The water tariffs will surge by 70 per cent from September 01 this year revealed the National Water Supply and Drainage Board.
The decision, however, will not affect low income families, and a final decision has not been taken to date on the percentage by which the water tariffs are increased in business premises.
Previously steps were taken to revise the electricity tariffs and although the percentage was revealed to be 70 per cent the charge has increased by more than 100 per cent in some bills.
GALENBINDUNUWEWA, Sri Lanka—For greater than half a century, Pahatha Mellange Jayaappu has tilled the sphere on his modest farm in Sri Lanka’s agricultural heartland, unswayed by recurrent political and financial turmoil.
Now the 71-year-old is simply attempting to eke out sufficient of a harvest to feed his household after an abrupt ban on chemical fertilizers final 12 months devastated his crops. He says he has given up on planting for revenue.
“We have lived through armed insurrections and bad government policies,” Mr. Jayaappu stated. “This is the worst year I’ve ever seen. They have destroyed the farmers.”
Many Sri Lankans aren’t getting sufficient to eat, and farmers and agricultural specialists say the meals shortages are set to worsen. The authorities reversed the ban in November and promised contemporary provides of chemical fertilizers, however farmers stated many obtained solely a small quantity, and too late for the present rising season.
The nationwide yield from this month’s rice harvest—certainly one of two annually—will probably be simply half the traditional degree, stated Manoj Thibbotuwawa, a meals safety professional on the Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka, a Colombo-based assume tank. Yields of different main crops resembling corn and sorghum will probably be off 30% to 60%.
The island nation of twenty-two million has been within the grip of an financial disaster lengthy within the making. Financial pressures began mounting earlier than the pandemic due to debt-fueled infrastructure spending and tax cuts that slashed authorities income. Then Covid-19 battered the tourism trade, and the conflict in Ukraine roiled international markets for meals and gas.
Without fertilizer, the 1-acre farm of Wasala Mudiyansalage Walamaga Gedera Weerakoon Banda, 66 years outdated, not produces sufficient rice for his household, not to mention to promote. He grows quite a lot of crops now, usually going to village gala’s to promote his greens, and works as a day laborer for a bit further money. Deepti Asthana for The Wall Street Journal
The ban on imports of agricultural chemical substances took impact in May 2021, and the rice harvest the next March was down 40%, based on authorities information. Prices soared. Sri Lanka, which had been largely self-sufficient in rice, was compelled to make use of a few of its fast-dwindling international reserves to import the important thing staple. Other crops, like tea, an vital foreign-exchange earner, have additionally suffered. In May, the nation defaulted on its exterior debt.
Nearly 6.3 million Sri Lankans lack entry to satisfactory meals, the United Nations World Food Program reported final month, and effectively over half of households are reducing again on meals or consuming less-nutritious meals. Food inflation crossed 90% in July, based on official information.
“Never before in modern history have we faced famine of this scale,” President Ranil Wickremesinghe stated final month.
Mr. Wickremesinghe was put in by Parliament final month after his predecessor, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, fled the nation and resigned within the face of mass protests over gas shortages and meals costs. The new president has warned that the nation must discover a additional $300 million to import sufficient fertilizer to stop one other rice catastrophe. The subsequent crop might be sown in September.
Mr. Rajapaksa billed the ban as a nationwide shift to natural farming, however agricultural specialists say that requires a years long transition. Opposition lawmakers stated reducing off imports of fertilizer, which the federal government closely subsidizes for farmers, was a shortsighted try to carry on to international reserves.
Above, farmer Pahatha Mellange Jayaappu, 71, has pawned practically all his spouse’s jewellery for farm loans; beneath, a number of the rice he has saved for his household, which he thinks gained’t be sufficient.
In Anuradhapura district, a significant hub of rice farming within the northern a part of Sri Lanka, many farmers say they don’t imagine that their troubles will finish quickly. About half the farmers within the area have given up on business farming.
“Even those who cultivate the land don’t have enough to eat,” stated 66-year-old farmer Wasala Mudiyansalage Walamaga Gedera Weerakoon Banda. His 1-acre farm, which normally produces about 2,000 kilos of rice—permitting him to promote half for a revenue—now can’t produce sufficient to feed his household, he stated. He and his spouse are down to 2 meals a day, and should go to 1 if the present crop disappoints.
He has been working as a wage laborer on close by farms to make a bit further money. “We have barely any income,” he stated.
Farmers complained that the natural fertilizers that got here in the marketplace after the ban took impact had been poor high quality, full of fabric that wasn’t absolutely decomposed. And the haste of the ban left inadequate time to make their very own compost, or discover ways to farm organically.
Sanath Sisira tried sprinkling cow and hen manure onto his fields, which helped his guava crops some however had zero impact on his rice crop.
“You can’t just throw food waste into the fields,” he stated. Without chemical pesticides, he added, bugs have devoured his melon crop. He says vehicles hauling crops are trailed by flocks of crows, as they’re crawling with bugs.
The authorities started supplying chemical fertilizers at a sponsored value to farmers on Monday, and international organizations just like the World Bank have agreed to offer monetary help to purchase fertilizer, stated
W.M.D. Wanninayake,
spokesman for the agriculture ministry. The ministry can also be encouraging farmers to plant crops like corn and mung beans, which require much less fertilizer than rice.
The nation has two rice farming seasons, with the smaller crop sown in May and harvested this month. If the climate cooperates, the following planting season must be profitable, stated Mr. Wanninayake.
But first will come this month’s harvest, which many farmers say they count on to be disastrous. Mr. Jayaappu estimated his rice crop at about 200 kilos, greater than 90% beneath regular. His soybean discipline will yield about one-third of what it did in earlier years. He didn’t hassle planting corn.
Mr. Thibbotuwawa, the food-security professional, stated extra meals shortages, particularly of rice, will hit by September, requiring the federal government to import extra.
“What we need is the government to prioritize these essential foods,” he stated.
But that may imply diverting the nation’s restricted international foreign money away from different necessities resembling gas and fertilizer, placing the following rice season in additional peril.
Many small-scale farmers like Mr. Jayaappu say they may not maintain out for an additional season, particularly after taking out loans. Some discuss of going into cities for building jobs, or of their wives going overseas to work as family helpers.
Anuradhapura district in northern Sri Lanka—referred to as ‘rice bowl’ of the area—was thrown into disaster by a ban on imports of artificial fertilizer and pesticides that took impact in May of 2021.
The ban was lifted in November, however fertilizer remains to be brief. Though Sanath Sisira, 44 years outdated, stocked up when the ban was introduced, he’s rising rice on simply half an acre of his 2½-acre farm.
Farmers are diversifying their crops to make sure they will feed their households. Other crops have the benefit of being much less labor-intensive and never requiring loans to purchase fertilizer.
Farmer Pahatha Mellange Jayaappu’s 13-year-old grandson, Anupama Deshan Gunawardhena, joins in farm work like sowing and plowing—and within the sense of insecurity because the household goes via this financial disaster.
Mr. Jayaappu’s, spouse, 66-year-old Wadu Gedera Yaso Menika, says their two sons, seeing no future in farming, are working as day laborers.
Farmers, who reside in tile-roof properties with primary facilities, additionally should take care of frequent energy cuts ensuing from gas shortages, one other product of the financial disaster.
Sameera Madushanka, 30, in his agrarian store in Galenbindunuwewa village. The discover says ‘no cash loans,’ referring to buying fertilizer on credit score. The value of a bag of fertilizer peaked at greater than 25 instances its pre-ban degree.
Mr. Jayaappu stated he and his spouse have pawned practically all of her jewellery to maintain the farm operating. Costs have skyrocketed, he stated—employed labor and rented machines tripling; substandard pesticide quadrupling.
He spent the equal of $113 on a 50-kilo bag of fertilizer on the black market, which is rife with pretend merchandise. He realized as soon as he acquired residence that the fertilizer was the unsuitable form. He sprinkled it over his rice fields anyway—to no impact. During a standard 12 months, he used to earn an annual revenue of about $1,400; now he’s shedding cash.
Mr. Jayaappu’s spouse, Wadu Gedera Yaso Menika, stated the household has run via all the cash she saved from two years’ work as a housemaid in Saudi Arabia. Now she worries that they must take out extra loans to maintain planting the following season.
The 66-year-old is livid on the authorities. There isn’t any level in farming, she stated, with out good fertilizer.
“We have tried everything,” she stated. “Everything died.”
Singapore will repeal a law that bans gay sex, effectively making it legal to be homosexual in the city-state.
The decision, announced by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on national TV, comes after years of fierce debate.
The city-state is known for its conservative values, but an increasing number of people have called for the colonial-era 377A law to be abolished.
Singapore is the latest Asian place to move on LGBT rights, after India, Taiwan and Thailand.
The government’s previous stance was to keep 377A but it also promised not to enforce the law, as a way to appease both sides.
But on Sunday night, Mr Lee said they would abolish the law as “I believe this is the right thing to do, and something that most Singaporeans will accept,” he said.
He noted that “gay people are now better accepted” and scrapping 377A would bring the country’s laws in line with “current social mores, and I hope it will bring some relief to gay Singaporeans”.
But he also said the government would ensure better legal protection for the definition of marriage as one between a man and a woman. This would effectively make it harder for gay marriage to be legalised.
He said Singapore remains a traditional society with many keen on maintaining family and social norms.
Even after not paying any forex debt and rationing fuel to just 40% of previous consumption, usable forex reserves of the Central Bank fell by 15% to USD 354 million by end July 2022 from USD 417 million by end March 2022.
Nandalal Weerasinghe, the Governor of the Central Bank of Sri Laka, has not been able to obtain a single dollar as “bridging finance” in his 4 ½ months in office.
Chairman of the Election Commission Nimal G. Punchihewa said that it is not fair for the subject Minister to hold the power to postpone the conduction of the Local Government Election and that such a power should be possessed by the Commission.
Despite any reason to postpone the Election being justified, some parties may view that it was due to political influence, he pointed out, adding that the Election Commission, therefore, should have the power to postpone the holding of the Local Government Election.
The Local Government Election has been postponed until next March as per the powers of the Minister of Provincial Councils and Local Governments, but after September, the Commission will have the power to hold it, hence the immediate conduction of the polls being of importance, Punchihewa added.
He noted that the holding of the Provincial Council Election which has been dragged in for many years must also be expedited.
Following the decision to amend the Electoral System, the Provincial Council Election could not be held, but amendments to the general laws affecting the holding of the polls passed by Parliament could allow the Election to be held in the old system, he pointed out.
The matter has also been briefed at the Select Committee and the Provincial Council Election should be held as soon as possible after adopting the necessary legal amendments, the Commission Chief stressed.
As the Yala Season paddy harvesting has already commenced, the Agriculture Ministry has stated that the government has allocated Rs. 2,000 million to purchase farmers’ paddy crops at a reasonable price and will allocate more in the future.
Following complaints by farmers that mill owners of the private sector are purchasing paddy stocks for Rs. 80 – 90, the government decided to increase the price of paddy, leading to some of the major revisions in paddy prices, Rs. 120 per kilo of Nadu paddy, Rs. 125 per kilo of Samba paddy and Rs. 130 per kilo of Keeri Samba paddy.
Chairman of the Paddy Marketing Board Neil Alwis revealed that about 845 metric tonnes (844,960 kg) of paddy were purchased within three days of starting paddy purchase.
As of now, purchase of paddy is carried out through 73 paddy warehouses in the districts where paddy harvesting has commenced. The purchasing activities will continue today as well, Alwis said.
Sri Lanka’s biggest export commodity Tea has been hit hard by former President Gotabaya Rajapakasa’s overnight blow below the belt of the plantation sector with stupid green agriculture strategy without a proper plan.
Before the country’s economic crisis, tea exports accounted for $1.3 billion annually. But now, it has dropped to its lowest level in 23 years.
The tea industry suffered from the government’s decision to ban chemical fertilisers in May 2021. Former President Gotabaya Rajapaksa had imposed a total ban on chemical fertiliser and agrochemicals, in a bid to make Sri Lankan farming 100 per cent organic.
The sudden ban hit growers hard, with production falling to 148.05 Mn Kgs for the seven month period this year although the ban was lifted by October 2021 following backlash from the industry.
But farmers were unable to access imported fertilisers as the country simultaneously ran out of foreign exchange.
The tea exports for the month of July saw a decrease of 7.8 Mn Kgs when compared with the corresponding month of the previous year.
The exports of Ceylon Tea for July totalled 22.76 Mn Kgs, where all the main categories showed a negative variance compared to July 2021.
The cumulative analysis of the January to July 2022 period showed that the exports totalled 148.05 Mn Kgs for the seven months.
Here again a decrease of 14.47 MnKgs is observed when compared with the 162.52 MnKgs exported in the corresponding period in 2021.
Iraq has remained as the major importer of Ceylon Tea, with an increase of 35 percent in imports year-on-year (YoY) for January-July 2022.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) secured the second position, with a total of 12.77 MnKgs, a 5 percent increase against the total imports recorded for January-July 2021.
Russia sits in the third place, with a total of 12.34 MnKgs, followed by Turkey, Iran, Azerbaijan and Libya for the January-July 2022.
A significant decrease in imports is reported from Russia (22 percent), Turkey (58 percent), China (21 percent), Syria (26 percent) and Jordon (20 percent) YoY.
Meanwhile, a notable increase in imports is recorded from Azerbaijan (6 percent), Libya (8 percent), the USA (8 percent), Saudi Arabia (7 percent), Germany (20 percent) and Poland (16 percent) YoY, as expanding markets for Ceylon Tea.
Sri Lanka Tourism Ministry has initiated a new Indian tourist promotion plan titled Murugan-Shiva Shakthi trails offering for Indian pilgrims by Air to visit North and East to places of Hindu worship.
Pallay International airport has been redeveloped to facilitate flights from New Delhi to Jaffna, tourism officials said.
Sri Lanka’s tourism officials, conscious of the dire need to shore up the country’s economy, plan to woo a greater number of Indian tourists, who constitute the single largest segment of foreign tourists, through new packages such as the Murugan-Shiva Shakthi trails.
Their optimism stems from the fact that there is a proposal to resume air passenger services from the Palaly airport, in Jaffna, to destinations in the southern part of India. .
Tourism minister Harin Fernando who was in Ahmedabad Journalists “We are trying to bring in a big crowd at once about 2,000 pilgrims to Jaffna airport, and from there starting by road.
‘We are looking at exploring these new avenues. We also have a lot of wellness, yoga, meditation and Ayurvedic medicines. There are a lot of values that India and Sri Lanka share,” the minister said.
As part of the Murugan trail, two important places — Nallur Kandaswamy or Murugan temple in Jaffna of the Northern Province, and Kataragama of the Uva Province in the southeast — have been included.
Referring to the ongoing 25-day-long festival in Nallur (which concludes on August 27), Chalaka Gajabahu, Chairman of the Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau, told a group of journalists, from India, recently, in Colombo, that the festival was expected to draw over a million devotees, including 1,00,000 from the diaspora. A “special calendar” of events was being prepared for Hindu devotees.
Answering to a question raise by an Indian Journalist as to whether the Northern Province would be a regular feature in the packages for tourists, Mr. Gajabahu replied in the affirmative and asserted “we have been actively promoting the North on trade FAMs [familiarisation trips].” The East, too, would receive more focus in view of its diverse cultural significance that encompassed Islam. However, he conceded that marketing of the North had not been done “much.”
The question was raised, in the context of coverage of Naguleeswaram in Jaffna and Thiruketheeswaram in Mannar, both coming under five abodes of Lord Shiva in Sri Lanka, in the new Murugan trail.
The other three abodes included Thirukoneeswaram temple, Trincomalee, in the Eastern Province, Munneeswaram temple in the north-west and Tondeeshwaram temple, near Matara, in the south. The trail would also include shrines such as Nagapooshani Amman temple and Nagadeepa Purana Vihara, both in Nainativu, off Jaffna.
The International Monetary Fund has requested the government to make a commitment on foreign and domestic debt sustainability expressing the need of “adequate assurances” from Sri Lanka’s creditors for a new program as it prepares a visit to Colombo later this month.
The aim of the visit is to make progress on a staff-level agreement for an aid package “in the near term,” to help the island nation weather a severe economic crisis, the IMF said on Friday. Staff from the global lender will be in Colombo from August 24 to 31, the IMF said.
“Because Sri Lanka’s public debt is assessed as unsustainable, approval by the IMF Executive Board of the Extended Fund Facility program would require adequate assurances by Sri Lanka’s creditors that debt sustainability will be restored,” the IMF said.
President Ranil Wickreamsinghe also highlighted the need of domestic debt restrucring as domestic borrowings have increased in massive prpotions recently.
At least two recent public meetings President Ranil Wickremasinghe categorically stated that domestic debt stock was serious and it needs to be restructured as well and that external consultants were looking into it.
He told the Organisation of Professional Associations (OPA) annual conference and awards ceremony held in Colombo this week that Sri Lanka’s International Sovereign Bond (ISB) holders may exert pressure on the government to restructure the domestic debt.
He noted that they alone may not be keen to accept a steep haircut under a debt sustainability plan, which is a prerequisite to secure an International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout.
Total outstanding domestic debt was Rs. 12 trillion as at the end of March 2022 while the gross domestic borrowings of the Government surpassed Rs 1.6 trillion in the first four months of 2022, Finance Ministry data shows.
Around 60 percent of the domestic borrowing (over Rs. 1 trillion) was raised from Treasury bonds, 31 percent (Rs. 518.2 billion) from Treasury bills, and 4.4 percent (Rs 73.8 billion) through provisional advances from the Central Bank, and Rs 65.6 billion was raised from Sri Lanka development bonds.
However domestic debt has already received upfront hair cut via over 60 percent inflation and inclusion debt restructure could cause financial instability, several economic experts warned.
Contradicting the President’s view of possible restructuring of massive domestic debt, Dr Weerasinghe point-blankly ruled out even such an eventuality adding that there was no need to restructure domestic debt at present as the monetary authority has taken measures towards debt sustainability.
Dr Weerasinghe disclosed that still there was no request for domestic debt restructuring and the Central Bank is fully convinced that it would be able to make it sustainable.
“The government position is to re-structure external debt,” Dr Weerasinghe said adding that the banks liquidity position will be affected by domestic debt restructuring.
Reuters reported on Thursday that Sri Lanka will ask Japan to invite the Indian Ocean island’s main creditor nations, including China and India, to talks on bilateral debt restructuring.
The loan package being negotiated with the IMF is for between $2 billion and $3 billion according to President Ranil Wickremesinghe, who said he would present an interim budget in September focusing on fiscal consolidation measures agreed with the IMF.
The country of 22 million people is facing its most severe financial crisis since independence from Britain in 1948, resulting from the combined impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and economic mismanagement.
Ordinary Sri Lankans have been battling shortages for months amid crippling inflation and a devalued currency, stoking unprecedented mass protests. Thousands of people stormed the colonial-era presidential residence in Colombo, the commercial capital, in early July.
Sri Lanka’s total bilateral debt earlier this year was estimated at $6.2 billion as of the end of 2020 by the IMF. It also has $14 billion of international sovereign bond debt.
