Invention as patriotism in times of COVID-19

“Whatever humanity-centred innovation I make for the world is made by me, as a Sri Lankan” – Internationally recognised inventor Dr. Nandadasa Narayana

By Suryamithra Vishwa 

Last week we started an initiative to support Sri Lankan innovation in the times of COVID-19, where we stated that we would be giving publicity assistance for innovators who wish to go public about their invention for the purpose of public good. This week we feature an interview with Dr. Nandasa Narayana, one of Sri Lanka’s most recognised inventors of international stature. He speaks of the urgent need to nurture the spirit of innovation, invention and entrepreneurship in these times of COVID-19 and the need to have a proper policy to nurture invention. He draws attention to the banking system, pointing out that it needs to move away from debt financining to innovation financing. He also emphasises that the education sector needs to do away urgently with rote learning and change curricula to encourage stimulative thinking. Below is the full interview:

Q: Could you speak about your journey into the world of invention?

My grandfather was Dr. D.J. Wimalasurenda, the pioneer of hydroelectricity in Sri Lanka. I followed the footsteps of my grandfather in wanting to create the extraordinary from the ordinary.

Curiosity was always with me as a child as a quality my family members encouraged. It is still there. Today we have in Sri Lanka a deadly rote learning system that kills curiosity.

My school was Matara Maha Vidayala where I studied until Advanced Level and thereafter Matara Rahula College where I studied in the stream of science. I was interested in engineering and I enrolled in Technical College in Maradana in 1962. I was further educated at the Institute of Motor Vehicle Technology in UK. Then I enrolled for studying Automotive Engineering at the City and Guild Institute in UK in 1970. Here I got the highest marks (as the youngest student in my batch) and was invited by the Bramton Corporation, a Canadian automotive engineering company but I did not join them. Instead I joined the Port Commission of Sri Lanka under Engineer Dr. A.N.F. Kulasinghe in the Research and Development Division. I served there four years. 

He saw my vast interest and knowledge in research and innovation during this time and I was thoroughly motivated to take on a career in innovation. I found that Sri Lankan engineers who worked with me could make products but they do not know how to sell. The recognising of this fact was the turning point in my career. I then decided to go to Stanford University in US to take up a course on Small Business Development.

I could have settled for a high salaried desk job even as an engineer but I have not done that. I have been an inventor for 56 years and started my company Flexport Innovations Ltd., 50 years ago. My very first company that I started was 56 years ago which was called ‘Flexport Little 3 Daughters’ which was started by my wife keeping in mind my three daughters. However, after getting a son we changed the name to Flexport Innovations and our tagline is ‘You name it, we make it,’ where we only want the client to tell what they need and we somehow make the invention for that. I have by now done 178 production processes which are those that can compete in the world market.

All this was possible because I harnessed my natural talents which I directed and integrated to the fields of engineering/innovation, marketing and entrepreneurship. 

I earned the country a sum of Rs. 164 billion foreign exchange for 24 years as per EDB reports. This is by making use of waste coir dust which was just being burnt. I stopped that and started making profitable use of it through many inventions using waste coir in Sri Lanka and abroad (coir pots being one and coir dust made ‘grow bags’ which are used to grow plants/trees in desert areas) and created a new worldwide trend in 104 coconut growing countries. Through this I have also built over 50,324 entrepreneurs globally. 

I also started the production of packaging materials using coir dust to replace plastic. For all this I got the worldwide patent rights under Flexport Innovations. 

I consider innovation and entrepreneurship going hand in hand. 

With this in mind I developed a Women Inventive Entrepreneurship which was launched with the assistance of several international institutions and the guidance of co-operative societies to deploy home-based unemployed women to provide a wholesome breakfast to schoolchildren using several toxic-free varieties of produce. This product was based on Sri Lankan heirloom traditional rice to replace gluten ridden immunity impairing wheat products which reduces immunity. 

Among the awards that I have got include the National Most outstanding Entrepreneur of Sri Lanka in 1996, receiving the Platinum Award. I was also recognised with two world awards as the Best Inventor in Asia at the Geneva Inventors Exhibition. My company designs and manufactures trophies and I have qualified for the Guinness World Records for the world’s largest test cricket trophy and for the most expensive diamond studded Trophy valued at $ 305,000 which we made for Steffi Graph, the world’s women’s Tennis Champion. We also made the world’s largest cricket trophy, which was 84” high and the record was for creating it in 20 hours. 

Q:Could you speak of the posts you have held and your contribution?

I have been the Inventors Commissioner from 2004 to 2006. As Commissioner, together with my colleagues, I initiated 6,500 school innovation clubs all over Sri Lanka. I resigned after two years because I found the bureaucratic pace to be too slow and I did not want to waste my time which I wanted to direct to productive use for my country. One thing I should state is I donated my salary that I got for the post of Inventors Commissioner to inventors to perfect their products. In the two years I held this post I also sent six Sri Lankan young inventors to the Geneva International Inventors Exhibition.

Few years ago, I was appointed as advisor by the then Minister for Public Administration and Management for a project I initiated to increase village entrepreneurship.

The Start-up Village Entrepreneurship Program was to be a sub component of Flexport CSR related company named – on FlexCiied which focuses on innovation, incubation and enterprise development, using the five-decade experience of Flexport Innovations, in commercialising their innovations.

Q: In our discussion you mentioned that you have tried to work with educators to change the rote learning system of Sri Lanka to shape minds to be conducive for innovation. Could you comment further details and your proposals in this regard 

Yes. I have had several discussions in this regard with many people in institutions connected with education. Disinterested rote learning is a serious systematic problem in Sri Lanka which is costing the country heavily. We are not producing minds which think, create and change the country for the better. We are creating dull, machine-like job seekers. I have come up with several ideas to change this and it involves working actively with schools and universities. But what is important is that we change the system that created rote learning and change the curricula. We are now having a serious problem with this COVID-19 pandemic. We need young people who can battle this with their minds, with their creations and their talent. There is much that we can do and what we should do. 

Q: We often find in Sri Lanka a servile attitude towards anything that is ‘imported’ and this includes goods, attitudes and ideology which goes parallel with amnesia associated with our pre-colonial history. Your comments?

This is a serious problem that we have. We have to change this. I have travelled abroad, studied there and worked with foreigners. But I have never been servile and I have never lost my identity as a Sri Lankan and all my innovations were made within this identity. I am a Sri Lankan passport holder even though I could easily have become an American citizen because I was offered 10 acres in Alexandria to do what I want connected with innovation. I was also offered citizenship in Singapore after I got widescale publicity in Malaysia and Singapore media for my inventions. But I did not accept these offers because I wanted whatever humanity-centred innovation I make for the world to be made by me as a Sri Lankan, based in Sri Lanka. 

My brother and I developed Nano technology in plating end surface with gold, silver, bronze or any other colour. We competed with China and got a very good profit where I paid off my debts which I have incurred borrowing money for researching for innovation. Although I could have become far richer or more famous in a foreign country if I had taken their citizenship offer, I am happy I did not do so and that I did all my creations as a Sri Lankan, following the footsteps of my grandfather, D.J. Wimalasurendra. 

He was also offered citizenship of the United Kingdom. He refused. My grandfather when he was an engineer in Sri Lanka objected to getting down foreign British made diesel generators to Sri Lanka, arguing that we had hydroelectricity capacity. He finally got himself elected to the State Council of Ceylon in 1931 in order to resume his struggle to get the Laxapana Hydro Power Scheme activated by the Colonial regime. 

We have to continue to inculcate in Sri Lankans a Sri Lankaness. Sri Lankans can support our inventors and entrepreneurs by buying local products. I am currently trying to launch a development centre to sell local products manufactured in 50,000 villages with the assistance of the 15,000 Gramasewakas, and Samurdhi Officers that we have. We are attempting to support the creation and strengthening of about 2m lakh village enterprises in 35,000 villages across 276 regional centres of the island in the targeted four years from 2020-25. This is expected to create employment for about 3m persons. 

Q: In the companies that you set up; Flexciied and Flexport Innovations, you have made the rare connections between subjects not easily linked with innovation – Economy, Spirituality and Environmental. Your comments?

 Yes. I spoke earlier about curiosity. This is the lifeline of an inventor. I have made several inventions around the concept of traditional medicine. Some of these I cannot reveal as they are still in the making. I have earned many accolades for my inventions connected with environment as I mentioned to your earlier questions. These days I am working on several inventions that are directly linked the COVID-19 pandemic and aimed at harnessing our indigenous medical heritage. My two companies are actively working on it. I am also researching on Spirituality and Quantum Physics based potential for innovations.

One of my last worldwide inventions done with a German and American was the Universal Language Translator which simultaneously translates conversation done in different languages. Further references can be made on this from the following link; www.ultinc.lk. An outcome of this could be a One World, One Language University proposed to be established in Sri Lanka funded by a German investor. If established, this could provide the base for software engineers and university students of Sri Lanka to come up as innovators. This initiative will also help the tourism industry. 

Q: What is your view of Sri Lankan banks and their role in innovation, invention and entrepreneurship in the country?

It is indeed depressing even to talk about this. In Sri Lanka banks kill entrepreneurship. This is a fact. We have to start from scratch a proper banking culture that will value minds and their innovations and train bankers how to evaluate a project based on that premise. 

I am trying to help in this regard. I am supporting the initiative in this regard of Dr. Daya Hettiarachchi, a pioneer software developer for banks who is also the Chairman of his company the Open Arc group. A lot of effort has to be taken to totally change the mindsets of Sri Lankan bankers of today who are merely doing debt financing. The percentage of entrepreneurs in Sri Lanka is below 3%. In Vietnam it is 18%. They too are a country which had a terrible war history but they put in strong policies, identifying innovation and entrepreneurship as the two main pillars of economic development. Thailand is even better. Their percentage of entrepreneurs is 24%. 

Q: How important do you think Sri Lanka getting a national policy for invention/innovation is? 

 It is very important. We definitely need such a policy and it should cut across our education system, our banking system and our vocational training system, among others. We have a lot to do in this regard; I am closely in contact with the National Inventors Commission to talk about this. We need to create this policy in line with the COVID challenge that we are having now. I had started talking about this to the University Grants Commission (UGC). I am now working closely with the National Institute of Education as an advisor and we are trying to see what we can do.