Reuters | By: Amantha Perera | August 16, 2017:

ADIGAMA, Sri Lanka (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Scorched by a 10-month drought that has killed crops and reduced residents to buying trucked-in water, Adigama’s young people are voting with their feet.

At least 150 youth have left this agricultural village 170 km northwest of Sri Lanka’s capital since the drought began, looking for jobs in the country’s cities, or overseas, village officials say.

Few are expected to come back, even when the rains end.

“If they get the lowest paying job overseas, or in a garment factory, they will not return,” said Sisira Kumara, the main government administrative officer in the village of 416 families.

“They will work at construction sites or as office helpers, anything they can get their hands on. The ambition is go aboard, to the Middle East or East Asia – but that takes time,” said Kumara, as he walked through a dried and long-abandoned maize plot.

W.M. Suranga, a 23-year-old who left his family’s withering paddy rice field six months ago for Colombo, said working for low wages in the city is at least preferable to struggling with no rain at home.

“At least I am sure of a pay check at the end of the month. This uncertainly of depending on the rains is too much of a risk,” he said.

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