HNB, UNIDO to help bamboo industry

Hatton National Bank (HNB) and the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) entered into a Memorandum of Understating at the HNB Towers recently to assist the bamboo industry in Sri Lanka.

Accordingly, UNIDO has allocated a revolving fund of USD 600,000 to assist the industry through HNB's Gami Pubuduwa micro finance scheme. The other stakeholders of the project are the Ministry of Industry and Commerce and the Sri Lanka Bamboo Association.

The project is aimed at developing a new industrial bamboo sector in Sri Lanka by setting up a bamboo supply chain and processing industry. The beneficiaries will be rural households which harvest bamboo from the countryside and river banks, as the bamboo industry has the potential to create many direct and indirect employment opportunities in villages.

Bamboo can be used as a biomass feedstock to meet the fuel wood demand in the domestic and industrial sectors, which has shown a steady increase over the past few years.