CARRERAS is offering 39 scholarships and bursaries valued at $2.85 million to students of universities, teacher’s colleges and community colleges in an effort to contribute to national development.

Eight scholarships valued at $100,000 each are available for students of community colleges pursuing studies relating to Business Administration; four scholarships valued at $100,000 each are available to students of the Edna Manley College of the Visual and Performing Arts. Six students of the St Josephs, Mico, Shortwood, Churches, Sam Sharpe and Bethlehem Teacher’s colleges will receive $100,000 each, while there will be 21 bursaries of $50,000 each made available to students of the University of the West Indies, (UWI) Mona, The University of Technology (UTech), Northern Caribbean University (NCU), the University College of the Caribbean (UCC) and Hydel University.

The ‘Carreras 2010 scholarships were launched on Wednesday at the Courtleigh Hotel in Kingston.

Head of corporate and regulatory affairs at Carreras, Christopher Brown, said at the launch that “Carreras, in collaboration with its major stakeholders, carried out an evaluation of its corporate responsibility and came to the view that the company should focus its efforts on providing opportunities for young Jamaicans to further their education.”

The company has been faced in recent weeks with tremendous losses in revenue from the trade in illicit cigarettes following the discovery of over $300 million worth of counterfeit Craven A cigarettes on the market. On Tuesday, 56 cases of assorted cigarettes valued at approximately $12.9 million dollars were also recovered by law enforcement officials in Kingston. Carreras, which holds 99 per cent of the legal market for the products and is the sole legal distributor of the most popular brands of cigarettes in Jamaica was left reeling from the discovery. However, Brown said the company, despite the challenges is still committed to national development and educational support.

“As a responsible corporate company we believe that we need to align ourselves with the national priorities of the country, and in national development. Despite whatever challenges we are having we remain focussed on supporting initiatives such as tertiary education and supporting education in general because we believe it is a fundamental part of national development and we will not refrain from our support in those areas,” Brown told Sunday Finance.