Moves to promote pottery industry

Nimal Wijesinghe Anuradhapura Additional District group correspondent

Left: Villagers in Ellewewa waiting to get free sets of earthen kitchen utensils under the Women’s Affairs Ministry’s Pottery Industry upgrading programme in Anuradhapura. Right: Minister Tissa Karalliyadda offering a seven-in-one set of kitchen utensils to a Buddhist priest. Pictures by Nimal Wijesinghe Anuradhapura Additional District group corr

Child Development and Women’s Affairs Minister Tissa Karalliyadda has initiated an islandwide programme to promote the country’s pottery industry.

The programme was inaugurated in the Anuradhapura district recently.

Potter families in 24 villages in the Anuradhapura district are being provided with training, pottery industrial equipment and other infrastructural facilities to revive the industry under the project. Marketing facilities will be arranged for the villagers.

The minister distributed earthenware including kitchen utensils worth Rs 500,000 among 1,250 families in Ellewewa and Henewattha in the Galenbindunawewa and Mihintale Divisional Secretariat areas.

“Earthen kitchen utensils bought by the ministry from Pottery Industry villages have been offered to 172,000 families islandwide. We believe that in addition to polluted and contaminated water, aluminium kitchen utensils cause kidney diseases which are spreading at an alarming rate in the Anuradhapura and Polonnaruwa districts.

The ministry encourages the use of earthen utensils in place of aluminium vessels. The move helps empower those who are engaged in the pottery industry, minister Karalliyadda said.