by Garvin Karunaratne, Ph.D. Michigan State University

The most vulnerable today in our Motherland are the persons and families that live on casual incomes far lower than Rs. 100,000 a month, some who depend on any income that comes their way., with no regular income whatsoever. In the City of Colombo I am personally aware that there are low wage earners who earn only Rs 33,000 a month, also calculated on a daily basis. There are also people who do not have even such an income. Low income people are easily in the lakhs within the City of Colombo. In the rest of Sri Lanka there are many- millions who eke out a living in poverty.

Will it not be ideal to rope them in to some work that provides them with a reasonable income, and the work they do will make something that will reduce imports- a contribution to our national economy. . This unfortunately requires National Planning which we stopped in 1977 .

We do have a country blessed with milk and honey, a country that has a fertile soil assured with rain and a people smart and productive.

I think it is up to us, administrators who did implement programmes of employment creation in the pre 1977 era who happen to be alive today, to provide details of successful programmes that may spur our Peoples Government to action.

The best method of finding incomes for the low waged is by not by giving handouts like Aswesuma; Instead it should be by getting them on the ladder to attend to some task which helps them with some income and also enhance the economy of the country.

Sri Lanka has had a few such schemes. The Janasaviya of President Premadasa did include some measure of training to make the people productive, the idea of my friend, the late Susil Siriwardena, but the scheme stopped abruptly with the untimely death of President Premadasa.

President Chandrika established Samurdhi, giving handouts to the needy and it also included involving a measure of work to be attended to. This effort at times went to the ridiculous extent of getting the beneficiaries to sweep and clear temple premises. Training to make the beneficiaries do something useful was a good attempt. However this aspect is something very difficult to implement was not developed and gradually died down.

Then came Aswesuma by the Government of President Ranil which was purely a donation, more a vote catching device for the forthcoming Presidential election.

It will be ideal to get the people trained to become productive. Someday, I hope this ideal may get some concern and an effort will perhaps be the way ahead. It is a difficult task but the only way ahead.

The other day I was at Nawala going from shop to shop searching for a step ladder made in Sri Lanka and I could not find any. The shops were full of step ladders of all sizes, but they were all imported from countries like Singapore and Malaysia.

To make a step ladder is an easy task and if we cannot make all our step ladders, we are really nuts.

Perhaps we are the only country in the entire world that does not make its own bicycles. In the UK originally there were a few makes of bicycles- – the famous makes like Raleigh, Hercules and Rudge, that once ruled the world. Today, there are a large number of factories making cycles.

It may be a good idea for our new leaders to decide that we will not import what we can make in our country. There will be criticism initially, a scarcity will come up but eventually our entrepreneurs will emerge and the Government has also to create programmes to train people to get into business making such items.. That is the only way ahead.

I have lived for long in the USA and in the UK where silencers for cars of all makes are made locally. When a silencer gives way in the USA or the UK one takes the vehicle to a garage and two quotes are given, one to replace with the original, always at a very high price and it takes a few days as the part has to be ordered from the manufacturer, and another quote for a locally made replica which can be found and installed in a few hours. Everyone opts for the local make. The garage owner orders the part from a local store and it gets delivered in a few hours and gets fitted within another hour. Making silencers for cars finds employment and incomes for many in the USA and the UK.

My real experience of replacing a silencer in Jessore Bangladesh comes in handy to prove that we can easily make our own silencers. I was driving my Toyota Publica, one of the smallest cars one can find, on my trip from Bangladesh to Nepal via India and on the end of the first day at Jessore there was a big bang and the silencer had given way. I limped on to the Jessore town where I stayed the night. The next morning I contacted the District Deputy Director of Youth. (I worked as a Consultant in Youth at that time.) The Deputy Director took my car to a local garage that repaired cars. The car was taken in and a workman got working . He pulled out the old damaged silencer and took it to pieces. He brought a sheet of metal and traced the dismantled pieces, cut them and started welding . Within two hours he completed welding, fixed the silencer and I was on the road. The newly done silencer sounded right and I drove as far as Pokhara in Nepal and back via Calcutta to Dhaka in Bangladesh. The silencer was firm even when I sold the car in two years time.

Also get cracking with fixing up the Department of Small Industry with experts who can advise our small industrialists to get going making every thing we need. Once before 1977 that Department had an expert unit that did wonders in Sri Lanka making all its textiles via Powerlooms and handlooms. I served once as a Deputy Director of Small Industry was once also associated as an administrator for over five years with that unit and can vouch for success. .

One can actually do wonders if only we want to. I must mention that we have entrepreneurs who have a vision and ability.

My mind travels in nostaglia to an incident that did happen when I served as Deputy Director of Small Industries way back in 1970. I was in charge of making allocations of foreign exchange to small industrialists. Kariyawasam the Member of Parliament for Elpitiya met me with a young lad and requested me to give him an allocation of foreign exchange to import small mirrors to enable him to make mirrors for motor vehicles. I immediately called one of my inspectors and told him to inspect and make a recommendation. My inspector fixed up a date for inspection. A few days later the inspector told me that he went to Elpitiya and found that the youth had no factory or even a smithy where he said he made the metal portions of car mirrors. I called Kariyawasam and gave him a piece of my mind for recommending the youth. Kariyawasam was adamant that the youth was a real worker, a youth who would not feign and not do anything wrong. It ended by my fixing an appointment to meet the youth and inspect for myself. Kariyawasam told me to meet the youth near the lorry garage of the Cooperative Union.

I was there in time and met the youth carrying a very heavy bag of metal on his shoulder. I asked the youth to take me to his smithy where he made the metal pieces to fit the mirrors and he took me to the garage where the Cooperative Union lorries were parked. I lay down my tools by the side of my house and make items. I have no money to make a smithy of my own. I told this to your inspector but he never believed it and he did not give me a chance to show how I made items.” he said. He laid down his heavy bag, sat down in a corner, pulled out his metal pieces and as I watched he fitted a jig that was around eighteen inches tall and wide. I touched and shook the jig. It was heavy and very firm. Then he said that he will have to wait till a coop lorry comes in and he can borrow their jack. I yet could not understand what he was going to do, but I was patient as he talked well and assured me of his intentions. A lorry came in. He looked at the driver and said that he would not part with his jack. I waited because his intentions looked good. Another lorry came in and he ran to the driver and borrowed his jack. He immediately got into action -sat down and cut pieces of metal to size, placed it on the jig and using the lorry jack pressed the pieces to shape again and again shoving them in at various angles. . In a few minutes he came up with metal pieces that would take in a mirror. He again sat down and with a file, shore off extra edges and got a metal piece that resembled the metal receptacle of a car mirror. He sat down again and used the file to give it more shape. It was really a marvel- a workman who really did perform something I could never imagine he could. I told him to come to my office the next day when I gave him an allocation to import small mirrors. I rang Kariyawasam and thanked him.

This true story tells us that we can make anything . If only that youth had a lathe he could have made many of our imports. We have a good work force that can be depended on. It is up to us administrators and our politicians to get activated. Sadly – both parties have been in slumber for half a century- since 1977. We have allowed importers to swamp our country with imports that we can easily make.

I can also support this idea with the story of how I established a Crayon Factory at Matara.

In 1971, working for our Motherland as the Government Agent at Matara we were implementing the DDCP- the Divisional Development Councils Programme aimed at establishing industries run by the youth. A large number of small industries sprang up all over the island. In Matara in some two months. I submitted a plan to establish a Seagoing Motorboat factory. It was approved and we built it at Matara and it made some 20 seaworthy fishing motor boats a year. This was a feather in the cap of the newly established Ministry of Plan Implementation headed by Professot HAdeS Gunasekera as the Secretary. He was so highly satisfied that he would no more approve any further industry in my District. I clashed with him again and again but he could not be moved for another industry for my District.

Finally in desperation I took charge. The aim was to plan and establish an industry that will not only be viable but will finally be a major contribution to the country.

It had to be a new industry, an industry making an essential item that we imported.

I had a smart Planning Officer, Vetus Fernando, a graduate in chemistry from the University of Colombo,. Once earlier as the Deputy Director of Small Industry I was in charge of allocating foreign exchange for the imports of essential items for manufacturers and I had inspected an industry making water colours and had seen the process of making water colours. I fed all what I knew about making water colours to my Planning Officer and told him to experiment and find the method of making crayons, an allied item. At that time Sri Lanka imported over ninety five percent of its crayons. I approved the purchase of some items the Planning Officer thought would be necessary for making crayons. The Planning Officer and I , assisted by a science teacher from Rahula College started experimenting at my Residence every evening. In a few days we realized that we wanted equipment and decided to obtain the science lab of Rahula College. I spoke to the Principal Mr Ariyawansa and he readily agreed. I, my Planning Officer, and a few other staff officers of the katcheri and the science teacher from Rahula College were at the science lab, from six in the evening to close upon midnight every working day and tried many experiments to make a crayon and failed even in two months.

Then the Planning Officer came with a brain wave. He thought of taking the crayons we made which were not of good saleable quality to show them to his professors and find advice on making good quality crayons. He went behind the professors and lecturers who had taught him a year ago. None of them wanted to help him in their well equipped laboratory. They had said that they were too busy in teaching and marking answer scripts. He had begged of them again and again on three days. He came back a downhearted and broken down man. However we were not to give in. We started our experiments again at the Rahula College science lab and in around another month found the recipe to make crayons. Then I sat beside him and experimented again and again and found the exact recipe to make a good crayon, Our crayons were fine tuned to be equal to Reeves, the best of the day.

Then I was faced with the task of how to proceed to make crayons. I decided on a cooperative and I selected the cooperative union in the District that I considered best. It was the Morawak Korale Coop Union headed by Sumanapala Dahanayake, the MP for Deniyaya as its President. I had assessed that he would be dependable. Sumanapala readily agreed with the task of commencing a Crayon Factory and carrying it on whatever problems crop up. Though I had no authority, I authorized him to use funds available at his Coop Union . The maverick he was, Sumanapala readily agreed. If we failed both of us stood responsible.

The Planning Officer gave Sumanapala the list of items, gas burners etc that were required and Sumanapala agreed to purchase all those items. He was also to have a place ready for work. Working with the Divisional Secretary for Deniyaya he was to select twenty five youths.

I selected a few officers who had been involved in the experiments we made to make crayons and some six officers moved to Kotapola the next day. I was surprised to see a section of the Kotapola Coop Union cleared for us. The officers set up the gas burners and commenced action. Small quantities of dyes were mixed with paraffin wax etc. and set to boil. One katcheri officer was monitoring each boiler and Vetus the Planning Officer was monitoring moving from boiler to boiler ensuring that the colouring was perfectly mixed and poured into glass moulds . The crayons were left to dry and later dropped into buckets of water checked and scraped if necessary. It was an endless operation, youths being trained on the job by Vetus and a few of us working on a continuous basis. . We snatched a few hours of sleep on a chair at times. GunamTambipillai and a number of other Estate Owners were coming in with sweets and patties and eats of all sorts at various hours and Sumanapala was everywhere. On about the third day Sumanapala was missing for a while and we continued our process of making crayons non stop. His cooperative workers were being trained. Sumanapala later turned up with labels that were pasted onto the crayons and he had also brought printed packets that were folded and pasted. The crayons were checked and put into the packets.

I left for Matara after a few days of continuous work. The other officers of the katcheri- Chandra Silva the District Land Officer, Wimalaratne the Assistant Government Agent, Development Assistant Dayananda Paliakkara and a few others continued working, snatching a few hours rest on a chair.

. Back at my officer the next day I looked through my papers, signed and gave orders on some and went back to Kotapola to join Vetus and others. . The room was half filled and I was happy with the progress. I opened packets collected at random and checked them for quality and was happy that it was all of excellent quality. I joined the work force and noticed that the youths engaged in pouring liquid, boiling and filling into glass tubes looked happy on the job. In two weeks time we filled two large rooms with packets of crayons. It was a non stop twenty four hour a day operation. The youth had mastered the art of making crayons,

I had no authority to establish an industry and somehow the factory and its produce- the crayons had to see the light of day and the crayons had to get marketed. We needed legitimacy and Sumanapala and I decided to take some samples and show them to some dignitaries- Cabinet Ministers, to apprise them of what we have achieved and get them on our side in case the Ministry tried to punish me for going beyond their remit of work.

Sumanapala and I decided to show the crayons first to Mr Subasinghe the Minister for Industries. Both of us knew him, Sumanapala knew of him for long as they were politicians. I first met him when Dr NM Perera had told him- more an order to find me a place in the Small Industries Ministry- when I had been incarcerated in the pool of unwanted administrators for over two months for a reason I never knew. Though I had never done anything wrong we sometimes do get cornered.

We- Sumanapala and I barged into the Minister’s room at the Ministry. He looked at us and greeted us.

We have come to show the crayons we made and we want you to come and open sales.” He opened one packet tearing the cover and scribbled a crayon on a piece of paper.

I cannot believe that we made such fine crayons.”,

Sumanapala said

The GA had found the method of making crayons and we invite you to come. My youths are making crayons at the moment and we need you to open sales.”

I added Please come to the Coop Union at Kotapola. It will be a grand opening of a product we ourselves made.”

You have done great. I will be there tomorrow evening.”

We rushed back to Kotapola and made arrangements for a public meeting to open sales. With that support we opened sales and Coop Crayon was sold even in Colombo.

One problem we faced was to buy dyes in the open market at a high price. I approached the Small Industries Department that provided foreign exchange allocations for small industries, the unit where I had worked a year ago. The Director decided that his funds were not to be used for cooperatives. In my days I would have easily decided positively and allowed an allocation, but his word was final. We were lost but continued the production purchasing dyes in the open market at high prices,.

One day we heard that the Controller of Imports was about to authorize the imports of crayons and Sumanapala and I moved in. We met the Controller of Imports Harry Gunaratne and convinced him that by giving us a small amount of foreign exchange to import dyes to make crayons he could stop the import of crayons. He was convinced but he wanted us to get approval from his boss, the Minister for Imports because such a cross allocation of foreign exchange had never been done earlier. We went immediately to meet Mr Illangaratne, the Minister for Imports and spoke with him. It did not take long to convince him. He not only authorized us an allocation of foreign exchange for importing dyes, but also instructed the Controller of Imports to stop the import of crayons altogether.

We won the day. Minister Ilangaratne was so taken aback with the crayons we produced that he wanted me to establish a Crayon Factory at Kolonnawa, his electorate. He was very adamant and I had to agree to do it. However I told him that I must first see our Crayon Factory at Morawaka fully established as a viable industry. He agreed. I left that Administrative Service about twelve months later. The Crayon Factory was developed to have islandwide sales before I left. Had I not resigned from the Administrative Service I would have had to establish a Crayon Factory at Kolonnawa, as promised.

I left the Administrative Service in April 1973 and Sumanapala and the Government Agent continued the Crayon Factory. It was developed to have island wide sales. This Crayon Factory was so successful that it earned the wrath of President Jayawardena who won the 1977 General Election. In my words:

.  Years later I met A.T.Ariyaratne  an officer of the Administrative Service who had once worked as Deputy Commissioner of Cooperatives and when I stated that I had been GA Matara, he told me that in 1977 he had been sent on a special mission-instructed personally by President Jayawardena, to inspect and audit  Coop Crayon and find some misdeed to punish Sumanapala and to close down the Crayon Factory. He told me that he had spent a few days inspecting and auditing the books but had to report that the industry was run well and that all books were in perfect order. Ariyaratne was not the type of officer who would stoop to create evidence to please someone in authority.

The Structural Adjustment Programme of the IMF which was followed by President Jayawardena from 1977 insisted that all Government commercial undertakings should be stopped and the Crayon Factory which was the most successful industry implemented under the DDCProgramme was stopped.

The pristine success of the Crayon Factory, to be commercially viable within the first six months, developed to have islandwide sales indicates what Sri Lanka can achieve if only a sincere attempt is made at developing any import substitution type of industry,.

I can add from my work in Bangladesh to the effect we can find success in attending to ardous tasks in development.

I was working as the Commonwealth Fund Advisor to the Ministry of Youth in Bangladesh in 1981.

The Ministry of Youth was training some 40,000 youths in an array of vocations. The training was generally three months in duration and the youths ended their training with a certificate on glossed paper handed over by a dignitary at a well attended occasion. Most of the trained continued unemployed for life.

Then, one night General Ershard of the Bangladesh Army took over the country in a bloodless coup. The Minister for Youth Development had been incarcerated a few days earlier. The Military viewed the work of the Ministry of Youth with scorn and a meeting was held to evaluate the work of the Ministry. The youth training schemes were narrated and supported by the two secretaries of the Ministry The Military leaders looked not satisfied and called on me for my comments. Instead of commenting on the existing programmes, I recommended that we should have an additional programme to create entrepreneurs of the youths that were being trained. I said that we did train the youths in various vocations but dropped them off to fend for themselves. My suggestion was for us to guide the trained youths to become self employed- making entrepreneurs of them.

The Secretary to the Treasury, the highest officer in Bangladesh who was present objected stating that enterprise creation was not something that can be done and said that an ILO project that tried to create entrepreneurs in the earlier three years at Jessore Bangladesh, was a total failure despite obtaining a number of experts from abroad. and had to be closed down as it was not possible to create enterprises. He said that the project was a colossal failure with a massive loss and the Bangladesh Treasury would not undertake such an attempt again. He emphasized that the ILO held the last word on building up industries.

I contested and said that I had successfully created enterprises and jobs in Sri Lanka and that we can build up entrepreneurs. The Secretary to the Treasury vehemently objected and both of us argued for two hours while the Minister for Youth, was listening and making notes. Finally he stopped us arguing, said that I had convinced him and approved my establishing a Youth Self Employment Programme. The Secretary to the Treasury objected stating that he will not provide any funds as he was dead certain that it would end in a failure with a massive loss. I replied even without consulting the two Secretaries of the Ministry with whom I worked, that I did not require a new budget, but will find savings within budgets already approved. The Minister approved my request.

I got cracking the very next day training youth directors and lecturers in concepts of economics on how to identify areas in the economy where there was a need for production, where the youths will make items that are in demand and will be able to readily sell them and create incomes. I trained the staff on how to guide youths who commence even small enterprises. A few youths volunteered to commence with their savings and they were guided almost every day, The task was to build up the abilities of the youths to identify some activity that will bring them an income and work on it- even buy day old chicks which they could buy with the stipend the Ministry paid them for engaging in training and get going with creating incomes. To youths trained in wood work and iron the task was to make a small item that will sell and sell it . To those trained in livestock, it was to buy a chick or a ducking, or a cow and see it grow and lay eggs or provide milk that were sold in the market.

It became a youth movement for every trained youth to make something that would sell and we officials were working with the youths on a day to day basis. The entire staff of the Ministry were trained by me in economics and the youths were guided every day. The parents and elders when they saw their youths getting involved in making something for sale and making an income responded by buying a cow or chicks. They cherished to see their sons and daughters engaging in enterprise creation.

In dress making, the training centres that were closed at four were kept open till ten at night for the youths to use the sewing machines in the training centres and make garments for sale. What they made for sale were sold to bring them an income. Selling was also closely monitored for sales techniques.

By the time I completed my two years service I had trained the staff of the Ministry and all Youth Training Centers on guiding the youths to become entrepreneurs. The Ministry wanted me to continue as the Advisor but due to personal reasons I decided to get back to my family in London.

It was a programme where the abilities of the youths were built up through the process of their engagement in commerce- producing items and selling them. The production process as well as selling the produce was monitored in a manner that built up their abilities.

By March 1983, in eleven months from commencement, , it was found that 283 youths had established their own commercial ventures and had built up heads of cattle and flocks valued at Tk 911,000.00 As much as 223 of them had reached a net income of Tk 369 a month. Of them 83 had reached Tk 500 a month, In Jamalpur, a District which we pioneered as a pilot district, 73 youths were earning a net income of Tk 445 a month all against the ideal of drawing Tk 500 a month.

By August 1983, in sixteen months from the commencement of the Programme as much as 479 earned net incomes of TK 593 a month. We were working with around 2000 youths by the time I left, monitoring them closely.

Members of the Bangladesh Civil Service, trained by me, continued the programme, expanding the 3 Residential Training Centers to 64 by 1997/2002. The Five Year Plan of Bangladesh(1997-2002) states that 596,000 youths were trained in self employment and devotes an evaluation of eight pages to this programme. This is easily the premier self employment programme the world has known.

The Government of Bangladesh Report of 19/2/2011 to the 34 th Session of the IFAD(FAO), one of the funders, states that two million youths have been self employed on this Programme. In four decades 1983 to today, this Programme had created over three million entrepreneurs. It is today the premier self employment creation programme the world has known.

The intrinsic success of the Youth Self Employment Programme to be a world class successful employment creation programme tells us of what can be achieved if only an attempt is made. The Programme was created by me in eighteen months- April 1982 to September 1983 and developed further by members of the Bangladesh Civil Service, trained by me.

Anyone interested for details is requested to contact the Ministry of Youth Development of Bangladesh . A personage that worked with me was Mr Md Asafuddowlah, of the Bangladesh Civil Service, who was the Additional Secretary of the Ministry of Youth Development, when I worked there. He later led the Ministry of Youth Development for around five years as its Secretary who now lives in retirement- MrAsaffuddowlah, is now well known as an orator, administrator and musician. He or the Ministry of Youth Development may be contacted for further details by anyone interested.

The achievement of this Youth Self Employment Programme was once hailed by Milinda Moragoda, Sri Lanka’s Ambassador for India, in 2011, in his Manifesto to become the Mayor for Colombo in 2011, he declared that to solve the problem of youth unemployment, he would seek to implement the Youth Self Employment Programme of Bangladesh which was an amazingly successful scheme introduced to that country by a distinguished son of Sri Lanka, Dr Garvin Karunaratne who served Bangladesh as an international consultant.”(The Nation;11/9/2011)

It is also important to note that the implementation of all these programmes was done with the local currency, the Rupee in Sri Lanka and the Taka in Bangladedsh. This proves that foreign exchange is not required for the implementation. In addition, all these programmes created production that obviated imports. Further the Youth Self Employment Programme even earned foreign exchange for Bangladesh when it received grants from the IFAD of the FAO

Over to our new President, His Excellency Anura Kumara Dissanayake. Will it not be ideal to have similar programmes to create employment and to obviate imports, thereby saving valuable foreign exchange as well as alleviating poverty. This is a task that can easily be accomplished in two years.

If our President dares to approve the implementation of any employment creation programme and if no one undertakes to do it , I will be there to take the responsibility and can assure grand success

.

Garvin Karunaratne, Ph D Michigan State University.

former Commonwealth Fund Advisor to the Government of Bangladesh 1981-1983

G.A. Matara , 1971-1973. Member of the Administrative Service

garvin_karunaratne @hotmail.com, 05092025