Mr. Douglas Devananda, Minister of Fisheries, who was engaged in observing activities in a number of fishery harbours in the Southern Province on 29.06.2024 stated that the construction work of Gandara fishery harbour, which is currently being built in the Southern Province, would be completed this year facilitating the fishermen to go fishing at sea.
The minister, further expressing his views on this occasion reminded that even though the modernization and development of Gandara fisheries harbour which is one of the most important fishery harbours in the southern province had started 03 years ago and the work had been halted to some extent due to the economic crisis and the covid epidemic, the construction work had once again been started with the economic development that had taken place after His Excellency, the president came into power. The minister continued saying that currently most of the work has been completed and the first phase of the work will be completed in two to three months providing with the necessary facilities to the fishermen to go fishing at sea.
The Minister, further expressing his views said that since the His Excellency the President had made the necessary provisions to complete the next phase very soon, the work of this harbor would be completed as soon as possible and it will be developed in such a way that it would provide an immense service to the fishermen.
Mr. Kanchana Wijesekera, the former State Minister of Fisheries in the Ministry of Fisheries and the current Minister of Power and Energy, participated in this event and he expressed his immense gratitude to His Excellency the President, the Ministry of Fisheries and Ministry of Finance for the construction of this fishery harbour, which is the biggest construction in the Southern Province. He also expressed his gratitude to the Minister of Fisheries, Mr.Douglas Devananda for carrying out the construction expeditiously with a strong interest.
A large number of fishery harbours including Nilwella, Suduwella and Galle were also observed by the Fisheries Minister and instructions to address the shortcomings in those harbours were given to the officials including Mr. Nishantha Wickramamasinghe, the Secretary of the Ministry of Fisheries and the Chairman of the Harbours Corporation
