Dilmah donates 10,000 COVID-19 testing kits
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Minister of Health, Nutrition and Indigenous Medicine, Pavithra Wanniarachchi accepting the Dilmah donation. Also present were Health Secretary Dr. S. H. Munasinghe and Dr. Janaka Sri Chandragupta, Additional Secretary, Development; Tharanga Indunil and H.M Gayani Priyangika from the Dilmah Engineering & Production Team; Gayan Thilakaratne, Manager - Human Resources Dilmah/ MJF Group and Thamindri De Silva, General Manager - Merrill J. Fernando Charitable Foundation.
Dilmah Ceylon Tea Company plc and associated Merrill J. Fernando Charitable Foundation on Wednesday initiated the second phase of its COVID-19 response with the presentation of 10,000 testing kits, virus collection swabs and RNA Mini kits at a cost of Rs. 44 million to Minister of Health, Nutrition and Indigenous Medicine, Pavithra Wanniarachichi.
The donation was made by staff and workers of Dilmah. Also present were Health Secretary Dr. S. H. Munasinghe and Dr. Janaka Sri Chandragupta, Additional Secretary, Development, the company said in a media release.
A minimum 15 per cent of the pretax profits from Dilmah are used to fund the humanitarian work of the MJF Foundation. Settlor Merrill J. Fernando has committed Rs. 450 million towards relief and post COVID-19 recovery.
The release said the first phase focused on emergency food aid and will continue through medical assistance to entrepreneurship development focusing on green recovery. The handover provided the first of three tranches to enhance Sri Lanka’s current testing capacity. “Thank you to Dilmah and their Foundation for providing these valuable items at the correct time. Today everybody asks for testing…and these will certainly help,” stated Secretary Dr. S. H Munasinghe.
“One of my proudest moments during the lockdown was to learn that Community Based Organisations and Women’s societies supported by the MJF Foundation united to donate time and resources to sew free masks and Personal Protective Equipment for use by their local Police, clinics and hospitals. It was a wonderful outpouring of support to their communities and country,” said Merrill J. Fernando Chairman and Founder of Dilmah and the MJF Group.
The second phase will support recovery efforts of micro and small agricultural enterprise, the reskilling of youth and adults to increase their earning potential, support to the value addition for agricultural products and the adaptation of therapeutic services for children with disability.