COLOMBO, Aug. 3 (Xinhua) -- Sri Lanka will launch a new program allowing prisoners to have vocational training while serving their sentences, said an official on Sunday.

Jagath Weerasinghe, spokesperson for the Department of Prisons, told reporters that the government has allocated 100 million rupees (about 330,000 U.S. dollars) for the initiative, the first of its kind to be implemented.

Weerasinghe said the vocational training scheme aims to help inmates reintegrate into society after their release.

Sri Lanka has 36 prisons and around 34,000 inmates, the majority of whom are incarcerated for drug-related offenses, according to Weerasinghe. ■