Award winner implores interest rates reduction

Ravi Ladduwahetty

Federation of Chambers of Commerce of Industry of Sri Lanka (FCCISL) Winner of the Entrepreneur of the Year Award for 2007 and Multichemi Group Chairman/ Managing Director Samantha Kumarasinghe yesterday implored the Government to drastically slash interest rates.

Sri Lanka’s industrialists are losing competitiveness due to high interest rates.

“ If this current situation prevailed with industrialists having to pay a staggering 36 per cent on Temporary Overdrafts, over 25 per cent of the local industries will face imminent closure,” Kumarasinghe cautioned.

Sri Lanka was losing its export competitiveness at these high interest rates in contrast to Bangladesh, where interest was low at 12 per cent.

He said that what Sri Lanka needed now was to create a new generation indigenous entrepreneurs and also the promotion of Sri Lankan brands internationally like Dilmah and Ceylon tea.

This would be a tremendous boost for exports and value addition,” he said.

Multichemi Group, will shortly go in for a global presence while creating an international brand image for its product “ Sigiri”.

We are exporting our branded products to eight countries- Japan, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Jordan, Maldives, the Czech Republic and the Gulf.

We have also registered the brand in 25 countries- the USA, the European Union nations, Australia, Malaysia, Iran, Vietnam, Russia and Ukraine.