Sri Lanka’s newly appointed trade minister Bandula Gunewardene had said he would revive an Export Development Council of ministers headed by the President which had not been convened for 20 years, the state foreign trade promotion office said.
Sri Lanka’s Export Development Act of 1979 provides for an Export Development Council of Ministers including the subjects of trade shipping, industries, agriculture and finance.
Minister Gunawardena had said reviving the mechanism back could resolve the issues faced by the exporter community expeditiously, as it enables high-level, cross-government consideration towards exports.
He had also urged the Export Development Board to set up 1,000 Export Processing Villages around the country, incorporating them as limited companies in line with a model followed in the 80s involving the Dambadeniya Export Development Village.
Sri Lanka’s exports had grown 11.3 percent from a year earlier to 1,090.18 million dollars in July 2020 the EDB said.
Minister Gunewardene had said the control of Coronavirus in Sri Lanka under President Gotabaya Rajapaksa had allowed economic activities to return to normalcy and exports to grow despite unfavourable global conditions.