Australian High Commission
Colombo
MEDIA RELEASE
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16 November 2010
High Commissioner presents “Australia Awards” for 2011
The Australian High Commissioner, H.E. Ms Kathy Klugman, hosted a ceremony today to congratulate 22 accomplished Sri Lankans awarded scholarships under the prestigious ‘Australia Awards’ program funded by the Australian Government for postgraduate study in Australia. The ceremony was attended by Minister for External Affairs, the Hon G.L. Peiris, and Minister for Higher Education, the Hon. S. B. Dissanayake, as well as Australian scholarships alumni and other distinguished guests.
Four scholars were awarded an Australian Leadership Award (ALA) Scholarship, selected for their outstanding potential to champion positive social and economic development in Sri Lanka and the region. These awardees will join the almost 700 emerging leaders across Asia and the Pacific conferred ALA Scholarships since 2006. Eighteen public sector employees working in the education, environment, health and governance sectors were awarded an Australian Development Scholarship (ADS). The 22 scholarships were valued at approximately LKR 240 million this year.
Australia Awards scholarships provide opportunities for some of the brightest and most promising Sri Lankans to build their capacity to achieve national, regional and international development priorities by working in support of government and at the community level. Commenting on the awards, Ms. Klugman said “Sri Lanka now has an unprecedented opportunity to build a peaceful and prosperous future for itself. Australia is keen to support this, including by promoting educational excellence so that Sri Lanka has the best people it can have to be catalysts for national progress now and in the future. These programs also help to develop valuable people-to-people links between Australians and Sri Lankans which support collaboration for many years after a student had returned home”.
Since the Colombo Plan started in the early 1950s, Australia has provided more than 100,000 scholarships across the globe. Scholarships are an integral component of Australian aid. The Australian Agency for International Development plans to invest A $244 million globally in scholarships in 2010-11, offering 3,000 new awards to support human resource development in partner countries including Sri Lanka.
This year’s intake will bring the total number of Australian scholarships awarded in Sri Lanka to 240 over the last 10 years. High profile alumni include the current Secretary to the Cabinet of Ministers (Mr Sumith Abeysinghe), Secretary of the Ministry of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (Dr Dammitha de Zoysa), and former Cabinet Minister for Human Resources, Development, Education and Cultural Affairs and Ambassador for Tokyo and Seoul (Dr Karunasena Koditiwakku), to name a distinguished few. Prominent Australian scholarship alumni in other countries include the current Vice President of Indonesia, the Foreign Ministers of Indonesia and Vietnam, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Maldives, and three secretaries of state in Cambodia.
Further information about AusAID scholarships can be found at http://www.ausaid.gov.au/scholar/default.cfm
Media contact : Sally Mackay on 2463228