NCE Export Awards awareness seminar
 The National Chamber of Exporters of Sri Lanka (NCE) conducted an
awareness seminar in April for all prospective applicants for export
awards in connection with the 16th annual NCE Export Awards to be
conducted in September 2008.
The keynote address was made by the President - NCE, Rohan Fernando.
He thanked the large number of representatives of member and non-member
companies present at the seminar.
Fernando stated that, apart from winning or losing, applicant
companies would have an opportunity to carry out a self assessment of
their export performance in 2007 and identify weak areas, which needed
attention, based on the evaluation made by the independent panel of
judges of eminent persons.
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briefing: Director - Member Services and New Projects L. S. G.
Tillekeratne, briefing the participants. Others in the picture
are Executive Director, NCE, Rasa Weerasingham, Past Chairman of
the Panel of Judges Nalin Attygalle, Past President, NCE, Felix
Yahampath, President, NCE, Rohan Fernando, and (Exective
Director, Institute of Policy Studies) Chairman of the Panel of
Judges Dr. Saman Kelegama. |
He added that all award winners could use information and photographs
of the awards in their promotional materials for 3 years. This enables a
company to earn recognition both locally and internationally among
buyers. A PowerPoint presentation was made by (Director, Member Services
and New Projects of NCE) Chairman of the Awards Committee L. S. G.
Tillekeratne, regarding the criteria used for evaluation of the
different product and service sectors and other important aspects
related to the application forms.
He explained that the main criteria among others encompass the
following: Overall export performance, net foreign exchange earnings,
value addition, new products introduced to the export market,
diversification of markets and entry into new markets, proper financial
management, improvements in productivity, Sri Lankan brand, achievements
in quality and standards, Corporate Social Responsibilities (CSR) etc.
He also explained the basis of inclusion of products and services under
the different categories and the basis of calculation of net foreign
exchange earnings and domestic value addition.
He added that the different product and service sectors will be
awarded gold, silver and bronze trophies and medals covering the
categories of small, medium, large and extra large enterprises. Further,
special awards would be given to the Best Woman Exporter, Best Sri
Lankan Brand Exporter, the 10 Most Outstanding Exporters - sectorwise
and the Most Outstanding Exporter of the year.
This presentation was followed by the address of the Chairman, Panel
of Judges - Dr. Saman Kelegama (Executive Director, Institute of Policy
Studies). He shared with the participants his experience regarding the
process of judging last year.
He stated that the eight eminent members of the panel of judges who
are specialists in their respective export fields such as marketing,
management and financial assess every application professionally before
finalising the winners. He added that complete transparency is
maintained as a result.
He further said that there is no bias in the evaluation process as
specific sections in the application form. For e.g. finance, marketing,
etc. are marked by specialists of the particular fields in the panel of
judges.
At the end of the marking process, the marks allotted to the
different specific sections are collated and an overall assessment is
made by the entire panel of judges.
Past chairman of the panel of judges Nalin Attygalle stressed the
importance of the marketing and branding aspects related to exports. He
stated that these two areas are very important in respect of both local
and international markets.
Closing date for submission of applications is June 10. Applications
could be downloaded from our website www.nce.lk. |
