The current Sri Lanka tax policies have an anti-business nature and these should be changed to create a better business environment, said Deputy Minister of Industries and Entrepreneurship Development Chathuranga Abeysinghe at the Western Province Entrepreneur Awards 2024 held at BMICH on Wednesday.
“The new government is determined to change this irregularity. A country also needs a shared vision to develop sustainably. We must focus on benchmarking and grooming entrepreneurs to become ones who cater to global markets. Grooming business people should be done within an ecosystem.Economic policy, environmental policy, land allocation policy and education policy have to be aligned and integrated for the formation of a business-friendly eco-system.”
“Hence the State sector, private sector, schools, universities should have one vision and this ecosystem has to be fully collaborative. For the first time in history the country is working towards achieving over 6.5% of economic growth and to gain annual export revenue of USD 45 billion by 2030. All who are being recognised today will be contributors of this process. He also identified start ups as a key area to develop and said his ministry will act as a one-stop-shop to facilitate startups.”
The annual event was organized for the seventh consecutive year by the National Chamber of Commerce of Sri Lanka in collaboration with the National Enterprise Development Authority. The award scheme aims to recognize micro, small, medium and large business sectors promoting business excellence and innovative practices in the Western province. Union Chemicals Lanka PLC clinched gold while the two silver awards were won by Everbolt Engineering (Private) Limited and Infinity Green International (Pvt) Ltd. The bronze award was secured by British Institute of Management and Technology (Pvt) Ltd.Wickramarachchi Brothers (Pvt) Ltd was recognized as the best woman entrepreneur of the year. Entrepreneur with special abilities was L N C Creations.
The Deputy Minister further said, infrastructure should also be in place for businesses to grow. We are yet to collect data systematically to determine the growth of businesses and to find business sectors that have the potential to cater to global markets. We need data on local and global markets to find gaps in the marketplace to act swiftly.”
When a country is unable to harness capital formation, businesses tend to collapse. We now work on developing an incubate system to nurture businesses from startup to maturity level and support the towards capital formation. This total exercise has to be done with collaborations.
“We are still revolving around a GDP of USD 84 billion and USD 17 billion worth of exports and our trade deficit is eight billion.”
Channa Bandara Wijekoon