Sri Lanka's First women’s BPO Launched in Uduvil to Commemorate International Women's Day

11th March 2012, www.sundayobserver.lk

ICTA launched the first women’s rural BPO on March 8 to commemorate International Women's day. It is also the third rural BPO to be launched. This BPO, in the Jaffna District, is being launched in partnership with the Foundation for Advancing Rural Opportunities.

This initiative is not only the very first in the Northern Province but it is also the very first women’s BPO in the country, a senior ICTA spokesperson said. According to ICTA sources it is the outcome of successful collaboration between the ICTA which has been at the helm of driving ICT in rural areas and the Foundation for Advancing Rural Opportunity, FARO a non profit organisation that actively supports employment generation in rural areas by outsourcing business processes of Colombo-based blue chip companies to the village.

This new BPO, named after the Founder of the School is the Eliza Agnew BPO Service Centre is hosted at the Uduvil Girls’ College in Jaffna. Partnering FARO on this venture is Hayleys Business Solutions International (Pvt) Ltd., HBSI (Pvt) Ltd who is very enthusiastic about their foray into rural areas with outsourcing work. The Company was closely involved in the project from the onset – in selecting operators, training and equipping the Centre.

ICTA sees this as a very important milestone in its efforts at taking the benefits of ICT to every village and every citizen. More importantly it supports the Government of Sri Lanka in its efforts at ensuring an equitable development of the country. The e-Society program of ICTA has implemented over 200 ICT based projects across the country. These projects have delivered to the door step of rural communities a host of valuable services – crop price information delivered to farmers via their mobiles; coordinates for fishing locations delivered to fisherman via their mobiles; text-to- Braille software which opens up the Internet and e-mail up for the visually impaired; e-learning software that makes learning fun for children.

The very first rural BPO was opened in Mahavilachchiya in the Anuradhapura District.