Category: Tourism

Sept 27, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka will start electronic visa approval for 78 countries with a online portal being opened after September 30, but Singapore and Maldives nationals will continue to be given on arrival visas at entry points, the island’s border agency said. The online visas could be applied through www.eta.gov.lk, Sri Lanka’s […]

Sept 27, 2011 (LBO) – A travel show to boost tourism to Sri Lanka wil be held in Toronto, Canada where the bulk of existing tourist traffic is now directed to India and the Maldives, its organizers said. “There is a lack of packages to Sri Lanka with travel agents in North America compared to […]

Sept 23, 2011 (LBO) – A well-known Sri Lankan chef is to offer food made according to exotic recipes of the island’s indigenous ‘veddah’ community to entice tourists during forthcoming celebrations to mark World Tourism Day. Sri Lanka is experiencing a boom in tourist arrivals after the end of the island’s 30-year ethnic war in […]

Sept 22, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Galle literary festival is notching up writers and sponsors for 2012 but it would remain ‘intimate’ giving audiences an opportunity to engage more closely with writers, organizers said. The festival started in 2007 amidst a three decade old war which ended two years later. The festival has since […]

Sept 21, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka is to launch a campaign to educate youth of opportunities in the booming tourist industry where a skilled labour shortage looms with an influx of visitors after the end of a war. Last year 950 million people visited globally countries that were not native to them, he said, […]

Sept 17, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Fortress Resort and Spa, has won the award fore the best coastal luxury hotel at a global travel awards, signalling the island’s emerging position in the luxury end of the market, an official said. Fortress is in Galle in Sri Lanka’s southern coast, and follows Dutch architecture. Sri […]

Sept 12, 2011 (LBO) – Tourist arrivals to Sri Lanka rose 29. 6 percent in August to 72,463 from a year earlier, with arrival in the first eight months up 35.2 percent to 537,787 data from the state tourism promotion agency showed. Visitors from Western Europe rose 17.8 percent to 30,053 with visitors growing 27. […]

Sept 12, 2011 (LBO) – The Sri Lankan government plans to set up a listed company to manage ‘rest houses’, state-owned budget hotels often sited in scenic locations, according to its new tourism strategy. “Hence the government is currently looking at a few alternatives to facilitate domestic tourism.” It said it was considering “greater involvement” […]

Sep 06, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka aims to make tourism a key component of post-war economic growth with a new strategy aimed at luring more high-spenders and increasing earnings and employment, an official said. Nalaka Godahewa, chairman of Sri Lanka Tourism, said the government was also working to make it easier for the private […]

Sep 06, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s tourism industry intends to ramp up training to meet a critical and growing skills gap amid a tourism boom after the end of the island’s ethnic war, officials said. “As the annual output of about 1,500 graduates is the industry requirement, incentives will be provided to promote skills […]

Sep 01, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s John Keells Holdings (JKH) group plans to build a 25 storey, 240-room business hotel in Colombo with an investment of 2. 90 billion rupees in a joint venture with Sanken Lanka. JKH aims to have up to 1,000 business hotel rooms to cater to growing numbers of business […]

Sep 01, 2011 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s Hayleys conglomerate has spent 2. 6 billion rupees to buy a 51 percent stake in hotel firm Amaya Leisure owned by Hayleys deputy chairman Dhammika Perera, a stock exchange filing said. The transactions of 24,497,461 Amaya Leisure shares were done in five crossings or off-market private deals by […]