Archives

A leading Taiwanese trade delegation in Colombo recently invited Sri Lanka to open a Trade Office in Taipei in order to promote investment, trade and tourism in Taiwan.

The team leader and Director, Taipei Economic and Cultural Centre in New Delhi, India, Luke H. Lu said: "there are many firms seeking joint ventures and we are glad that many Sri Lankan business entrepreneurs are eager to do industrial ventures with Taiwan."

He said that Taiwan would have been the biggest foreign investor in Sri Lanka if not for the country's decision to close down the Colombo's Taiwan Trade Office in Colombo in the early 90s.

"There are only 33 Taiwanese investors in Sri Lanka at present. Luke Lu said that last year 600,000 Taiwanese Buddhists visited Thailand for Buddhist pilgrimages, although Sri Lanka is a more beautiful country with more historical places for Buddhist pilgrimage.

The same year two million visited China and we do an enormous volume of trade and investment with China. Sri Lanka, China and Taiwan are members of the World Trade Organisation and there should be no trade barriers, according to WTO Conventions.

Lu said that they would welcome thousands of Sri Lankan workmen with a minimum wage of about US$ 1,000 in the lowest grade. He was speaking at a welcome reception at the "Raja Bojun" Hotel hosted by the Greenlanka Taiwanese Company in Sri Lanka.

Jim Ramanayake, President, Sri Lanka-Taiwan Business Council on whose invitation the mission arrived in Sri Lanka, said that Sri Lanka was an excellent location for investment with many harbours around the island, good infrastructure facilities, industrial parks and skilled English speaking workers. Sri Lanka has a literacy rate of 95%.

The vast SAARC market, he said, is one of the largest. The Free Trade Agreements and SAPTA tariff concessions would give an added advantage for exporters from Sri Lanka.

Ramanayake said that for the past several years Sri Lanka is experiencing a severely adverse trade balance with Taiwan chiefly due to the lack of Trade Offices.

Taiwan has been permitted by many Asian countries such as India, Thailand, Vietnam, Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, Philippines and Singapore to open trade offices.

The Taipei World Trade Centre has offices in 33 countries.

Sri Lanka exports to Taiwan were Rs. 1.1 billion in 2001 up from Rs. 919 millions in 2000, whereas imports from Taiwan were Rs. 28.8 billion in 2001, down from 29.5 billion the previous year.

Out of the Asian countries in the year 2001, Taiwan had the highest US dollar reserves of Rs. 410 billion followed by Japan and South Korea.

N.G. Panditharatne, Secretary SLTBC was also present.

News | Business | Features | Editorial | Security
Politics | World | Letters | Sports | Obituaries |

Produced by Lake House
Copyright 2001 The Associated Newspapers of Ceylon Ltd.
Comments and suggestions to :Web Manager