Nature’s Beauty Creations Ltd (NBC), manufacturer of Nature’s Secrets and winner of Sri Lanka’s highest environmental award, the ‘National Green Award-Gold’, recently donated over 2700 medicinal and valuable plants across 13 different plant varieties for reforestation efforts at Nilgala Forest Reserve.

Located in Ampara District, the Nilgala Forest Reserve vicinity was known to have been the medicinal forest used by King Buddhadasa, a King renowned for his skill in indigenous herbal medicine. The forest which was declared a conservation area in 1953 is also the catchment area for the Rambakan Oya Reservoir. However, recent human intervention had destroyed over 2000 acres of the forest, and had also hindered the lives of the neighbouring village of indigenous Veddha community.

A reforestation drive was recently initiated by Eastern Province Governor Hon. Mrs. Anuradha Yahampath to which Nature’s Beauty Creations Ltd donated all the required plants for the first phase of the reforestation programme. All donated plants were grown at the company’s Medicinal Plant Garden by its Agriculture Team, and is part of the Nature's Secrets 'Siri Laka Osu Uyanak Karamu' project initiated in 2020 which aims to grow and donate over 100,000 medicinal plants by 2025. It is part of the company’s efforts towards large-scale biodiversity conservation, reforestation, land restoration and increase in carbon sequestration. The company has already made many plant donations to various national environmental projects across the island, including to ‘Sadhaharitha Hetak’ and ‘Surakimu Ganga’ projects by Ministry of Environment and Central Environment Authority, as well as to other initiatives by the Sri Lankan Army, Divisional Secretariats, Youth Service Centers and schools.

The ceremonial planting of the trees at Nilgala was attended by Eastern Province Governor Hon. Mrs. Anuradha Yahampath, Veddha Chief Uru Warige Wannila Aththo, Eastern Province Ayurveda Commissioner, Prof. Piyal Marasinghe, Eastern Province Ayurveda doctors, Maha Oya Divisional Secretariat, Officer-in-Charge of Sri Lanka Police, Maha Oya, school principals, students and villagers, and was also supported by the Sri Lankan Army and the Civil Defence Force. All the donated plants were planted within the same day with the assistance of those in attendance.

Since its inception, NBC has been a pioneer in implementing environment protection initiatives across biodiversity conservation, waste management and sustainability awareness. NBC has also been a zero water waste facility for more than 13 years, generates renewable biogas within its facilities, carries out plastic waste recycling projects, has set up a subsidiary company to manufacture patented, organic biological fertilizers to reduce Sri Lanka’s chemical fertilizer usage, and implemented many other eco-friendly initiatives.  The company’s vision is ‘to be the most environment-friendly cosmetics manufacturer in the world’.

Picture - Warnajith Chandrarathne, Head of Agriculture and Research & Development at NBC, ceremonially hands over the medicinal plants to Veddha Chief  Uru Warige Wannila Aththo. Mr Asanka Gnanakeerthi, Manager Agriculture at NBC, is also present in the photo