From New Ideas to New FX Earnings: Making ViYASA Work for Sri Lanka
“The difficulty lies not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones.” — John Maynard Keynes
By Prof. Asoka.S.Seneviratne
Introduction
Sri Lanka’s long-term economic resilience depends on its capacity to earn sufficient foreign exchange through productive and diversified economic activities. The Daily FT article, “Economic transformation in Asian countries and lessons for Sri Lanka on new ways of earning,” published on 26 October 2026, makes an important contribution by challenging the country to look beyond traditional sources of foreign-exchange earnings and develop new industries, services and business models.
The experiences of Singapore, South Korea, Penang in Malaysia, Taiwan and Dubai demonstrate how economies can create new sources of international income by developing capabilities, attracting investment and finding new ways to participate in global markets.
The National Business Facilitation Centre, ViYASA, offers a potential mechanism for turning this vision into action. Beyond facilitating existing investments, it could be assigned a specific responsibility for (i) receiving, (ii) evaluating and (iii) coordinating credible proposals for new foreign-exchange-earning and saving pathways.
Realising this potential requires a clear mandate, effective inter-agency coordination, transparent commercial assessment, timely decisions and measurable results. ViYASA should complement existing institutions, not duplicate their functions or take over the responsibilities of private businesses.
The ultimate objective is to turn promising ideas into viable economic activities that generate sustainable net foreign exchange, create productive employment and strengthen Sri Lanka’s long-term external resilience.
Beyond Managing Foreign-Exchange Shortages
Sri Lanka’s economic experience highlights an important distinction between managing a foreign-exchange shortage and developing the capacity to prevent recurring shortages.
Borrowing, import restrictions, debt restructuring and international financial assistance can help address immediate pressures. However, lasting economic resilience requires the country to generate sufficient foreign exchange through its own productive activities to meet its external obligations.
This is the central challenge addressed in the Daily FT article, “Economic transformation in Asian countries and lessons for Sri Lanka on new ways of earning,”. The author invites Sri Lanka to reconsider how it earns foreign exchange and to learn from Asian economies that developed new industries, services, and business models rather than relying exclusively on established sources of income.
I strongly support this central argument. Its significance extends beyond identifying potential business opportunities. It raises a fundamental policy question: how can Sri Lanka create the institutional conditions necessary to turn promising ideas into commercially viable economic activities?
The purpose of this article is to support the original author’s argument by examining the practical role ViYASA could play, the institutional barriers it may encounter, and the measures needed to overcome them.
What Can Sri Lanka Learn from Successful Asian Economies?
The experiences discussed in the original article demonstrate that economic transformation does not always depend on possessing abundant natural resources or inventing entirely new technologies.
Singapore developed a major oil-refining industry despite having no domestic oil resources. South Korea established globally competitive steel production and shipbuilding industries despite significant initial disadvantages. Penang became an important electronics manufacturing centre through investment facilitation and integration into international production networks. Taiwan developed a distinctive semiconductor manufacturing model through Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, while Dubai built international aviation and logistics activities around its geographical position.
These experiences are different, but they share a common lesson: countries can create new sources of foreign-exchange earnings by identifying opportunities, developing capabilities, attracting investment and establishing effective links with international markets.
The lesson for Sri Lanka is not to copy these economies mechanically. Their institutional arrangements, resources and historical circumstances differ. Rather, Sri Lanka should identify opportunities suited to its own skills, location, existing industries and commercial relationships.
Potential pathways include international professional and digital services, higher-value manufacturing, maritime and logistics services, education and research, value-added agricultural and marine products, and new opportunities developed through the Sri Lankan diaspora.
These are possibilities for investigation, not guaranteed sources of income. Each must be assessed against international demand, competitiveness, investment requirements, skills, technology, and environmental considerations.
The central question is straightforward: what can Sri Lanka produce, process, or provide to international customers that creates additional, sustainable economic value?
Why New Ideas Need an Institutional Mechanism
An attractive business idea does not automatically become a successful enterprise. A proposal may require cooperation among several ministries, regulators, public utilities, financial institutions, investors, and private-sector partners.
Each organisation may have a legitimate responsibility, but the proposal can become trapped between institutional boundaries. An individual agency may be unable to resolve a problem that requires several agencies to act together.
This is particularly relevant when a proposed activity does not fall neatly within the established responsibilities of a single ministry. Even when the commercial opportunity is credible, no institution may have an explicit responsibility for coordinating the entire process.
Sri Lanka therefore needs more than encouragement to innovate. It needs a practical mechanism through which promising proposals can be received, evaluated, assigned to the appropriate institutions, and guided towards implementation.
ViYASA, the National Business Facilitation Centre established under the Presidential Secretariat and opened on 22 September 2026, offers a potential starting point. Its stated purpose is to help remove administrative and regulatory obstacles to investment and coordinate the public institutions involved.
The proposal advanced here is to build on that existing role by giving ViYASA an explicit responsibility for coordinating credible new pathways for earning and, where economically justified, saving foreign exchange.
This would be an extension of its facilitation function, not a claim that it already possesses a fully developed mandate for national foreign-exchange strategy.
Connect the Existing Institutions, Not Duplicate Them
For this proposal to succeed, the respective responsibilities of existing institutions must remain clear.
The Board of Investment (BOI) should continue to promote and facilitate investment. The Export Development Board (EDB) should contribute its expertise in export development, market access, and support for exporters. Ministries, regulators, public utilities and other agencies should retain their respective legal and operational responsibilities.
ViYASA’s distinctive contribution should be to connect these institutions when a promising economic opportunity cannot progress through the efforts of any one of them alone.
For example, a proposed export activity might require investment approval, access to land, an electricity connection, environmental clearance, technical certification and cooperation with an overseas commercial partner. The relevant institutions would retain responsibility for their decisions, while ViYASA would coordinate the process, identify unresolved obstacles and ensure that agreed actions are followed through.
This distinction is essential. ViYASA should not become another approval layer or attempt to replace the BOI, EDB or other established institutions. Nor should it assume responsibility for financing or operating private businesses.
Its role should be to connect the institutional machinery, resolve coordination failures, and help viable proposals reach the point at which businesses can implement them.
The Barriers ViYASA Must Overcome
ViYASA’s potential contribution will depend on how effectively it addresses several practical challenges.
First, its mandate must be clear. Facilitating existing investments and coordinating new foreign-exchange-earning pathways are related but distinct responsibilities. If the latter is considered a national priority, it should be expressly assigned, with clear objectives and an agreed division of responsibilities.
Second, coordination must lead to decisions. Meetings between agencies are not sufficient if decisions continue to be delayed. Each selected proposal should have a designated coordinating officer, a lead implementing agency, defined responsibilities, and an agreed timetable. Unresolved matters should be escalated to the appropriate decision-making authority.
Third, proposals must be commercially credible. Not every innovative idea will produce a successful business. ViYASA needs transparent assessment criteria that examine overseas demand, competitiveness, investment requirements, access to technology and skills, employment potential and environmental implications. Independent expertise should be used where necessary.
Fourth, implementation barriers must be identified early. Land availability, utilities, infrastructure, regulatory approvals, technical standards, financing and access to overseas markets can each prevent a proposal from progressing. A practical implementation plan should identify the relevant obstacles, the institutions responsible for resolving them and the expected timeframe.
Fifth, the process must be accessible without becoming overwhelmed. Entrepreneurs, universities, professional associations, small businesses and Sri Lankans overseas should have a clear way to submit proposals. However, ordinary complaints about individual licences or routine administrative matters should continue through the appropriate channels. ViYASA should concentrate on credible opportunities that require cross-institutional coordination.
Finally, institutional continuity and public trust are essential. Professional assessment, consistent rules, transparent selection and protection against political favouritism will help ensure that decisions are made on economic merit rather than personal influence.
These are not reasons to abandon the proposal. They are practical conditions that must be addressed if ViYASA is to deliver its intended contribution.
From Proposals to Implementation: A Practical Approach
A disciplined process could help translate the proposed mandate into measurable outcomes.
The first step would be to invite ideas from businesses, chambers of commerce, professional bodies, universities, research institutions and the Sri Lankan diaspora. Submissions need not begin as complete feasibility studies, but they should explain the opportunity, the capabilities already available in Sri Lanka and the likely contribution to the economy.
The second step would be an initial assessment of commercial potential. Proposals that demonstrate credible demand and a plausible route to implementation could proceed to more detailed evaluation. Others could be returned for clarification or declined with reasons.
The third step would be to identify the institutions and resources required. For each selected proposal, ViYASA could coordinate an implementation plan specifying approvals, infrastructure, technology, skills, investment requirements, institutional responsibilities and milestones.
The fourth step would be to monitor progress. Delays and unresolved obstacles should be recorded and referred to the appropriate authorities. Where an obstacle requires a change in law or government policy, ViYASA should provide an evidence-based recommendation to the competent decision-maker.
The fifth step would be to evaluate results and learn from experience. Successful proposals should demonstrate their economic contribution. Unsuccessful proposals should also provide lessons that improve future assessment and implementation.
A carefully selected pilot programme could test this approach before it is expanded. This would allow the Government to learn which coordination arrangements work, where additional authority is required, and how performance should be measured.
Such a process would transform ViYASA from a place where obstacles are reported into a mechanism through which viable economic opportunities are systematically advanced.
Measure Economic Results, Not Administrative Activity
The effectiveness of the proposed approach should be judged by outcomes rather than announcements, meetings or the number of proposals received.
Relevant indicators could include the time taken to assess proposals, the number of commercially viable projects advanced, investment actually realised, productive employment created and new export activities established.
The most important economic indicator would be the actual net foreign-exchange contribution of the resulting activities, assessed over an appropriate period.
Gross export receipts alone can be misleading. A project may generate substantial export revenue while requiring significant imported machinery, intermediate goods, services and other foreign payments. Its net contribution should therefore be assessed alongside its wider benefits for productivity, employment, technology and domestic value addition.
Where savings are claimed, the assessment should similarly account for imported inputs and other foreign-exchange costs. Projected results must be distinguished from actual outcomes, and estimates should be revised as reliable evidence becomes available.
ViYASA could publish periodic aggregate performance reports and subject its results to independent review. Such transparency would help policymakers and the public determine whether the mechanism is delivering value and where improvements are needed.
The objective is not to promise that every proposal will succeed. It is to establish a system in which good proposals have a fair opportunity to progress, public resources are used responsibly, and results can be assessed objectively.
Earning, Saving and Borrowing Foreign Exchange
The institutional proposal must also be understood within the wider framework of Sri Lanka’s economic policy.
Earning foreign exchange through exports of goods and services, international business activities, and other productive receipts creates recurring income from overseas markets. Saving foreign exchange through greater efficiency or competitive domestic production can reduce external expenditure, provided the net savings are genuine. Borrowing provides financing in the present but creates repayment obligations in the future.
These are not interchangeable.
Foreign-exchange reserves represent a stock of external assets accumulated over time, whereas export receipts and other foreign-exchange inflows are flows. A country can rebuild its reserves while remaining vulnerable if its recurring external payments continue to exceed its sustainable foreign-exchange income.
Equally, not every import is economically undesirable. Imported machinery, technology and intermediate goods can support future production and exports. The objective should not be to minimise imports indiscriminately, but to strengthen the economy’s capacity to earn and manage foreign exchange sustainably.
ViYASA could contribute to this objective by helping credible new earning and saving pathways overcome administrative barriers. It cannot substitute for sound macroeconomic management, export policy, infrastructure investment or a stable business environment. Its contribution would be to make the institutional response more coordinated and effective.
A Shared National Responsibility
The success of this initiative cannot depend on ViYASA alone.
Government institutions must respond consistently and coordinate their decisions. Businesses must identify commercial opportunities and develop viable proposals. Universities and professional bodies can contribute technical knowledge, research and innovation. Investors can provide capital and market expertise, while Sri Lankans living overseas may offer valuable connections to international customers, technologies and business partners.
Chambers of commerce and professional associations could play a particularly useful role by collecting ideas from their members, screening proposals and helping promising initiatives develop into credible submissions.
This approach would broaden participation in economic development without transferring commercial responsibility to the Government. It would also recognise that valuable ideas can emerge from outside established planning structures.
The Government’s task is to create the conditions in which these ideas can be evaluated fairly, implemented efficiently and held accountable for results.
The proposed role for ViYASA should therefore be viewed as a means of mobilising the country’s existing capabilities, not as a substitute for them.
Conclusion: From Possibility to Economic Progress
The Daily FT article makes a valuable contribution by challenging Sri Lanka to look beyond managing its next foreign-exchange shortage and consider how it can develop new sources of sustainable income. The experiences of other economies demonstrate that new capabilities, international partnerships and innovative business models can create opportunities that did not previously exist on a comparable scale.
ViYASA offers a practical institutional mechanism through which part of this vision could be pursued. Its potential lies not in creating another layer of bureaucracy, but in connecting existing institutions, helping viable proposals overcome administrative barriers and coordinating their progress towards implementation.
Realising this potential requires a clear mandate, professional assessment, effective coordination, consistent policies and transparent measurement of results. The approach should complement the work of the BOI, EDB and other institutions while preserving the commercial responsibility of private businesses.
Sri Lanka cannot guarantee that every new idea will succeed. It can, however, establish a process in which credible opportunities are identified, assessed fairly and given a practical route towards implementation.
The ultimate measure of success will be whether these efforts generate additional net foreign exchange, create productive employment, strengthen domestic capabilities and reduce the country’s vulnerability to recurring external pressures.
The central challenge is therefore not simply to generate more ideas, but to create the institutional conditions that allow good ideas to become successful economic activities.
Sri Lanka’s economic transformation will depend on its ability to turn new ideas into new earnings—and institutional coordination into measurable national progress.
(The author served as the Special Adviser to the Office of the President of Namibia from 2006 to 2012 and was a senior consultant with the UNDP for 20 years, and a Senior Economist with the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (1972-1992). He can be reached at asoka.seneviratne@gmail.com)