A green garden,consisting of valuable trees and plants, developed in commemoration of the people who have lost their lives by the terrorist attack on 21st April 2019, was declared opened by., the Minister of Maweli Development and Environment Ajith Manapperuma on 11th June 2019, in Diwulapitiya, Pinnakele, under the name, “ManudamUyana”.
This project has been implemented jointly by the Ministry of Mahaweli Development and Environment, Department of Forest Conservation, Sri Lanka Army and National Savings Bank.
It was launched in parallel to the World Environment Day and in addition, a program is in place to plant trees along the sides of Megoda Kelaniya Road by National Savings Bank under the guidance of Keleniya Raja Maha Vihara.
With a view to contributing to the national and global course of environmental conservation, National Savings Bank has launched the NSB Agro forestry Project under which, 26,000 and 76,000 plants with an economic value have been distributed among the customers respectively on the World Thrift Day in 2017 and 01stJanuary 2019.
Further, vegetable seeds were distributed under the theme, “A Picturesque Garden - A Robust Economy” in commemoration of World Thrift Day, 2018 while plants were distributed among the customers in line with the auspicious time declared for planting trees for the Sinhala & Hindu New Year, 2019.
Deforestation is one of the gravest environmental issues that we have encountered during the past few years in Sri Lanka.
The current forest cover in the country is approximately 29.7% which needs to be increased to 32% by 2030 and to achieve this target, it is imperative to grow trees in an additional area of 145,000 hectares.
National Savings Bank, the premier savings bank in the country, looks forward to ensuring its maximum contribution to achieve this purpose by implementing many more projects of this nature in future to build an evergreen environment for the future generations of the country.
(LI)