Mangala showcases SL at AIIB

Finance Minister Mangala Samaraweera with the President of South Korea Moon Jae-in, the Deputy Prime Minister of South Korea Kim Dong-yeon and other Finance Ministers

Minister of Finance and Media Mangala Samaraweera concluded his first official overseas visit after assuming office, taking part in the Board of Governors meeting of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. 

Having attended the opening session, the Minister took part in the Governor's roundtable discussion on financing Asia's infrastructure priorities.

During the discussion, the Minister spoke about Sri Lanka's economic growth which has been driven by large infrastructure projects. Developing physical infrastructure must be done along with administrative and legal frameworks to ensure the required policy or regulatory support to streamline and boost public and private investments.

He also said that the Government's plan is to make Sri Lanka an export-driven economic and financial hub of the Indian Ocean, while creating unprecedented opportunities in many sectors. In order to achieve these objectives, the Government has set out a high-level reform agenda in several key sectors of the economy, facilitating and empowering the private sector as the principle engine of growth.

Formulation a new trade and investment policy, tax reforms and various other measures to improve investor climate are also being implemented. 

Given the rapid increase in climate-related disasters in many countries, like the floods Sri Lanka faced two weeks ago, the building of climate or disaster resilient infrastructure will be of paramount importance for the future. “If we are to meet this challenge, we must incorporate climate resilient concepts into all future infrastructure development projects,” he said.  

The Minister also had the opportunity to meet Kim Dong-yeon, the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister for Strategy and Finance of South Korea, Arun Jaitley, the Finance Minister of India and Sri Mulyani Indrawati, the Finance Minister of Indonesia, for bilateral discussions on the sidelines of the AIIB Conference.