Balancing Borders: How Should Sri Lanka Manage the Rohingya Influx?
While the bedrocks of migration in Sri Lanka – foreign employment and remittances – are settling, other aspects are unsettling in 2025. The year 2024 closed with estimates of over 311,000 departures for foreign employment and over USD 6.5 billion in remittances. In December 2024, 115 Rohingya people, including 78 adults and 25 children, were rescued while traveling on a multi-day trawler off the coast of Mullaitivu. The group was seeking asylum in Sri Lanka, and 12 men were identified as having facilitated the voyage. Similarly, three batches of Sri Lankan migrants who were trafficked for forced criminal activities in cyber scamming compounds in East Asia were repatriated in 2024. Many “were coerced into various cyber scamming activities under the pretext of legitimate job offers in the IT sector and other customer service roles”.
Voting Beyond Borders: Can Overseas Sri Lankans Finally Have Their Say?
The recent presidential election in Sri Lanka marked a series of “firsts,” setting it apart from previous elections. It saw a record-low number of 350,516 valid voters per candidate, implementation of the Regulation of Election Expenditure Act of 2023, and a second count of votes. Notably, there was also greater engagement from Overseas Sri Lankans (OSLs) in the country’s electoral process than at any time previously. However, despite this enthusiasm, the long-standing debate over granting OSLs the right to vote from abroad remains unresolved. Of the OSLs, it also means 1.5 million Sri Lankan workers abroad could not vote in the recent election according to the SLBFE.
Good Riddance to the FBR: What Next to Increase Migrant Remittances to Sri Lanka?
The decision by the Cabinet to partially lift the Family Background Report (FBR) requirement for female migrants is long overdue and a welcome move to promote female labour migration from Sri Lanka. The FBR policy was introduced in June 2013 to restrict females with children under the age of five and to discourage females with older children from taking up foreign employment. The FBR initially covered only female domestic worker departures but in August 2015, this was expanded to cover all females. As a result, from 2013 onwards the dominance of women among worker departures declined significantly. The partial removal of this discriminatory requirement is likely to increase female departures by enabling women to decide independent of their maternal status while minimising delays and vulnerability in the recruitment process. However, to reap the desired outcome of more remittances, the new stock of females departing for foreign employment in the absence of the FBR must be convinced to remit through formal channels.
Black, White and Grey Markets: The Dynamics of Foreign Exchange and Remittances in Sri Lanka
Despite the pandemic and related difficulties in remitting, inward remittances to Sri Lanka had picked up by December 2020 to record year-over-year growth of 5.8 %, contrary to all expectations. The reasons for such a quick rebound include catching up on postponed remittances, accumulated terminal employment benefits and savings-related remittances of migrant workers laid off due to the pandemic, receipt of counter-cyclical remittances from less frequent remitters and the shift from informal to formal channels. In the current context of the foreign exchange crisis in Sri Lanka, the latter is the most critical factor to focus on.
Sri Lanka’s Post-COVID-19 Recovery: The Need for Inclusive Economic Growth
High levels of inequality impede sustainable growth and development of a country. Sri Lanka made impressive strides to reach an upper middle-income country (UMIC) status in July 2019, only to slip back a year later. The COVID-19 crisis, amid growing inequities, is likely to make the task of regaining UMIC status even harder. This blog highlights the main sectors and social groups that are adversely affected, and explains the need for inclusive economic growth (IEG) post-COVID-19 for Sri Lanka to emerge as a peaceful and developed country.
Demystifying Hawala/Undiyal – The Not So Dismal Science:[…] believed that informal fund transfer operations in Sri Lanka have expanded considerably due to the wide gap between the…