Building pre-schools in the tea plantations
The Australian High Commission’s Direct Aid Program (DAP) has funded the construction of two pre-schools for plantation sector children in Nuwara Eliya district. The project, worth LKR 1,876,000 was implemented by the Plantation Rural Education and Development Organization (PREDO) at Fordyce Estate and Kirkoswald Estate. Second Secretary Chloe Ashbolt declared the pre-schools open on 8 December 2013.
Education levels for plantation sector children are below the Sri Lankan average. A good pre-school education aims to set the foundation early for a quality education. With these two pre-schools the DAP program has now funded the construction of five pre-schools in the district since 2009. The Australian High Commission has funded many projects under the DAP program to improve education facilities and livelihood development in Sri Lanka’s plantation sector, one of the most disadvantaged in the country.
Providing addresses to 3,000 families
Workers in Sri Lanka’s tea plantations do not have their own addresses.All mail is delivered to the tea estate and then given to workers in an often ad hoc manner. This results in confusion and missed opportunities – people have foregone university placements as they did not receive acceptance letters, people regularly do not receive cheques that are accidently delivered to another person of a similar name, and people regularly do not receive personal and official correspondence.
The Australian High Commission has now supported a pilot project to obtain individual postal addresses for plantation sector employee families in Passara, Badulla district, under the Direct Aid Program (DAP). The project secured addresses for 3,000 families and also initiated a process to obtain National Identity Cards for 500 persons. The project was implemented by the Centre for Policy Alternatives with the help of partner organisation Uva Shakthi Foundation, in association with the Passara Pradeshiya Sabha (local government), the Passara Police and Passara Post Office. The project, worth LKR 2,120,000, also initiated the naming of roads in the area and placed 20 mail collection boxes in
