Chairman of FACETS Sri Lanka Juzar Adamaly said that the next goal of FACETS Sri Lanka is to establish Colombo as the Gem and Jewellery Hub of Asia. He made this remark while officially declaring the opening of 25th ‘FACETS Sri Lanka’ International Gem and Jewellery Exhibition in BMICH.
FACETS Sri Lanka 2015, the annual international gem and jewellery show, will be the flagship event of the sector.
More than 150 exhibitors will showcase their products from today till Sunday at the Sirimavo Bandaranaike Memorial Exhibition Centre. . “It is over a 10,000 foot fall this year throughout the four days of the exhibition. A large number of buyers from China have confirmed while over 100 international buyer delegation are expected to attend the show from China, India, Dubai, Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong, USA, Russia, Norway and Germany,” one of the top gem and jewellery exhibitors Zam Gems Managing Director Ahsan Refai told the Daily News business.
Sri Lanka will seriously consider economic reforms during next five years to make its production of goods and services “the most efficient and competitive” in this part of the world, MP Dr. Harsha de Silva said.
Sri Lanka has signed three memoranda of understanding with Hong Kong, Thailand and Korea yesterday to boost regional trade.
Sri Lanka-Hong Kong’s HKTDC, Sri Lanka-Korea’s KOTRA and Sri Lanka-Thailand’s DITP were the three MoUs signed yesterday.
Sri Lanka’s January-October YoY exports have surged by almost 9% while an export product that recently faced volatile EU markets showed a promising turnaround, as revealed yesterday.
“For the month of October 2014 alone our provisional exports were at $ 900 m and this is only merchandise exports without taking into account of service exports such as ICT,” said EDB Chairman/CEO Bandula Egodage, commenting on the provisional top-line export data presented to him by EDB Directors at a progress review session held at the EDB yesterday.
Sri Lanka’s surging IT and BPO exports would hit the critical dollar one billion mark as early as next year, surpassing previous expectations! And London Stock Exchange and HSBC have praised the Lankan IT sector ‘with joy’, as revealed on 05 December in Jaffna. And the pioneering Northern IT Exports forum by EDB & ICTA was packed with enthusiastic regional IT industry.
“We earned $719 Mn from ICT exports, and our projection for 2014 is $820 Mn. At this rate, we expect to hit dollar one billion mark very soon-as early as 2015. We have seen 123% growth in IT sector over the last five years. London Stock Exchange and HSBC also praised the Lankan IT sector with joy” said Saman Maldeni (Director, Export Services of SLEDB) on 05 December in Jaffna.