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Cabinet subcommittee to look into pending FDI proposals

04 May 2022

  • Many proposals stuck at various ministries, says Godahewa 
By Imesh Ranasinghe  The Cabinet of Ministers has appointed a sub-committee comprising five ministers to look at pending foreign investment proposals stuck at various government ministries and departments, and expedite their approval process, to bring in much-needed foreign exchange to Sri Lanka, said Minister of Mass Media Dr. Nalaka Godahewa. Speaking at the Cabinet briefing held yesterday (3), the Minister said that many foreign investment proposals that have already come to Sri Lanka have been stuck at various government ministries and departments due to various reasons. For example, he said that several investment proposals which have already come to the Urban Development Authority (UDA) related to land are still pending; similarly, investment proposals are pending at Colombo Port City, the Board of Investment (BOI), and the Railway Department. Godahewa said that the BOI Chairman has informed about several investment proposals which are pending, as BOI has not had an opportunity to meet senior officials of relevant ministries.  Further, the Minister said that when looking at the past decade, Sri Lanka has failed to attract foreign investments of close to $ 2 billion except in 2018 ($ 1.6 billion), while the foreign investments have significantly dropped in the years after. The Central Bank of Sri Lanka’s (CBSL’s) annual report showed that foreign direct investments (FDIs), including loans received by BOI companies during 2021, increased by 13.6% to $ 780.2 million compared to $ 687.0 million recorded in 2020, while the stock position of foreign investments amounted to $ 17 billion in 2021. Accordingly, the committee appointed by the Cabinet includes Dr. Godahewa as its Chairman, while the other members are Minister of Transport and Industries Dilum Amunugama, Minister of Power and Energy Kanchana Wijesekara, Minister of Ports and Shipping Pramitha Bandara Tennakoon, and State Minister of Urban Development Lohan Rathwatte. Last month, the Cabinet appointed a committee chaired by the Secretary to the Prime Minister with the participation of four other ministry secretaries to establish a mechanism to appraise financial proposals related to foreign exchange and energy supply presented by various parties. Explaining the role of this committee, Dr. Godahewa said that the committee was appointed to filter and identify investment proposals that should be forwarded to the Finance Ministry to continue the investment process. He said that many investment proposals, especially those related to the power sector, require sovereign guarantees, and added that if all of these were forwarded to the Finance Ministry to discuss their feasibility, committees appointed by the Finance Ministry would be overloaded. The Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB) has already received 600 applications for expressions of interest (EOIs) for renewable energy projects above 50 megawatts, where the tender procedure is tedious and needs to be expedited.


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