Lanka set to achieve five percent growth - Labour Relations Minister

Chamikara WEERASINGHE

Sri Lanka is set to achieve a productivity growth of five percent in the next couple of years in keeping with its national development policy under Mahinda Chinthana. This is will enable the country to achieve an eight to ten percent economic growth in the years to come, Labour Relations and Manpower Minister Athauda Seneviratna said.

He said: "the expected target is to achieve this rate for the nation during the next couple of years, during which the Government will focus on increasing productivity of all economic sectors."

Seneviratna was addressing the Governing Body of Asian Productivity Organization (APO) at its 51 st session, which was held on Monday at Colombo Hilton with the participation of member countries, that have joined from Teheran to Tokyo. Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickremanayake was also present on this occasion.

The APO theme this year was "Productivity and Global Financial Crisis."

He said that according to demographic projections of the International Institute of Labour, nearly 90 million new jobs would be needed in the 2009 to 2010 period, to absorb new entrants to the labour market. He said, since a large share of this demand would be from Asia and the Pacific countries, it would be important for the APO member countries to implement a coherent and coordinated job oriented recovery strategy. This should be based on sustainable enterprises and done without delay, the Minister pointed out.

He said that APO's technical support has contributed immensely for the improvement of the productivity campaign. He said, the Labour Ministry has formulated a National Productivity Policy and a National Productivity Secretariat was also established to implement the policy initiatives. " The National Productivity Secretariat has been able to take the productivity message to the grass root levels, which has led to the improvement of a large number of schools, private and public institutions," he added.