Financial Times

Rising imports see Lanka's trade deficit up in January

Rising imports - despite a rise in exports - saw Sri Lanka's overall trade deficit rise by US $ 19 million to $ 150 million last January against a trade deficit of $ 131 million in January 2002, the Central Bank said in its latest report.

However, the domestic foreign exchange market remained liquid due to increased inflows under the services account, private transfers and capital accounts reducing the pressure on the exchange rate and enabling to build official external reserves through market purchases by the Central Bank, the statement added.

Both exports and imports continued to grow in the month under review (January 2003) with export growth being supported by a strong performance of industrial exports, mainly machinery, mechanical and electrical equipment, and textiles and garments.

Export earnings in US dollar terms increased for the fourth consecutive month, by 11 percent in January in comparison with the level recorded in January last year. Expenditure on imports measured in US dollar terms too increased by 12 percent in January, continuing its upward trend experienced since July 2002. "Consequently, the trade deficit expanded to $ 150 million in January from a deficit of $ 131 million recorded in January 2002," the bank said.

Among industrial exports, earnings from textile and garment exports increased by 5 percent to $ 192 million in January reflecting higher volumes of garment exports to USA and European countries, while the combined value of all other industrial exports in the same month rose by 43 percent over the value in January 2002.

Earnings from agricultural products declined by 9 percent due to lower earnings from tea and other agricultural products.

Spending on imports at $ 531 million recorded an increase of 12 percent in January compared to $ 474 million in the same month in 2002.

The import of consumer goods increased by 7 percent in January 2003.

Lankan fishing flies dominate world market

Fishing flies made at a factory in Sri Lanka export promotion zone at Katunayake is dominating the world market and much of the US.

Highland Flies Sri Lanka (Pvt) Ltd is an exclusive exporter of hand made fishing flies products to the world and has a 75-80 percent share of the the US market and is ranked No. 2 in the world, the Board of Investment (BOI) said in a press release.

Fishing files are artificial but made for anglers to catch trout and salmon. Fly-fishing is one of the most specified forms of angling and the flies have to resemble the real thing to fool the salmon or trout. In fact many anglers make their own flies.

Manik de Silva is the Director/Factory Manager of Highland Flies that employs 250 mainly female workers. The flies are handmade and each worker produces a specific design that may resemble a fly, mosquito or dragonfly. Fishing flies come in all different shapes, styles and colours. There are many different styles of flies and many patterns ranging from simple to very complicated structures. Flies are divided into various fishing styles like dry flies, wets flies, nymphs and streamers.

KBSL bags prestigious IBM Awards

Keells Business Systems Limited (KBSL) recently won the most coveted award in the IBM Business Partner Community in Sri Lanka for the "Best Customer Satisfaction Award" along with the "Product Leadership Award - pSeries", "Leadership Award Solution Sales - Sales and Distribution", "New Customer Leadership Award - Sales and Distribution" for the year 2002 at their annual IBM Business Partner "Kick Off".

KBSL has been a major player in both the RISC and Intel Server based markets in Sri Lanka for IBM along with its solution portfolio covering the Banking and Finance, Customer Relationship Management and Enterprise Resource planning areas of business. KBSL is the only IBM Business Partner in Sri Lanka to provide first level support to its pSeries customers and have over 140 systems installed islandwide to its credit.

Business intelligence, data warehousing seminar

Keells Business Systems Limited (KBSL), Sri Lanka's largest Information Integrator together with its banking services solution provider, i-flex Solutions Ltd, one of India's top five software companies, recently held a seminar on the concepts of Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence for Sri Lanka's banking and financial services sector.

It also officially launched its own Data Warehousing and Business Intelligence product, 'Reveleus'. Reveleus enables organizations to respond to market needs, enhance customer service levels and manage risk through its suite of information management products and services.

Qatar Airways continues normal flights

Qatar Airways said that it has continued to safely operate its normal scheduled services to Europe, the Gulf, the Indian sub-continent, and the Far East since the outbreak of conflict in Iraq. Qatar Airways Chief Executive Officer Akabr Al Baker said Qatar Airways was the first Gulf airline to recommence services into Kuwait City, after Kuwait airport was temporarily closed when the war started.

Asian Paints' new Colour World unit

Asian Paints (Lanka) Ltd has commissioned another Colour World unit, its state-of-the-art automatic paint mixing and dispensing facility, at Asian Paints Centre, Dehiwela.

The Colour World outlets offer customers one of the world's most advanced dispensing systems, with the promise of unlimited colour options in both exterior and interior emulsion paints. The outlets are sophisticated shop-in-shop units with Asian Paints' easy-to-use proprietary interactive computer programme that allows customers to try out shades on interiors and exteriors similar to their own before buying the paint.

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