Recognition for SL’s growing trade potential – an endorsement to govt.’s reform agenda: Malik

• Standard Chartered in a recent report ranked SL in 14th place among 20 countries that were ‘most rapidly improving potential for trade growth’

Sri Lanka’s recent recognition as one of the top 20 countries with highest trade growth potential by the international banking giant, Standard Chartered is a powerful global endorsement of the government’s ongoing trade and competitiveness reform agenda, Development Strategies and International Trade Minister Malik Samarawickrama said.

Sri Lanka was recently ranked 14th among 20 countries that were ‘most rapidly improving potential for trade growth’ in a report titled ‘Trade 20: Rising Stars in Global Trade’ by Standard Chartered.

“This is a powerful global endorsement of our reform initiatives to provide an enabling environment for businesses - small or large - to participate in international trade. Our government’s focus has been to usher in a new era of trade and enterprise-driven dynamism for our country, reverse the anti-trade bias of the past and move away from the unsustainable and unsuccessful growth model that was heavily reliant on government spending,” Samarawickrama stressed.

Standard Chartered stated that Sri Lanka’s impressive performance was largely due to its trade readiness improvements. 

Sri Lanka was ranked at the 10th position in terms of trade readiness among the top twenty countries. 

“Its excellent trade readiness score is driven by infrastructure upgrades, with particularly strong progress in terms of digital infrastructure. 

The Sri Lankan government has been working on an ambitious development strategy, overhauling the market’s sea, air, road, power and telecoms infrastructure,” the report highlighted. 
Trade readiness reflects the extent to which a market has the foundation to support future trade growth. It is measured by improvements to physical and digital infrastructure, e-commerce and ease of doing business.

Samarawickrama cited that the initiatives implemented under the government’s trade and competitiveness reform agenda such as digitisation of the Customs Department, enabling online Customs payments via any bank, introducing digital signatures legislation, and establishing of the National Trade Information Portal were key reasons for this recognition. 

He stressed that the government would continue the trade and competitiveness reform agenda to transform Sri Lanka to a regional hub. “We intend to continue this. If we are to truly become the regional hub that many speak of, it has to be through international trade. This recognition of Sri Lanka among the top twenty economies with the most rapidly improving potential for trade growth should be welcomed by all in the private and public sectors and support more reforms in this direction, “he said.

Samarawickrama added that steps are also underway to establish an electronic National Single Window and improve digitisation at all agencies that impact border facilitation while new infrastructure investments are also being rolled out. The report examined 12 metrics across 66 global markets (the major global economies plus the major economies in each region) to reveal the economies where recent positive developments point to an acceleration in trade growth potential.

Markets in Asia-Pacific including India, China, Sri Lanka and ASEAN dominated the Trade20 index with nine out of the Trade20 economies originating  from this region, suggesting that the potential for individual markets to increase their trade growth is particularly high in the region.