Hikkaduwa beach festival 2009 is one of the most happening beach events this year. Therefore this is one of the effective campaigns organized to boost the tourism industry in our country.
Many corporate organizations together with the Sri Lankan Tourism Board made their utmost effort to make the 2008 beach festival a successful and memorable one which attracted many locals and the international crowd to visit Sri Lanka (This breath taking event attracted nearly 10,000 Sri Lankan youth. 20% of the foreign tourists visiting Sri Lanka attended the 2008 festival).
The Hikkaduwa beach festival 2008 was blasting with fun-filled activities held throughout the whole week such as kite festival, rugby, sundown parties, DJ parties, girls only nights and much more. But there were other activities which were done in a shrewd manner to lure the youth. ‘Young girls’ smoking was one which astonished the crowd. Young guys offering free cigarette packs were another activity which was noticed among the crowd. From the sources we realized that most of these youngsters were employed by the tobacco industry’s who were used to promote their products among the young crowd. Is it not atrocious to manipulate youth in such ways?
It is well known that the tobacco industry will use and manipulate any given chance to trap our youth in their net. We fail to understand that the tobacco marketing is still being done in ways which we are not aware of but still done right in front of our face. Like last year this year’s Hikkaduwa beach festival is sponsored by the Ceylon Tobacco Company (CTC) according to information given. Even though CTC is banned to sponsor or promote their products according to the NATA Act, CTC is impliedly joining hands with the other corporate partners for this event to reach the youth.
Let us realize this and enjoy Hikkaduwa 2009, the most happening beach event of this year from July 31 to Aug. 2
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