https://archive.veriteresearch.org/handle/123456789/332 2026-04-21T11:30:10Z https://archive.veriteresearch.org/handle/456/6718 Gender-based Budgeting for 2024: More Tokenism or True Commitment? de Silva, Venya; Kemps, Portia With the committee stage debates on Budget 2024 still ongoing, our interest has been piqued by a term that has gained relatively little attention since it was mentioned in the Budget Speech presented on 13 November 2023: Gender-based budgeting. Gender-based budgeting or Gender-Responsive Budgeting (GRB) makes sense, from a social justice perspective and a sustainable growth perspective. However, given the government’s track record with GRB, those of us looking for more than a token reference are likely to be disappointed. However, GRB needs to be on the government’s agenda for 2024, and the government now needs to go beyond paying lip service to GRB. 3p. This article was published as an opinion column by the Daily Mirror in print and is available online at https://www.dailymirror.lk/opinion/Gender-Based-Budgeting-for-2024-More-Tokenism-or-True-Commitment/172-272718 2023-12-07T00:00:00Z https://archive.veriteresearch.org/handle/456/6717 Zoned Out: Export Ambitions Hindered by Land Limitations Abeysinghe, Subhashini; Arangala, Mathisha The experiences of East Asian and Southeast Asian countries such as Malaysia, Vietnam and Thailand, show that foreign direct investment (FDI) into export-oriented sectors is critical to accelerate growth in manufactured exports. But, compared to these countries, Sri Lanka has a poor track record of attracting foreign direct investment (FDI). The total yearly FDI inflows into Sri Lanka have remained below USD 1 billion for decades. In contrast, during the last decade, average annual FDI into Malaysia was USD 10 billion, Thailand USD 9 billion, and Vietnam USD 12 billion. With an annual FDI track record of over USD 2 billion, even the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) in the region, such as Cambodia and Bangladesh, fare better than Sri Lanka. Sri Lanka has known for a considerable time that the difficulty of accessing land, a basic requirement for any investment, is a key bottleneck investors face in Sri Lanka. For example, enterprises surveyed by the World Bank in 2011 identified access to land as the most critical challenge faced when investing in Sri Lanka. Industrial zones, specifically export processing zones (EPZs), have been the blueprint for many East and Southeast Asian countries to create industrial land suitable for investments within a short period. These zones offer multiple benefits, such as pre-allocated land, reliable utility services, better road and port connectivity and unified customs services, eliminating the many infrastructure gaps and bureaucratic hurdles investors face in developing countries. When Sri Lanka embarked upon an export-oriented investment drive in the 1980s it followed the same path and invested in EPZs. Today, it has 15 operational EPZs. However, a study by the Harvard Center for Development Studies in 2016 found that the country's EPZs were operating at nearly full capacity. In the largest zones, namely in Katunayake, Biyagama, Koggala, Seethawaka, Horana and Mirigama, less than 10% of the land was vacant. 3p. This article was published as an opinion column by the Daily Mirror in print and is available online at https://www.dailymirror.lk/opinion/Zoned-Out-Export-ambitions-hindered-by-land-limitations/172-269037 2023-10-12T00:00:00Z https://archive.veriteresearch.org/handle/456/6716 The Troubling Lack of Compliance by Public Authorities With RTI Act Weerasooriya, Nishana; Talayaratne, Shannon Today (28 September) marks the international day for universal access to information. This year’s theme is ‘the importance of the online space for access to information'. Public access to information is an essential element of a functioning democracy. It can promote public accountability for government decisions and thereby, also combat corruption. This idea is echoed in the preamble to the Right to Information Act, No. 12 of 2016 (RTI Act), which emphasises the need for transparency and accountability of government in order to enable the people of Sri Lanka to fully participate in public life, combat corruption and promote good governance. The RTI Act enables the public to access information: (a) by the public requesting information from public authorities and (b) through public authorities providing certain types of information to the public, i.e. proactive disclosure. Article 14A of the Sri Lankan Constitution also guarantees the right of access to information. Sri Lanka’s problem is not that it does not have a law in place, but that despite the legal obligation that exists for public authorities to disclose information, there is a lack of compliance with the law. 3p. This article was published as an opinion column by the Daily Mirror in print and is available online at https://www.dailymirror.lk/worldnews/opinion/The-troubling-lack-of-compliance-by-public-authorities-with-RTI-Act/172-268140 2023-09-28T00:00:00Z https://archive.veriteresearch.org/handle/456/6715 Schrodinger’s Banks: The Immediate Need for Policies to Ensure Financial Stability Peiris, Udara Sri Lanka is entering into a new, dangerous phase in its economic recovery. Although macroeconomic stabilisation has made progress, financial stabilisation needs immediate attention. The combination of covid-era loans and crisis-era loans with high-interest rates all coming due, and in an environment with volatility and uncertainty in loan quality, it is important that policies be put in place now, well before any crisis emanates from the banking system. 2p. This article was published as an opinion column by the Daily Mirror in print and is available online at https://www.dailymirror.lk/opinion/Schrodingers-Banks-The-immediate-need-for-Policies-to-ensure-Financial-stability/172-267232 2023-09-14T00:00:00Z