.
• Difficulty in allocation of alternative land as in urban
areas always there is a land scarcity.
• Disaster in an urban area will cause more direct and
indirect losses (lost of property values, employment, access
to work place, harvest, food storage, etc.)
• Disasters in urban areas will lead to high environment
pollution (septic tanks, chemical storage, etc.)
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| 1.2.
OCCURRENCE OF LANDSLIDES IN SRI LANKA |
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Among
the natural disasters discussed above, Landslide is the
most pressing environmental problems of the hill country
areas in Sri Lanka. Every year, a great economic loss
is reported due to economic impact in the urban and semi
urban environment projects, infrastructure and more importantly
to lives. In case of occurrences of landslides in
Sri Lanka, ten districts have been identified as landslide
prone areas that are Badulla, Nuwara-eliya, Rathnapura,
Kegalle, Kandy, Matale, Kalutara, Galle, Matara &
Hambantota. Nearly 20 000 Km2 of highly prone area to
landslides spread over these districts (fig 1.1).
Major landslides occurred during the past two decades
have caused loss of thousands of lives and about 175,000
people became homeless. Damages to life and properties
due to frequent occurrences of landslide increase with
run- |
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| out
velocity and hence people who are living within the vulnerable
area and along the run-out track of the slide have no time to
escape. Adequate mitigatory measures, such as stabilization
procedures, early warning systems are yet to be commenced up.
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1.3.
OCCURRENCE OF FLOOD IN SRI LANKA
Floods occur when there is excessive rainfall within
a short period and when the run off cannot be accommodated in
the natural surface water systems. Floods become a severe problem
when it affects the populated areas where damages to life, property
and infrastructure become high in both number and value.
In Sri Lanka, all major rivers start from the central hills.
When the mountainous receives intensive rainfall, all flat areas
that are surrounded by this hilly region become flooded within
a short period of time. As a result, every year, during the
rainy seasons, people who are living in the downstream areas
are severely affected by flood. However, unfortunately, there
is still no early warning system established to issue warning
to people to escape from the incidence. Currently, number of
government bodies involve in the field of disaster management
but flood mitigation, disaster response and evacuation procedures
are not yet finalized.
1.4. EFFECTS OF NATURAL DISASTERS ON THE NATIONAL ECONOMY
Frequent occurrence of natural disasters in Sri Lanka
causes considerable damage to the Sri Lankan economy. As a developing
country, economic losses due to natural disasters are not affordable
compared to country’s annual GDP. Table 1.2 shows the
number of families affected by disasters and details of relief
granted during past two decades of Sri Lanka. In general, the
amount of affected people and economic losses has been increased
drastically.
When the number of affected people is confirmed, the impact
of Tsunami is higher than the impacts of any other natural disasters
that have occurred in the country. However, when the frequencies
of occurrence of different disasters are considered, Landslides,
floods and Droughts also have a significant impact on the life
and economy of the country.
Following shows that nearly 300,000 families are affected annually
by any forms of natural disaster during past two decades and
ask for relief from the social services department of Sri Lanka.
Out of this, about 40% have been caused by the flood and landslide
disasters. This shows that floods and landslides are one of
the major natural disasters faced by our community. Further,
it is understood that amount of all the deaths have occurred
due to floods and landslides during the past two decades except
for 21 deaths due to cyclones in 1993-96 period. During 1981-96
period a total of 684 deaths have occurred due to floods and
landslides. This is nearly 95% of the total deaths occurred
during the period. Hence, when compared with other disaster
landslides and floods can be fatal for people.
Table 1.2: Number of Deaths and Families Affected by
Natural Disasters and Amount of Relief Distributed
By the Government from 1994 to 2003 |
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| Source:
Department of Social Services-2004 |
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2
MAJOR PROBLEMS FACED DURING THE DISASTERS MITIGATION PROCESSES
Not only the Tsunami, but also flood and landslides
have caused a remarkable increase of death and damages in the
country. This was not the first and may not be the last of groping
in the dark not only with regard to disaster mitigation and
management but also relief and rehabilitation. During the implementation
of appropriate mitigation procedures, following problems are
generally encountered
2.1. Problems Encountered in Mitigation of Landslides
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i |
Government
of Sri Lanka is still not in a position to allocate required
funds to implement remedial measures to stabilize landslides,
slope failures and rock falls. Although, the experts at
the National Building Research Organization, have already
identified more than 60% of the total landslide prone
areas of the country suitable remedial measures to stabilized
those unstable soil and rock slopes, no financial allocations
are available to implement them. Therefore only the Non-engineered
measures have been adopted such as avoidance, tree plantation,
surface drainage etc., but in most of the cases those
techniques are not adequate to keep unstable masses under
control. |
ii |
Unplanned
land use practices applied on hill slopes is another problem.
Landslide Studies & Services Division of National
Building Research Organization, as the only institution
in Sri Lanka to perform landslides investigation and mitigation
procedures is carrying out awareness programs to educate
the general public of how to practice suitable land use
on hill slopes. However, they always neglect guidelines
as introduced to them and as a result, the hilly areas
are becoming increasingly vulnerable to landslides, slope
failures and rock fall. |
| Current
unplanned awareness procedure must be strengthened and
formulated as a national level program |
iii |
In
the toe area of most of the landslide prone slopes in
the country are highly populated and some of such areas
are already urbanized. People living in such places are
always under the threat of landslides. In case, if a landslide
occurs, people don't have sufficient time to escape from
the incidence since there are no early warning systems
available. We are now in need of establishing such systems
in landslide prone slopes. However, insufficient financial
allocations restrict implementation of such warning systems. |
| v |
Lack
of cooperation among the institutions that are handling
disaster mitigation activities has also become a problem.
Even though these organizations are loosely linked with
each other, whenever a disaster occurs, all these organizations
seem to work in isolation creating unnecessary expenses
and reflection of work. |
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2.2.
Problems Encountered in Mitigation of Floods
Mitigation of flood hazard is also a difficult task
to achieve in Sri Lanka. Even now, there is no specific institution
in the country to mitigate the impacts of floods. In some of
the major rivers, dams have been constructed to generate hydropower.
These dams are now playing a major role in controlling the flood.
Five hydro-power generating dams in the Mahaweli river, has
prevented the whole flood plain area from severe floods. However,
along the rest of rivers and streams, dams or flood control
structures have not been constructed and as a result, every
year, severe flooding affects the areas situated downstream
of those rivers. Following problems still exist against mitigation
of flood disasters.
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| i |
All
the riverbanks are highly populated due to the lack of
land availability in Sri Lanka. Most of them are self-employed
by fishing, sand mining etc., in the rivers. Since, the
present unemployment rate is increasing day by day the
government finds it difficult to provide alternative jobs
for them. Therefore, resettlement is also impossible.
Construction of flood retention levees is also a difficult
task not only due to high population density but also
due to lack of annual budgetary allocation by the government.
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ii |
Negligence
of the people is also a very big problem to be over come
flood hazards with an immediate effect. Although, the
institutions, involved in disaster mitigation activities,
are already carrying out public awareness programs, public
participation is still unsatisfactory. Even though the
government has introduced suitable construction methodologies
for flood prone areas, people do not follow such construction
methodologies. It is also true that, most of the people
living in flood prone areas are not having the required
financial strength to practice such construction methodologies.
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| iii |
No
early warning system has been established along any of
the river courses. This is due to lack of financial allocation
and negligence of the post disaster situation in Sri Lanka.
Currently, river gauging stations are operated in most
of the rivers but their use is still limited to measuring
of discharge and rainfall intensity. Even if river water
level is recorded to be dangerous, warning announcements
are not issued to the vulnerable areas. |
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| 2.3.
Specific Problems Encountered in Disaster Mitigation |
| i |
Among
all the problems discussed above, negligence of the people
should be addressed as a major issue encountered during
mitigation programs. Even though the people living in
the vulnerable areas are aware of the danger through public
awareness programs and training courses, they tend to
forget all about it within a short period. Strategy of
most of the people is that “disasters never come
to me but to the nabour”. They never think, that
they will be victims. |
ii |
Inappropriate
land use policy and improper development procedures are
also problems. During the planning stage of construction
activities, nobody concerns about the impacts of natural
disasters. Central and local governments are still not
practicing appropriate regulations for avoiding unplanned
land use and development practices. As an example, the
application to get a building approved is the same all
over the country. For one thing the application form is
very old and it is not tailor-made to suit for each area.
For hilly areas, flood prone areas, coastal areas, and
drought prone areas, the same set of questions is forwarded.
The questions should be appropriate to tackle specific
problems for each particular area. If it is a hilly region,
then the form should query whether the building would
be on a slope and what its stability (a statement on the
level of risk from landslides should be evaluated) . If
it is in flood prone area the question should be on the
distance to the closest river. |
| iii |
Lack
of places for quick evacuation. It is true that, during
a disaster there are no evacuation places developed in
any of the disaster prone areas especially flood prone
areas. After the disaster comes, affected people have
nowhere to escape. They get exited about the threat on
their head since they know that they are helpless at all
and finally become poor victims. |
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| 3.
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR FUTURE DISASTER MITIGATION ACTIVITIES IN
SRI LANKA. |
Although
number of government as well as non-government organisations
are involved in the disaster management in Sri Lanka, the importance
of disaster mitigation has not been well recognised yet. In
order to reduce the risk of disasters, most essential thing
is to mitigate it at the planning stage. Hence, highlighting
the disaster mitigation in the development plan of the local
authority is important.
Some measures for disaster management such as awareness-creation
among the people and training a wide range of officials has
been implemented quite successfully. But the story was different
in the recent landslide that occurred at Palawela, Abhayapura.
When pre-signals were appeared such as tilting of trees, cracking
of houses and opening of tension cracks, the people who were
at up hill had moved away, but not those who were in down hill
even though they too had been informed of the dangers. As a
result, more than 75 people have been reported killed and 35
houses were destroyed.
All the Sri Lankan rivers originate from the central hilly region
and upper portion of all those flow over very steep slopes,
hence the flow rates of these rivers are very high. During the
rainy season, floodwater comes fast and hit the, down stream
flat areas. However, there is no pre warning system or monitoring
systems established along the rivers. People do not know what
is going on in the up stream area. When floodwater encounters
their living space with a jet velocity, time for evacuation
is not enough at all. Therefore, until a proper structure is
set up and mitigatory and management measures are put in place,
the only disaster management in Sri Lanka will be handing over
relief items to the ragged men, women and children after the
disaster has struck. |
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3.1.
Emergency System Preparedness
Based on its expertise in the field of disaster management,
the NBRO suggests the following mitigation plans to be absorbed
in to Natural Disaster Mitigation Plan. |
| i |
All
organisations involved in the disaster forecasting, management,
mitigation and related research should be re-established
under a single act, and all those organisations must be
strengthened with sufficient legal authority and institutional
framework. An umbrella organisation for all including
the local and central government bodies in the mitigation
and management of disasters will make a strong corporation
among all those organisation and institutions. |
ii |
Establishment
of a well-developed disaster forecasting system is necessary.
Currently, Department of Meteorology is forecasting weather
but no organisation make use of it. After the Meteorological
Department issue a certain signal on Heavy rain, Cyclones
or Droughts organisations involved in the field of disaster
management must monitor the possible development of a
disaster. A standby staff must be available with all those
organisations. |
| iii |
Evacuation
places must be set up in all possible and suitable locations.
All those evacuation places must be fully surrounded by
dense trees. A detailed investigation must be started
soon to identify such places in flood and landslide prone
areas. Simultaneously, a well-planned evacuation procedure
must be introduced to all vulnerable people through regular
drills. |
iv |
Strethening
of mass media and communication system is another area
to be addressed. Currently, most of the electronic media
and other mass media are oriented only for entertainment.
However, it must be noted that it is necessary to educate
people about the natural disasters and importance of preparedness
and mitigation with the participation of them. Because,
it has been noticed that disaster response from the general
public is still unacceptable. If they are concerning about
their surrounding environments, damages and deaths due
to a disaster could be minimised. |
v |
Early
warning systems for disaster prone areas are yet to be
established in Sri Lanka. Most of the disaster prone areas
are highly populated but non-of them is equipped with
early warning systems. Therefore, vulnerable people never
get sufficient time to escape. Therefore, with immediate
effect such early warning systems must be established
as much as possible. Currently, the Landslide Hazard Maps,
which are produced by National Building Research Organisation,
is the only document available for people atleast to identify
the risk categories in the area where they live. Nevertheless,
there is still not a trend from people or construction
and planning institutions to make use of them. Development
works are carried out without identifying the vulnerable
areas as indicated by such maps. |
vi |
Preparation
for the next disaster is the next important thing to be
adopted. In Sri Lanka, the present situation of disaster
preparedness is still doughtfull. Soon after a big disaster,
people, forget all about the damages and deaths. They
never think of preparing for the next event of the disasters.
Therefore, all organisations dealing with disaster mitigation
should organise continuos programs for preparedness for
the next disaster. |
vii |
It
is well understood that the public participation in mitigation
of a disaster is very important. People must have a specific
training to make logical decisions during a disaster.
In this matter public, police department, armed forces
as well as Non Government Organisations (NGO) must be
trained through continuous drills. It must be noted that
public participation drills play a major role in those
aspects. Representative from all these sectors must be
trained first which enable them to train staff of their
own organisations. For example, during the great Hansin-Awaji
earth quack in Japan in 1995, voluntary groups had rescued
80% of the victims. Rescue operations had been able to
carry out with great ease officials got maximum support
from voluntary rescue workers. |
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3.2.
Measures for the Lives of the Victims
In order to minimise the damages to victims' lives
there is still not a systemic way to practice. It is true that
within hours of a disaster in Sri Lanka, a search and rescue
operation are quickly underway. The Government establishes an
emergency operations room, mobilises the Armed Forces, and delivers
foods and relief items to the victims. Armed Forces play a vital
role in the relief efforts ensuring communications and transport
of relief items to areas isolated by the disaster. However,
this emergency operation system is not operated continuously.
The national and local government must immediately collect and
analyse information on the state and scale of damage and exchange
this information with related persons and organisation, enably
them to take quick and appropriate decisions. |
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3.3.
Survey and research for future disaster mitigation
In order to avoid the damages, and deaths, which will
be caused by a big disaster, implementation of detailed surveys,
researches and development in association with an already occurred
disaster must be commenced up. Identification and improvement
of construction methodologies in disaster prone areas, ground
improvement techniques, appropriate land use practices and guidelines
must be updated in every disaster prone areas of the country.
Large-scale national level investments must be made in order
to establish disaster resistant structures. However, implementation
of such large-scale research is a difficult task due to insufficient
budgetary allocation. Even now it is not too late to implement
such Long-term plans for avoiding hillside disasters, fluvial
disasters and coastal disasters. Following studies must be started
with immediate effect. |
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| a |
Soil
conservation and erosion control projects to prevent mountainous
regions from collapsing and eroding of mountain soils
and sediments. Herein this case, an erosion control project
called Upper Watershed Management Project has already
been implemented in Sri Lanka but their objectives and
strategies are still not sufficient to tackle existing
problems. |
b |
Landslide
prevention projects to prevent and decrease landslide
disasters. Here in this regard, mitigation strategies
of landslides and slope failures are yet to be implemented
although the landslide investigation works are already
in the progress. |
| c |
Construction
of dams and sediment control structures for flood control |
d |
Steep
slope countermeasures projects to prevent rock falls.
Planting of trees in a systematic way is the best solution
to overcome this problem. |
e |
Coastline
conservation projects are already under way but further
researches in order to modify and improve cost effective
and efficient methodologies are yet a big target to archive.
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| 3.4.
Maintenance of Emergency Readiness System |
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updated bill on Disaster Counter Measures needs to be passed
by the parliament. Recruitment of new staff and establishment
of new powerful government body are also necessary. The proposed
bill should address the following issues |
| a |
Prevention
and Mitigation of Disaster, |
b |
Protection
of life and property from the effects of Disaster, |
| c |
Maintenance
and restoration of order in areas effected by disasters, |
d |
Provision
of facilities for emergency response, relief, rehabilitation
and reconstruction in the event of a disaster, |
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| Currently,
several government organisations and projects are already employed
in the field of Disaster management. Following table (Table
2.3) indicates the current activities and responsibilities of
each of the organisation involved in the disaster management
activities. |
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| Table
2.2: Current Disaster Mitigation Activities in Sri Lanka |
| Organisations/
Institutions |
Responsibilities
and Functions |
| Landslide
Studies and Services Division (LSSD) of National Building
Research Organisation (NBRO), Ministry of Housing Construction
Industry, Eastern Province Education and Irrigation Development. |
Investigation
and mapping of landslide prone areas, preparation of landslide
hazard zonation maps, providing consultancy for mitigation
of landslides and slope failures, Research on Landslides
and their related deciplines, Conducting public awareness
programs and drills, Issuing early warning by mass media
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| Sri
Lanka Urban Multi-hazard Disaster Mitigation Project (SLUMDMP)
of Centre for Housing Planning & Building (CHPB),
Ministry of Housing Construction Industry, Eastern Province
Education and Irrigation Development. |
Training
of government and non-government officials on disaster
preparedness and mitigation, Conducting public awareness
programs, providing consultancies for disaster mitigation,
Providing funds for mitigation of urban disasters |
| National
Disaster Mitigation Centre, Department of Social Services,
Ministry of Social Welfare |
Conducting
public awareness programs, providing consultancies for
disaster mitigation, Providing funds for mitigation of
disaster prone areas, Providing disaster relief to the
affected people, Providing funds for restoration programs,
Resettlement programes for the homeless people |
| Upper
Watershed Management Project, Ministry of Environment
& Natural Resources |
Mitigation
procedure for erosion control in the upper water shed
areas, identification of high vulnerable areas for erosion
and landslides (NBRO is conducting landslide investigations
work), relocation of people from vulnerable areas, Providing
funds for erosion controlling works. |
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| However,
all these organizations still seem to be working in isolation,
sometimes loosely linked but leaving many gaps. In case if one
organization is tackling a future disaster, the other organizations
are not aware of that. Repeating the same study will be the
result. Therefore, unnecessary time and financial loss is unavoidable.
Out come of such repeating activities are also not good but
if there was a strong corporation among all those organizations,
outcome of the process will be more effective. In order to overcome
this existing situation, the following steps should be taken
in to consideration. |
a |
Formation
of strong legal system and structure of disaster management. |
b |
Formation
of powerful government body for disaster management and
mitigation. |
c |
Establishment
of exclusive disaster management communication network
such as meteorological disaster management information,
river/ basin information or road disaster information
systems, central disaster management radio communication
system which connects national organizations dealing with
disaster management and mitigation and also people living
in disaster prone areas. |
d |
Formulation
of standby disaster mitigation staff should be given first
priority. Currently, after a disaster it takes time for
quick response against disasters. |
e |
Corporation
among disaster mitigation organizations and rescue bodies
such as voluntary groups, police department, armed forces
and NGO's must be strengthened in order to minimize damages
and deaths caused by disasters. |
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| Under
the current policies applied in Sri Lanka, disaster mitigation
is not adequately effective. Whenever, a disaster occurs, NBRO,
as a disaster mitigation institution, goes to the scene and
investigate all surrounding areas to check weather there are
further threats. However, due to the lack of strong legal system
and structure of disaster management, mitigation procedures
can not be implemented with an appropriately. Evacuation of
people from the dangerous locations is the only mitigatory measure
that can be adopted. However, through continuous public awareness
programs, NBRO educates the people of how to identify a threat
using pre-signs and how to minimize possible risk with the use
of local and low cost methodologies. In addition, NBRO has already
introduced hill slope construction methodologies. Unfortunately,
people still neglect to follow the introduced methods due to
misjudgment of the problem. In order to tackle the future problems
associated with landslides and floods, NBRO is already in the
process of development of the methodologies as shown in the
following figure (2.3). |
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| Figure
2.3: Proposed methodology of mitigation and preparedness of
future disasters in Sri Lanka.
However,
even if this procedure is used, disaster mitigation procedure
should be formulated in an appropriate manner. Japan, as one
of the most disaster prone country in the world, has already
developed an adequate disaster mitigation procedure (Annexure
–A).
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| 4.
CONCLUSION |
| It
may appear that the severity and frequency of the natural disasters
in Sri Lanka may not be on the same high scales as one finds
in some countries. However, with respect to the annual GDP of
the country, the damages caused by the natural disasters are
still unaffordable. In order to implement a sustainable disaster
management in Sri Lanka, the following are the major task to
be achieved with immediate effect. |
a |
Lack
of training and education in the disaster management field |
b |
Lack
of funds |
c |
No
special package of assistance to the disaster victims |
d |
Delay
of the relief distribution channels |
e |
Inadequate
manpower and facilities for search and rescue operations |
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| It
is useful to notice that, legislation is not the only solution
to disaster mitigation since disaster will occur whether we
like it or not but environment gives us pre-signs before the
occurrence of any disaster. Therefore, it must be noted that
sensitive searching of the surrounding environment is necessary
to avoid the damages. |
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