e-bay and Alibaba to start operations focusing on Sri Lanka’s market
View(s):By Duruthu Edirimuni Chandrasekera
To help businesses go digital, e-commerce and Internet sales firms e-bay and Alibaba will be launching its services in Sri Lanka, officials said. Key officials of both these organisations participated at the panel discussions at the World Export Development Forum (WEDF) held in Colombo last week. “They will be coming to Sri Lanka with their services,” Indira Malwatte, Chairperson and CEO Sri Lanka Export Development Board (EDB) told the Business Times. The EDB along with the International Trade Centre organised the 16th edition of the export world’s flagship event. Ms. Malwatte said that the EDB will be calling a meeting with all local firms trading through e-commerce to discuss on e-bay and Alibaba. “We are going to hold a meeting with firms that carry out trading online. We will also adopt a screening system (which will gauge their suitability to enlist them on the two platforms) to include them on e-bay’s and Alibaba’s platforms,” she said.
While any firm can register on these platforms, Ms. Malwatte said that those which were screened by EDB will be backed by EDB in their trading activities. She said a meeting will also be scheduled with the Central Bank to iron out issues relating to exchange control. Digital trade has rendered entire services sectors tradable, liberating them from the constraints of geography, she said adding that even for physical merchandise, e-commerce has created new opportunities for ‘micro-multinational’ SMEs to link up to customers around the world. She said that over 160 companies from Sri Lanka and from more than 30 countries around the world have already begun to explore potential deals. ”B2B matchmaking meetings have the potential to generate concrete results particularly in the specialty foods sector, tourism, IT and business process outsourcing,” she said reiterating that due to the WEDF local firms had established several contacts. “Now we are following them up,” she said.