Indian business team headed by Foreign Secretary Jaishankar meets Sri Lankan PM for second time
COLOMBO: Indicating the importance of their on-going visit to Sri Lanka, the Indian public and private sector business delegation headed by Foreign Secretary S.Jaishankar met Sri Lankan Prime Minster Ranil Wickremesinghe for the second time on Monday, to carry forward the discussions the group had had with Sri Lankan governmental and private sector stakeholders spread over two days on increasing bilateral trade and investment.
The Indian technical team is spearheaded by the Investment & Technology Promotion (ITP) Division in the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).
The ITP gives a definite direction and focus to the economic diplomacy strategy of MEA. It works closely with Indian Missions abroad and government Ministries and Departments as the nodal division on trade and investment. It also engages with Export Promotion Councils, Chambers of Commerce & Industry, and industry associations on promoting our common objectives of facilitating trade and investment. Some of the areas that ITP Division handles in conjunction with other Ministries are Lines of Credit, consultancy services, civil aviation matters and foreign investment. It also provides support to the Commercial Wings of Indian missions abroad in the form of resources and information to enable them to carry out their functions.
India is looking to investing in Sri Lanka in the field of energy, highway construction, medical services, and ports and airports construction. In the field of energy, Indian Oil is already an importer and distributor of petroleum products. It has renovated and is using about 15 giant oil storage tanks in Trincomalee. It now wants to renovate and use more of the 99 tanks allotted to it some years ago.
India is to set up a 500 MW LNG-fueled power plant at Kerawelapitya near Colombo. In North Sri Lanka it will build roads linking Jaffna with Mannar; Mannar with Trincomalee via Vavuniya and linking Vavuniya with Colombo via Kurunegala. The Indian railways will be bidding for projects in South Sri Lanka after successfully completely rail projects in the North.
India is also interested in airport construction with an eye on the Palaly airport in Jaffna with a view to making it an international airport to be linked with South Indian cities. Two Mumbai based companies are to lead an international consortium to build a container terminal in Colombo port.
Companies which are in the Indian delegation include PSU majors as well as private sector companies like GMR and GVK.
During the three-day visit, Foreign Secretary Jaishankar called on President Maithripala Sirisena and Foreign Minister Mangala Samaraweera also. The visit ends on Tuesday.