All Blogs
Sri Lanka Kelani Valley profits up on rubber
Oct 31, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Kelani Valley Plantations group said profits grew 116 percent to 77. 8 million rupees in the September 2011 quarter with revenues growing 55 percent to 1,510 million rupees, helped by rubber. In April, wages of plantation workers were raised by a nation-wide collective agreement. Tea is labour intensive […]
Price Fuss
Oct 31, 2011 (LBO) – Dairy multinational Fonterra’s Sri Lanka unit has stopped supplying dairy products to the Food City supermarket chain after protests from traders they were being undercut by discounts offered by the retailer. Customers said supermarkets operated by the Cargills group had put up notices that Fonterra had withdrawn dairy brands like […]
” UN rights report
PERTH, October 30, 2011 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s foreign minister Sunday condemned a “preposterous” UN-commissioned report alleging war crimes in his country, revealing he stopped Canada raising it at a Commonwealth meeting. Foreign Minister Gamini Peiris also confirmed Sri Lanka will host the next Commonwealth leaders’ meeting in 2013, saying that none of the 54-nation […]
Britain urges Sri Lanka to make progress on rights by 2013
LONDON, October 30, 2011 (AFP) – British Prime Minister David Cameron urged Sri Lanka on Sunday to make progress on human rights before it hosts the next Commonwealth leaders meeting in 2013 to prevent the likelihood of boycotts. Cameron said he pressed President Mahendra Rajapaske during this year’s Commonwealth heads of government meeting in Australia […]
Sri Lanka expropriation law will harm investment: ex-chamber chief
Oct 31, 2011 (LBO) – A former head of Sri Lanka’s largest business chamber, Chandra Jayaratne, has warned that a proposed expropriation law will harm the island’s image as a safe investment destination. The proposed bill, which was reportedly written by a private law firm, seeks to vest in the state ‘underperforming enterprises and underutilized […]
Sri Lanka lures Vietnam businessmen
Oct 31, 2011 (LBO) – A team of Vietnamese businessmen who visited Sri Lanka recently as part of a state visit by Truong Tan Sang, president of Vietnam, was reported to be keen on investing in the island. During the visit the Sri Lanka – Vietnam Business Council of the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce held […]
Sri Lanka inflation eases to 5.1-pct in October
Oct 31, 2011 (LBO) – Consumer inflation in Sri Lanka’s capital Colombo slowed to 5.1 percent in October 2011, from 6. 4 percent in September, the third straight monthly slowdown, the state statistics office said. The Colombo Consumer Price Index slid 0. 1 percent to 151.5 points in October, from 151.7 in September. The 12-month […]
G20 leaders to meet under threat of new global recession
PARIS, October 31, 2011 (AFP) – Leaders of the world’s biggest economies meet in Cannes this week as Europe tries to convince markets and US critics that its debt bail-out package is serious and urges China to fund it. “I think the result will be welcomed with relief by the whole world, which expected strong […]
Visa Scam
WASHINGTON, October 30, 2011 (AFP) – A case working its way through a federal court in California has exposed huge student visa scams by “sham” universities cashing in on Indians and other foreigners looking for a quick path to jobs in the United States. Enrollment at Tri-Valley University, an unaccredited self-styled Christian graduate school, surged […]
Bill Rumpus
Oct 30, 2011 (LBO) – At least two listed companies in Sri Lanka have been named among several dozen, in a secretly hatched law to expropriate assets of firms deemed by the state as ‘underperforming’ or ‘underutilized’, a media report said. The two listed firm named in the secret law in Hotel Developers (Lanka) Plc, […]