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GSK donates medicines for IDPs

GSK Pharmaceutical Sri Lanka Managing Director Stuart Chapman (left) presents part of the donated pharmaceuticals to Health Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva. GSK Sri Lanka Medical Advisor Dr. Lucian Jayasuriya (second right) and Head of Sales Roger Talayaratne are also in the picture.

GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), has donated a stock of essential pharmaceuticals to the government for the use of the internally displaced people (IDPs) in the country.

The presentation was made to Health Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva this week at the Ministry of Healthcare and Nutrition.

The items included antibiotics, iron and vitamin supplements, asthma medication and medication for inflammatory skin conditions.

GSK Pharmaceutical Sri Lanka Managing Director Stuart Chapman said: "It is our duty to help these people who have lost everything they owned. As a leading corporate entity in the country, GSK is happy to contribute towards their well-being."

He said the donation includes medication for some of the most common illnesses that these people are suffering from, such as infectious diseases, asthma and dermatological problems.

New governing body for Disaster Management Software System

Lanka Software Foundation (LSF), the non-profit open source software development organization recently announced the graduation of Sahana, the disaster management software system developed in the wake of the 2004 South Asian tsunami.

A new independent foundation is being set up to take permanent ownership of Sahana and lead its future development.

"The objective of Lanka Software Foundation is to create real economic impact. With Sahana, LSF has been able to build a thriving ecosystem that has long-term sustainability in the software development industry in Sri Lanka", said Chairman, Lanka Software Foundation, Mano Sekaram.

In four years Sahana is widely accepted as the global de-facto disaster management software system. It has been deployed in major disasters around the world such as in Pakistan during the Asian Quake, in Indonesia during the Yogjarkata Earthquake and in three other disasters that occurred in the Philippines.

As one of the first global free and open source software projects for disaster management, Sahana has received many awards and accolades, including the Global Free Software Foundation (FSF) award for Social Benefit in 2006.

At the LSF and Sahana joint board meeting held earlier this week, it was decided to set up the new Sahana Foundation is a United States 501-C3 non-profit organization with the vision of building and sustaining a global community of open and collaborative ICT for emergency management.

The Sahana board and Project Management Committee members unanimously appointed President and CEO at Global Crisis Services Inc; Brent Woodworth as the Chairman of the interim Sahana board which will be functional for six months. The Founder, Director and Chief Scientist Dr Sanjiva Weerawarana, was also voted into the Sahana board.

SLIM organizes training session with Kent Ridge

Participants at the workshop

Creating high performance organization to face the challenges:

The Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing (SLIM) held a training session on team building for high performance organization to face the challenges recently, at Dampe Village Piliyandala.

Kent Ridge facilitated the workshop participated by the council members, executive staff of SLIM and others.

The program was initiated by the newly elected president of SLIM Saliya Weerasekera and his council. Group activities, role plays energizers management simulation and games were used in this program, themed "Winning is the name of the game."

"Through interactive and interesting activities, we were made to understand our shortcomings and it was a good eye-opener for our team," said a participant.

Allianz Lanka opens Galle branch

Mayor of Galle Methsiri de Silva opening the branch

Allianz Lanka recently opened its first southern branch in Galle.

Galle is Allianz's second venture into the provinces, the company having opened its first provincial branch in Kurunegala in December 2008.

The Galle branch is managed by Branch Manager Aruna Shantha and serviced by an experienced team of sales, front office and underwriting professionals trained to internationally benchmarked Allianz standards of customer service and underwriting.

The Guest of Honour the Mayor of Galle Methsiri de Silva, expressed his satisfaction that Allianz had chosen Galle to spearhead its Southern operations.

He said he would exercise every care to ensure that the people of his township and its environs benefitted from the presence of Allianz in Southern Sri Lanka.

Swiss Lanka Hotel School signs MoU

Opening pathways to international job market:

Tourism being the only trade that indicates a boom in employment opportunities worldwide, Swiss Lanka Hotel School will sign a MOU May 16 in Colombo with 'Informatics Campus in Singapore', facilitating Sri Lankan students to obtain higher qualifications in the hospitality trade leading to Masters' Degrees and the assurance of international industrial attachment.

Swiss Lanka Hotel School is one of the leading institutions for training and placement of trainees for higher education internationally.

Informatics of Singapore is the leader in the region with their University partners offering top Degree programs in Singapore, such as University of South Queensland (Australia), University of Wolverhampton (UK), Prifysgol-Cymru University of Wales, Northumbria University, University of Portsmouth and Oxford Brookes University.

With the signing of this MOU Students from Sri Lanka are assured of an employment-targeted training imparted by Swiss Lanka Hotel School as well as obtaining internationally recognized Degrees from Informatics Campus in Singapore.

This collaborative higher education program is a cost effective international education that opens a pathway for international employment.

It is economically beneficial to study in Singapore as the fees are in Singapore Dollars.

ICASL Microsoft workshop on ERP

The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Sri Lanka (ICASL) is conducting a workshop on Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) using Microsoft Dynamics Navision organized by the IT Training Division of the Institute.

This workshop would provide adequate theoretical and practical knowledge of the user interface structure as well as on managing organizational process with the help of Microsoft Dynamics Nav.

This workshop aimed at Managers, Finance Managers, Controllers and Accountants working in enterprise would cover a vast area of contents such as Overview of ERP, Implementation of ERP system, ERP on Manufacturing/ Production planning and Material management and Security in an ERP environment.

This workshop would be held on May 16 and 17, 9.00 a.m. to 4.00 p.m. at the IT Training Division of the ICASL. Further details can be obtained from [email protected]