BSL’s Patron Member Virtusa stepped up in 2021, to design, establish and operationalize “Life Commitment” – BSL’s Online Reporting System for documenting private sector contributions on present and planned initiatives in biodiversity/environmental conservation. This effort is intended to provide much-needed information to the Government of Sri Lanka for successfully meeting the country’s national and international environmental commitments.
Denver Denver De Zylva – Vice President, Virtusa (Pvt.) Ltd.
This comprehensive data gathering repository currently online, has multiple uses – one of which is that the Government of Sri Lanka will be able to easily identify private sector contributions towards its multiple national and international commitments, including the National Biodiversity Strategic Action Plan (NBSAP), the Aichi Biodiversity Targets, the National Adaptation Plan (NAP) for Climate Change Impacts in Sri Lanka, the UN SDGs and the country’s commitments towards the Bonn Challenge. The survey also documents hitherto un-available financial investments made towards these initiatives over a determined period.
In the first phase, a comprehensive database of projects carried out by BSL’s members was established. Upon completion of this initial phase, Virtusa made the survey software foolproof by addressing technological issues that appeared during the initial deployment. Further, the survey platform was upgraded with visually appealing graphics to attract the wider private sector to submit their project information with the inclusion of online analytical tools for reporting.
Following closely on the heels of this successful initiative in 2022, Virtusa extended further technical support to the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce and Biodiversity Sri Lanka to design, establish and operationalize an online Plastic Waste Reporting System, the objective of which is to enable up to date reporting of plastic waste collection by corporates dealing with PET and HIPS and monitoring the fulfillment of their EPR commitments in terms of achieving national collect back targets. The reporting system will help regulatory authorities to assess the progress of the plastic waste collection of corporates dealing with plastic packaging at any given time. This reporting system is currently online and in use.
The support extended by Virtusa to these nationally significant efforts is a step in the right direction in the country’s sustainability journey.
