The Economic Transformation Bill presented to Parliament in May will have far reaching economic benefits to Sri Lanka, Central Bank Governor Dr. Nandalal Weerasinghe said at a special event held at the Information Department yesterday.
The Governor said that this Bill is packed with features and regulation that brings financial discipline to the country and curtails uncalled for expenses. “In addition it also has insulated features to reduce corruption.”
He recalled that during the Covid pandemic and economic crisis no country came to bail out Sri Lanka as the country’s credit worthiness was not good. However the successful economic policies and the current successful negotiations with creditors Sri Lanka’s credit worthiness has reversed to positive territory which resulted in the country receiving two tranches of around US$ 330 million each from IMF.
“When obtaining funds for development projects information should also be provided to say that these are viable projects and hence loans would not be wasted on unrealistic projects in the future. This had raised the country’s debt, he said.
He also said that Sri Lanka should move out of being an import dependent country to an export oriented country.
Shirajiv Sirimane