SL will lay groundwork for a self-reliant economy by 2028: Prez

Anura Kumara Dissanayake

Sri Lanka would lay the groundwork for a self-reliant economy by 2028, President Anura Kumara Dissanayake said yesterday, as the island nation works to break from cycles of economic fragility and external debt dependency.

“Our ultimate goal is to restore national sovereignty through economic stability and self-reliance,” Dissanayake said in a keynote address at the international conference ‘Sri Lanka’s Road to Recovery: Debt and Governance’, held in Colombo.

Hosted by the Finance Ministry, Central Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF), the forum brought together policymakers and global financial institutions to take stock of Sri Lanka’s recovery under the IMF’s Extended Fund Facility, its ongoing debt restructuring and the reforms ahead.

Dissanayake warned that macroeconomic stability alone is not enough, adding that reforms must go deeper to reset the country’s economic fundamentals. 

“Surface-level stability is not enough. We must deepen this stability through structural reforms that reshape the foundations of our economy,” he said.

Dissanayake called for collective commitment from the public officials and citizens, underlining that rebuilding must be a national endeavour, if Sri Lanka is to move beyond crisis management and chart a new economic course.