Tag: Sri Lanka

Jan 26, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka has to grow more food to reduce imports which will help strengthen the exchange rate, Treasury Secretary P B Jayasundera said, as the country lost almost a quarter of its foreign reserves defending a dollar peg. “There is no economic justification to import any longer the kind of […]

Jan 26, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka should not intervene excessively to maintain a peg with the US dollar, economic development minister Basil Rajapaksa said as reserve losses mounted in a bid to keep the rupee at 113. 90 to the US dollar in the spot market. “I feel there must be a realistic value […]

Jan 26, 2012 (LBO) – The State of Qatar is in talks with Sri Lanka to build a toll expressway from the island’s main international airport to the northwestern coastal town on Kalpitiya, economic development minister Basil Rajapaksa said. Sri Lanka opened its first expressway to Galle in the south late last year. Officials say […]

Jan 26, 2012 (LBO) – A Sri Lankan business chamber is negotiating with immigration authorities to secure special passports for business people to help them cut through red tape during overseas travel. The National Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka (NCCSL) is trying to secure a different type of passport business people recognised by chambers […]

Jan 25, 2012 (LBO) – The International Monetary Fund cut the forecast for world growth as a series of ‘stimulus’ measures by deficit spending failed, worsening debt, undermining confidence and pushing some nations to into sovereign credit trouble. Emerging economies will grow 5.4 percent in 2012 (down from an earlier forecast of 6.2 percent), with […]

Jan 23, 2012 (LBO) – Curtains came down on the five-day long Galle Literary Festival on Sunday with discussions on obsessive love, war and Indira Gandhi taking centre stage. Biographers Nayantara Sahgal and Katherine Frank shed light on the iron lady of South Asia, the iconic Indira Gandhi’s political career and how she exercised power […]

Jan 20, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s decision to raise taxes on exports in raw form and reduce those for raw material imports is to encourage local manufacture and value addition, Minister of Industry and Commerce Rishad Bathiudeen said. The island intends to make it more expensive to export rubber, timber and minerals in raw […]

Jan 19, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s post-war economic rebound is slowing and financial problems in key Western markets could reduce demand for the island’s exports and hit earnings from worker remittances and tourism, the World Bank said. Given the possibility of further weakening in the global economy, efforts at greater revenue mobilization particularly in […]

Jan 18, 2012 (LBO) – Sri Lanka has signed co-operation deals with Qatar Holdings LLC, a sovereign wealth fund and its wholly owned real property unit following a visit to the island by the emirate’s ruler, the foreign ministry said. Qatar Diar Real Estate Investment Company has signed a deal with Sri Lanka’s Board of […]