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President Anura Kumara Dissanayake
Economic Confidence Index rises to +36, highest in four years of Verité Research polling
Economic policy think tank Verité Research yesterday said that the approval rating of the Government polled at 65% in early February, in the latest round of its Gallup-style ‘Mood of the Nation’ poll.
With a ±3 percentage point error margin, the approval rating has remained statistically stable from the 62% polled a year ago. The disapproval rating remained low and unchanged from what it was in the previous poll in February 2025.
For the first time in the poll’s four-year history, the share of those who rated current economic conditions as “good” or “excellent” exceeded those who rated them as “poor.”
Perceptions of the economic outlook also improved. Those who said the economy was “getting better” increased to 64% from 55% one year ago. The proportion who said it was “getting worse” was largely unchanged. Those with no-opinion reduced, which points to more people having become more certain and more optimistic about the country’s economic direction.
All of the sentiments on the economy are aggregated into an Economic Confidence Index ranging from -100 to +100. The index registered +36, a huge improvement from +14 a year ago.
Additionally, a majority (59%) said they were satisfied with “the way things are going” in the country. This marks the first time in the last four years of polling that satisfaction levels have risen above 50%.
In various other aspects where the present Government was evaluated against past Governments, the highest positive evaluation was for reducing drugs and crime—even more so than for reducing corruption.
The regularly conducted ‘Mood of the Nation’ poll is part of the Syndicated Surveys instrument of Verité Research to enrich its regular macro political briefings. This instrument allows other organisations to add survey questions to check sentiments of Sri Lankans. The polling partner was Vanguard Survey Ltd.
The latest poll was based on a nationally representative, multi-stage, randomised sample of 1,048 Sri Lankan adults from separate households, and was conducted from 24 January to 3 February. It was designed to have a maximum sampling error margin of ±3.0 percentage points at a 95% confidence level. Error margins can be further affected by lapses that could arise in the implementation process.
