Minister said this at a Workshop organized by the Asian Development Bank on resolving issues in Sri Lanka and studying employment issues held in Colombo recently.
Minister further said; “Sri Lanka has currently turned a new chapter in the development sector. New Government is focusing its special emphasis on enhancement of the labour force in Sri Lanka while extending further attention towards enhanced economic development based on Good Governance. This, in fact, demands injecting more and more investments both public and private as well as foreign investments into the sector.
"Present Government with the cooperation of the international community has already laid the foundation to pursue a balanced development in the country. Our target is to uplift Sri Lanka which is currently in the lower middle income category, to the level of upper middle income country. The present Government is devoted to overcome the economic challenges through Good Governance and export based development. We are pursuing to realize our economic targets through anticipated one million employment generation programme, enhancement of avenues of income generation of the people, strengthening the economy of the working people, and granting the land right to masses. In achieving the development target of the country within the next four years. We are thus focusing on achieving higher development through a successful public-private integrated development process. In this venture, particular attention is focused on strengthening the industrial and service sectors through introduction of new industries and services into the economy. Despite the efforts taken by every government to resolve the unemployment issue no government has so far succeeded in achieving the target. Therefore, the present Government wants to address the unemployment issue successfully through steady investments in the country. Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Sri Lanka have maintained a strong bond between each other for over 50 years now and during that period the ADB has extended to our country nearly USD 8 Billion in the form of loans and donations. Last year, 2015, the ADB had granted Sri Lanka USD 600 Million and this year USD 700 Million. Earlier these donations were injected into the agricultural sector yet, in future, we expect to invest these in the sectors such as electricity, education, and highways."
Minister further added that Asian Development Bank has extended its support to Sri Lanka towards enhancing various sectors such as education, electricity, agriculture, development of natural resources, etc. and the present Government is expecting further assistance from the ADB towards intended future development process of the country.
