UN HABITAT Sri Lanka with the assistance of M/S Bovis Lend Lease of Australia has collected a large consignment of cricket gear donated by school children in Australia to be gifted to children in Sri Lanka. This initiative comes under a goodwill project for tsunami victims in Sri Lanka organized by the two partners.

The Cricket gear are intended for less privileged cricket playing schools in all the tsunami affected districts including those in North East Sri Lanka. Mr. Harry Solomons, a well known Sri Lankan presently living in Australia, who had made several such donations to schools in Sri Lanka in the past, has helped coordinate this project from Australia.

UN-HABITAT, the United Nations Human Settlements Programme selected the schools to receive the cricket gear in consultation with the Ministry of Education, Ministry of Sports and Sri Lanka Cricket. Twenty three cricket playing schools from eight tsunami affected districts were selected.

A special ceremony was held at the United Nations Compound, Bauddhaloka Mawatha, Colombo 07, at 1030 hrs.on Friday, 15 June 2007, presided by Mr. Frederick Lyons, Resident Coordinator, United Nation to hand over the cricketing gear. Dr. Greg French, High Commissioner for Australia in Sri Lanka, Sri Lanka Cricket, and Secretary, Ministry of Sports participated in the ceremony. Members of the Sri Lanka national cricket team who have won the hearts of the cricketing world at the recently concluded Cricket World Cup were amongst the celebrities who handed over the cricket equipment to the Captains of school cricket teams.