The Government must promote digitalisation more aggressively as it will bring down some cost of the government and will also help to curb corruption, said Director/Group Chief Executive Officer at Dialog Axiata PLC, Supun Weerasinghe at the Sri Lanka Internet Day event.
In addition technology will also pave the way for a more efficient public service and also in health and education sectors and it will greatly help to reduce government expenditure.
“The best example of use of technology is the Fuel QR Code. Indian government saves around USD 22 billion annually from moving the public sector towards digitalisation.”
Sri Lankan cooperates should help the government to increase revenue by contributing with taxes and the government on their part should ensure that this revenue is used efficiently. He said Dialog over their past 25 years have invested over Rs. 50 billion and they are not shy to invest in Sri Lanka as they want to give the best to their customers. “We have also made investments towards 5G and as soon as the commercial licenses are issued we will invest rapidly towards this segment.”
He however said that lack of foreign currency in Sri Lanka is a major negative factor towards their investments and they had to borrow around USD 150 million from IFC. He said that Sri Lanka still has one of the cheapest voice and data tariffs in the world and due to a smaller market (population) profits are not huge.
“We have also adopted several innovative systems to save power which includes investing in solar as well as USD 25 million for Lithium batteries. He also disclosed that Dialog electricity bill was Rs. 500 million before the CEB tariff hike.
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