John Keells Foundation felicitated high performing volunteers contributing to CSR initiatives of 2017/18 at its annual Volunteer Recognition Day held on 21st June 2018 at Cinnamon Lakeside. The event was graced by Chairman and Directors of the John Keells Group. Speaking at the event, Mr. Susantha Ratnayake, Chairman, John Keells Holdings PLC (JKH) stated, “I take this opportunity to thank you profusely for the amazing passion and commitment that you continue to show. You are John Keells’ greatest ambassadors as the good work done by the Foundation and all staff volunteers continues to empower wider sections of society.”

Volunteers under the top 2 categories were felicitated at the event. A total of 840 staff volunteers in 1,398 instances accounting for 5,411 hours, was recorded in 2017/18 comprising of 21 Gold certificates, 71 Silver certificates, 168 bronze certificates and 580 recognized as merit winners.

Most projects carried out by John Keells Foundation (Foundation) – the CSR entity of the Group – function with the support of volunteers. Hence the Group’s volunteer network enables employees to go beyond their day-to-day work and make a hands-on contribution to community and environment development while the volunteer leave policy facilitates the release of staff for CSR activities with minimum restraint. Volunteers vary from project champions, trainers and trained assistants to those who engage in skill-based volunteerism and administrative support. Commenting on volunteerism at John Keells, Muditha Senarath-Yapa, Head of John Keells Research who champions the Foundation’s Science Promotion project and was a `gold’ recipient at the event, said, “As a volunteer, my greatest fulfilment was in observing children from rural areas learning to code a small robot to do simple tasks. It clearly shows that Sri Lanka is a country of very talented people. The day we learn to harness this potential is the day we change this country”.