PPP with Chinese firms will handle H’tota, Mattala operations: PM
Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe yesterday said the government has agreed that the Port of Hambantota operations and Mattala Airport operations will be done by Public–private Partnership (PPP) together with Chinese companies.
He said the sale proceeds accrued to Sri Lanka’s official reserves from the Port of Hambantota would be over one billion USD.
Speaking during the 110th sessions of the Institution of Engineering Sri Lanka, the Prime Minister said progress has also been made towards completing a PPP with another Chinese Company for Hambantota Airport.as a result, he said a further amount would be added to the country’s official reserves.
“These two transactions would constitute non-debt creating FDI inflows which will help increase unencumbered official reserves significantly. Such reserves would have a more favourable impact on stabilizing the exchange and interest rates than building up reserves using borrowed sources.the increased reserves can also serve as a useful cushion in the context of the expected increase in US interest rates and other Global Financial Market Development,” he said
He said as far as the world is concerned, global economic power is shifting to Asia and within Asia towards the South Asian continent. “That’s where development is going to take place and we are at the centre. How do we look at this opportunity? This is a life time opportunity for us. If you miss it you are going to miss it all together,” the Prime Minister stated.
Mr. Wickremesinghe said the development we are going to look at is going into a knowledge-based economy and promoting innovation, because Sri Lanka’s per capita income in the high side of South Asia and it keeps increasing. He said within South Asia there are other areas with much more levels of income. “Myanmar, Bangladesh, West Bengal , or Bihar they account for 84 per cent of the world’s population. We need not go into the other end of Bengal. We have to go for a high income economy which means we have to upscale our economy, industries, agriculture, education, connectivity and housing,” he stressed.
“There are some other areas of India that are fast grading their tasks including Maharastra and Gujarat area, the other next to us is our traditional and cultural trading partners are the five Southern Indian states such as Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Andra Pradesh, if we work with them which is today a $ 500 billion economy we can develop much further and much faster. How do we get about it? First is infrastructure. We are thinking of two corridors one from Kandy side and the other the Wayamba which will take the spillover of industries from the Western Province and Southern Development,also we are talking of developing Trincomalee where there is another Port. So these are infrastructure,” he added.
The Prime Minister said Sri Lanka would be going for free trade agreements with number of countries bur assured that Sri Lankan professionals will not be at a disadvantage as a result of these.“we are going in for free trade agreements with a number of countries including India. Our engineers and others are not going to be of a disadvantage,” he added.
Megapolis Minister Patali Champika Ranawaka who was a special guest said Sri Lanka had already taken steps for innovative development through projects such as Techno city. He said the Kahatuduwa-kaduwala outer circular road project will begin soon.