Nature’s Secrets Research Award 2012 rewards innovation from Peradeniya Uni.

Nature’s Beauty Creations (NBC), manufacturers of Sri Lanka’s No. 1 herbal cosmetics brand ‘Nature’s Secrets’, recently presented research awards.

‘Nature’s Secrets Research Award’ is a concept that is aligned with their commitment to promote applied research that would be advantageous to the country. Although local universities produce a large number of scientists, financial allocations for research and development as a percentage of GDP is minute.

Nature’s Secrets has raised this concern at a number of occasions with the government and relevant officials. Having its own Plant Research Centre dedicated for advanced research on medicinal plants in Sri Lanka, Nature’s Secrets decided to facilitate applied research with the objective of fostering commercially applicable research among local scientists.

The Nature’s Secrets Research Award is a cash award of Rs. 250,000 which will be awarded annually to the best commercially viable research project conducted at the Faculty of Science, University of Peradeniya. It was decided to present this award to research carried out at the said faculty as Chairman/Managing Director of Nature’s Beauty Creations Ltd. Samantha Kumarasinghe followed his higher education there.

The award was agreed to be presented from 2010, however the Peradeniya University did not nominate a qualifying research team to be rewarded in year 2010 and 2011. Nature’s Beauty Creations does not have any influence or decision making on selection of a research team for the award and the task is solely carried out based upon criteria approved by the Board of Science Faculty.

Criteria were that the selection shall be done by a ‘Selection Committee’ appointed by the Vice Chancellor that may include the Dean of the Faculty, Director PGIS and few other members. The decision of the Selection Committee shall be accepted by all research teams and it shall not be challenged; a ‘research team’ could comprise of one or two lecturers and one or more postgraduate research students; the project shall have a maximum of six months’ work within the year of award; the research must be done at the Faculty of Science, University of Peradeniya and it should be a commercially viable project that has been ‘accepted’ by a Sri Lankan entrepreneur for commercial application; the reward of Rs. 250,000 shall be handed over in full, directly to the research team or through the university and any year that a qualifying project is not selected, the reward could be carried forward for a maximum of one more year.

A research project for development of an automated tool for performance evaluation in weight lifting was selected by University of Peradeniya for the valuable Nature’s Secrets Research Award 2012. The research group comprised Dr. U.A.J. Pinidiyaarachchi, Prof. S.R. Kodituwakku and K.A.D.G. Kuruppu.

“The product, which is a software, can be developed cost-effectively and will be useful in evaluating performance of Sri Lankan weightlifting athletes and help them improve on their techniques when competing at international level,” said Principal Investigator of the team Dr. U.A.J. Pinidiyaarachchi.

Held at the University of Peradeniya, the Nature’s Secrets Research Award 2012 was presented to the winning research team by Chief Guest National Research Council Chairman Prof. Eric Karunanayake. Guest of Honour Vice Chancellor of Peradeniya University Prof. Athula Senaratne handed over certificates to the three members of the research team while the cash reward of Rs. 250,000 was presented by Nature’s Beauty Creations Chairman/Managing Director Kumarasinghe to the Dr. Pinidiyaarachchi.

The event was attended by Prof. Parakrama Karunaratne – Dean of the Faculty of Science of University of Peradeniya, Poorna Kahingala – General Secretary of Sri Lanka Weight Lifting Federation, Dr. Ranjala Ratnayake – Head of Plant Research Centre of Nature’s Beauty Creations and Nalaka Gunawardena – Deputy General Manager (Factory and Premises) of Nature’s Beauty Creations.

The company is a strong believer that Sri Lankans can be innovative and productive and plays a dynamic role in uplifting and strengthening the national economy. NBC, a 100% local entity dedicated to promoting the Sri Lankan herbal heritage, has embarked on a journey to create a global herbal cosmetics brand by 2020. Their acclaimed brand is presently exported to many countries in Continental and Western Europe, South and South East Asia, Asia Pacific and the United States.

Nature’s Secrets is the only Sri Lankan cosmetics brand manufactured under European recognised Good Manufacturing Practice (GPM) guidelines, and internationally recognized ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 standards. Its ultra-modern, state-of-the-art and purpose built production plant at lush Millewa, Horana, sees the transformation of age-old indigenous herbals into modern-day beauty care products using modern cosmetology.

NBC has created a herbal garden with over 500 varieties of rare medicinal plants including aquatic plants. Within this facility NBC has established Sri Lanka’s only privately owned Plant Research Centre dedicated to carrying out scientific research on invaluable medicinal plants of Sri Lanka. NBC has also established a plant tissue culture laboratory, with a view to propagating rare and endemic medicinal plants of tropical Sri Lanka.