Several leaders in the maritime field said this week that Sri Lanka should set up a streamlined government body to seize the island’s potential as a global shipping hub.
“We are a country of missed opportunities,” said Admiral Jayanath Colombage, former Chief of the Sri Lanka Navy, at a seminar hosted by the Ceylon Association of Shipping Agents at the Galadari Hotel onTuesday. “We understand where we need to be, but we don’t do anything.”
“That is why 70 years (after Independence) we are where we are today,” he added. “Time and tide wait for no man.”
Admiral Colombage said Sri Lanka’s ports needed to be increasingly digitized in order to compete with the rest of the world.
He pointed out that Sri Lanka’s ease of doing business ranking, published by the World Bank, was 111. For comparison, Mauritius, another small island nation, ranked 25.
He also advocated for better shipbuilding and repair services, marketing Sri Lanka as a flag of convenience, and more efficient communication between government agencies.
“We have too many agencies dealing with the ocean, and every agency is working in a water-tight compartment,” he said.
Sri Lanka Ports Authority Chairman Parakrama Dissanayake agreed.
“We need to have a maritime promotion bureau, which is un-politicized,” he said. “Like the tourism promotion bureau, the industry should agitate.”
The idea of a powerful maritime body that could deal with strategy, branding, and management of Sri Lanka’s ports emerged in multiple experts’ speeches.
“We are talking about a global maritime hub, but who is doing it?” asked Captain Ranjith Weerasinghe, the Chairman and Managing Director of Freedom of Highseas. “Who is in charge of a maritime hub? This country goes on without a compass.”
“We need an apex body named the Sri Lanka Maritime Authority,” he said. He gave the recent example of the Sri Lanka Ports Authority and the Immigration Department wrestling for jurisdiction over which body is supposed to issue landing permits to incoming sailors.
“There needs to be one body to look after things like this,” he said.
A maritime authority, he argued, could “streamline regulations for everything that we do within the maritime hub.”
It is part of the government’s “Vision 2025” to make Sri Lanka the trading hub of the Indian Ocean. The panelists argued that political leaders needed to act fast before the opportunity slips away.
“We need leaders who have maritime affinity, and a vision,” said Admiral Colombage.
“If not Sri Lanka will only be aspiring to be a maritime hub in the 22nd century as well.”
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