{"id":112464,"date":"2021-03-08T16:43:01","date_gmt":"2021-03-08T23:43:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=112464"},"modified":"2021-03-08T16:43:01","modified_gmt":"2021-03-08T23:43:01","slug":"can-sri-lanka-become-competitive-and-productive-economy-in-asia-with-value-engineering-in-public-enterprises","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/03\/08\/can-sri-lanka-become-competitive-and-productive-economy-in-asia-with-value-engineering-in-public-enterprises\/","title":{"rendered":"CAN SRI LANKA BECOME COMPETITIVE AND PRODUCTIVE ECONOMY IN ASIA WITH VALUE ENGINEERING IN PUBLIC ENTERPRISES"},"content":{"rendered":"

BY EDWARD THEOPHILUS<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

The\neconomic conference held in Colombo several years ago especially focused on\neconomic issues such as foreign debt, regulation, and export performance. They\nwere quite significant issues not only in Sri Lanka alone but also in many\nthird-world countries.  The major\nmacroeconomic attention of the conference was based on three vital aspects,\ncompetitiveness, government fiscal stability, and maintaining long-term\nsustainable economic growth. The current world problem of the Covid 19 crisis display\nthat macroeconomic variables are subject to fluctuation and the concept of\neconomic stability directing policy-makers to arm with policy ideas that could\nadapt to a fluctuating environment, is the essential thing to do in an unstable\nenvironment. The idea of a production economy was ignored by the conference,\nmost probably to continuing import liberalization, which supported the Western\nand Asian countries associated with the thrust on the market economic system.  These three aspects were interconnected with\neconomic reforms, which have been rhetoric of the international financial\ninstitutions such as IMF, World Bank, and Asian Development Bank towards\ndeveloping countries since the ending of the cold war in the early 1990s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sri\nLanka already identified several issues related to economic competitiveness and\nvalue engineering issues in the public enterprises during the 1977 general\nelection, and the government budget presented for 1978 by Mr. Ronnie de Mel\nhighlighted some of these issues in the budget speech with complicated\ncorruptions had been in the country since 1956 socialist era mentioning a poem\nof John Milton. The elected government in 1977 initiated several policy\nmeasures for trade liberalization and market-oriented economic policies as they\nwere essential conditions under the environment of that time.  The policy initiation of Sri Lanka and radical\nchanges intended to implement in the economy were kicked off before Australia\nintroduced many competitive measures into the economy.   Many criticisms against Sri Lanka\u2019s policy\ninitiatives, most probably because of ignoring the point of becoming a\nproduction economy. Later, rapid economic progress achieved in the country\ndespite the assembled views of left political parties ascertained that the\nmarket economic policies were the right strategies for the country to entertain\nthe public. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although\nSri Lanka initiated a competitive policy framework, it was lacking positive\ncontrols for good governance and economic disciplines when compared to\nSingapore, Malaysia, and Australia where had been undertaken a market economic\nsystem with strong economic disciplines. The countries where initiated liberal\npolicies never undermined the process of production and the productive economy\nas they were associated with job creation and balanced growth. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nelected governments since 1990 have not been attempted to abolish the\nfundamental policy directions of the economy initiated in 1978 despite the\nmarket economic system rhetorically used as a baleful to blame in the political\nplatforms by opposition political parties before elected them to office. The\nbacksliding of open economic policies was a major challenge and the hardest\ntask for elected governments in the 1990s. Politically motivated propaganda in\npublic meetings and newspapers, the government with leftist ideology was willing\nto continue market policies in the country as it appeared satisfaction of\npublic by the economic environment by such policies. The general public of Sri\nLanka did not want to go back to the inward-looking policies of the so-called\nBandaranaike era, which created queues and black markets for each essential\nitem. Although the prices were a bit higher under the market economy, scarcity\nwas not an issue and the producer too gained the right price for their products\nat an open market. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\ntrade competition of Sri Lanka involved many sectors to improve the product\nquality of the economy supporting the market-oriented equilibrium rather than\nan artificial counterpoise maintained by the Bandaranaike regime with a massive\nscarcity.  The initial way of competitiveness\nof the country is required by deregulating several key markets.  The main market was the financial market\nwhich consists of trading banks, non-bank financial intermediaries, investment\nbanks, stock market, and superannuation market. \nThese market operations have been involved with a heavily regulated\nlabor market and a rigid trade union system in the country.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nbudget speech of 2015 and the government policy initiatives reflected some tiny\nendeavors to deregulate the financial system but it appears that the effort was\nbecoming purely unsuccessful because the contract between the president and the\nprime minister concerning policy implementations seem to be contradictory to\neach other based on either the political ideologies of the unity government or\nthe policy disagreement between two different bosses of the government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When\neconomic reforms presenting it needs to understand the complexity in the South\nAsian region where can be observed disparity among all races and such\ndifferences clash with the policy implementation process.  The nature of economic development and growth\nin the Asian Region is that the ethnic similarity has contributed to stable\neconomic progress in China, Soth Korea, Japan, Malaysia, and Taiwan. However,\nthe South Asian Region has many disparities relate to religions, races, castes,\nand attitudes. The government of Sri Lanka has taken many steps to unite all\nhuman groups in the country, however, many groups using inconsequential points\nuse to halt progressive steps. For example, China and India have large volumes\nof population and in the process of economic policy implementation India\nreflects a failure, the major reason is ethnic deviations of people in\nIndia.  Sri Lanka has limited ethnic groups\nand some factors such as castes are less influential in the economic policy\nprocess, notwithstanding, the actual situation, the diversity of ethnic groups\nin Sri Lanka have altered to a negative influential factor to create a\ncompetitive and productive economy in Asia, and value engineering in public\nenterprises.    <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mr.Gotabaya\nRajapaksa and Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna wanted to avoid two bosses\u2019 practices\nin the yahapalana regime to collective policy development integrating many\npolitical groups to a single government. The elections in 2019 and 2020 gave\nthe mandate to the current government and becoming a competitive economy is an\nessential role and it needs to understand that competitiveness associate with\nseveral factors such as competitive pricing of products and services,\ninnovations, value engineering in government and private firms and promoting\nmarket logics to attitudes of people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\ncurrent nature of the political environment indicates that although the two\nbosses practice ended after the presidential election in 2019, the aspect of\nuniting the country seems to a failure or going to be failed on disguised\ndiversity and religions attempt preaching against the selfish thinking\npractically religions failed to take the message to the wide society.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sri\nLanka cannot afford for losing production and service firm\u2019s power play of\ntrade unions and the government needs to take actions for cracking down on\nTrade Unions that have become unreasonably powerful under the current regime\nmay become a serious barrier to the competitiveness of the country. The\nexperience in many factories in the past trade unions did harmful\ncompetitiveness as well as members of trade unions forcing firm owners to close\nfactories and service firms.  The\ngovernment needs to develop strategies and mechanisms to deal with trade unions\nand they need to be educated the public on the points of inflation,\ndisturbances related to COVID 19, depreciation of the monetary unit. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although\nmany universities are providing education in Sri Lanka, the education system\nhas visibly failed to eliminate mythical attitudes in the country, and many\nacademics, as well as highly educated people, are either trust forecasts of\nuneducated astrologists and mythical instruction of soothsayers. These are\nsigns that Sri Lanka\u2019s constraints to be a competitive and productive economy\nin Asia.  Logical thinking is a vital\nfactor for developing attitudes supportive the progress.  W.W.Rostow indicated in his stages of\neconomic growth, the economic take-off would not be sustained if people of the\ncountry are slavers of mythical beliefs. This is a significant issue related to\ngrowth and development. It seems that although the government policy has failed\nto take modernization and technology to the rural economy mythical soothsayers\nhave already invaded the technology to sow mythical attitudes in the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Value\nengineering in public enterprises relates compatible policies relate to\ncost-cutting, productivity, competitiveness, innovation, and cost leadership in\npublic enterprises. Trade unions have swallowed public enterprises and\npolitical appointments to boards have failed to cut feathers of trade unions\nand value engineering should be the motto of public enterprises. If these work\nsuccessful, Sri Lanka could be a productive and competitive economy in Asia,\nand public enterprises could be launched to value engineering and eliminating\nfiscal problems in Sri Lanka. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sri\nLanka has many limits to the growth and attitudes of people whether they are\nliving in urban areas or rural areas they are affixed with delusion and\nchanging or salvation of people from delusion is the essential condition for\neconomic prosperity, politicians, religions, and policymakers are in an ocean\nof myth and people migrated to other countries from Sri Lanka too in this\nmythical world.  How can change this\nsituation?      <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BY EDWARD THEOPHILUS The economic conference held in Colombo several years ago especially focused on economic issues such as foreign debt, regulation, and export performance. They were quite significant issues not only in Sri Lanka alone but also in many third-world countries.  The major macroeconomic attention of the conference was based on three vital aspects, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-112464","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-edward-theophilus"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112464","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=112464"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/112464\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=112464"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=112464"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=112464"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}