26th January, IT Day of Dambadeniya Development Foundation

IT Day of Dambadeniya Development Club was ceremonially opened today at Open Auditorium. This event was facilitated by many veterans in IT and Management fields. This has been organized by the IT Club of Dambadeniya to improve the awareness on Information Technology of youths and students in the area. They have scheduled to conduct many valuable workshops and lectures on importance of IT knowledge acquisition and self management.

eYouth Forum launches its national networking process at JAVA 2009 Exihibition in Colombo.

The National Youth Forum establishing and networking process was launched today by the Damabadeniya Arunalu e-Youth Forum at JAVA 2009 exhibition premises at BMICH in Colombo. Through this they expect to make use ICT  for designing and developing a better future for youths in all parts of the country. Under this program they expect to empower all its member youth technically as well as with soft skill. Further, they  focus on youth’s livelihood and future employment also. According to them that kind of support programs enhance the opportunities of project sustainability and program  integration at any place of country disrespecting to ethical, language or social differences. 

“We want introduce and improve the awareness on eYouth Forum concept to other youths in the country. Further this will be the step stone of new relationships. We realized that most of the youth come to us are really interested on this and they are enthusiastic than we expected. That is good sign for us, we hope we would be able commence our preliminary activities in the nearest future and deliver the benefits all youths in the country.” Told one member participated to JAVA 2009 Exhibition from eYouth Forum from Dambadeniya. 

Mr. Sunil Rodrigo, Senior Manger Damabadeniya Development Foundation, also said ”It is a great opportunity for youth to step into a common platform where they could address their grievances, issues and ideas to be reckoned by relevant decision and policy makers in the country”

Interviewed by Wasantha Tennakoon 

Dambadeniya Community Radio- Winners of South Asia Manthan Award 2008

Dambadeniya community Radio is another success story of Dambadeniya Development Foundation where it address the isssue of raising the voice of voiceless in achieving a better tomorrow for their lifestyle. The most significant factor is this radio is being manged by the youth from Dambaeniya whom are bieng empowered to handle their own afairs. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlJs2ZJPKZ0

Creation of social enterprises to improve the harmony between ethnic groups

In Srilankan society youth are not being recognized as a major stake holder and their voices continue to remain unheard in developing the social-economic levels in the society due to the ethical, cultural and religious differences and the current political & cultural situation prevails result that they do not interact with each other widening the gaps in misunderstanding, undervaluing and the suspicion that lead to conflicts and violence while marginalizing the Tamil and Muslim communities in most cases. Hence we want to change the present situation into a phase that all the youth belongs to different ethnic group would come together and be able to create a sustainable social enterprise value chain as a model that enhance their efforts to understand each other while make them recognize in the society and to become a rolling model that could be replicated in other conflict areas.

In this blog, the effort of crating a chain of ICT base social enterprises utilizing the resources in their environment and a Multi Ethnic Forum{MEF} as a common platform that could be used by youth from all the ethnic groups would be an ideal place in developing sustainable peace and harmony.

Recognition of youth as an important stake holder in rural development

Our cultural and ethical behavior patterns always place the youth in a corner or a cell consider them an ineffective force not to be reckon in the decision making process at all the levels.But the youth are being our future workforce to take our country towards the prosperity, it is necessary to build the capacities o f the youth force enabling them to take part in the decision making process in rural development as they are the most strongest force available and capable in delivering the goods to the communities. Hence it has become a nessacity to enhance the efforts of the youth to recognize and develop their skills to become an important stake holder in the national development programmes, especially in the role of a courier in rural development activities.

Role of ICT in conflict resolution and peace

It is well known that at every level, from the family unit up to the national level ethnic conflicts, the major bottle neck in exchanging the views and thoughts is the huge communication gap prevailed through out the past few decades. Though the grass root level participants play a major role, most of the times few decision makers are taking vital decisions creating these gaps wider as those are not being implementing at the grass root level. Hence usage of the new technology, ICT could play a major role bridging these communication gaps through participatory process and in addressing the common issues and improving the relationship among these groups caught in the middle of the conflicts.