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| Wednesday, 24 November 2004 |
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Established by a group of National minded business leaders, professionals and intellectuals in 1989, the People's Rual Development Association (PRDA) - a national level NGO - had two clear objectives. One was to free the new NGO from dependence on Foreign Donor Aid as fast as possible. The other was to promote small scale entrepreneurship among rural women from low income families in the Puttalam and Gampaha Districts. Within 15 years the organisation has been able to free itself completely from foreign donor funding and develop its own assets including its own fund from which it now supports all its development activities. On November 24 at the auspicious time of 10.24 am the PRDA together with the 42 affiliate Rual Women's Organisations launches an innovative "Enterprise Promotion Trust" to promote Small Scale Rural Enterprises in the Puttalam and Gampaha Districts. The new "Trust" will be launched by Mrs. Shiranthi Rajapakse, wife of the Prime Minister, states a press release from the Prime Minister's office. Like PRDA, its affiliate Rural Women's Organisations have also completely freed themselves from foreign donor funding by developing their own trust funds which range from a few lakhs to a few million rupees. Those who launched the initiative of evolving a proud national NGO free of Foreign Donor funding way back in 1989 included well-known professionals such as K. Balapthabandi PC, Chittral Amarathunga (Attorney-at-law) and R.C.de S. Manukulasooirya, business community leaders such as Patrick Amarasinghe and Sri Sangabo Corea, bankers such as Mahinda Galgamuwa and development activities such as Sunimal Fernando and Willie Gamage. Two of the original founders of PRDA - namely, Sunimal Fernando and Willie Gamage - work on the personal staff of Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapakse while K. Balaptabendi PC is Senior Advisor to the President. |
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