Investment: Port City calls for regular BOI meetings

The Sri Lanka Colombo Port City Economic Commission should regularly convene with the Board of Investment (BOI), with the intention of courting companies within the Special Economic Zone (SEZ) to consider relocating their offshore ancillary companies within other economic zones in the country, Colombo Port City Economic Commission Chairperson Harsha Amarasekera said on Tuesday (10).

“Now that our regulatory framework is up, the Act amendment is up, the regulations are up and the tax incentives are now finally in place, we can have a conjoined effort where services will be within the Port City, and others would be outside,” Amarasekera said, engaging in a discussion with the COPF on the lack of investment in the Hambantota Investment Zone, which when first conceptualised, was meant to be complementary to the CPC.

“Case in point would be companies like Ansell, which are going to set up their research and development arm within the Port City, who have always been within the BOI framework previously.”

“One could complement the other. In fact, some of the entities that are already within the Port City could be encouraged to see whether their ancillary companies offshore would want to explore setting up a manufacturing entity or any other such investment, outside of the Port City, within Sri Lanka, under the ambit of the BOI.”

Amarasekera said that at present, whenever there are applications, the Colombo Port City receives which are beyond its own ambit, they are referred to the BOI.

“We can set up a meeting where the Director Generals could meet up, every month or once in two months, to have a discussion on the activities taking place within the Port City, as well as the BOI, and see what are the areas where further work could be done.”

Source: The morning