Export Growth and Sustained Development - 2012 Presidential Address

It has been the normal practice  for the President of SLEA, to give an overview   of the theme of the Sessions in his Presidential Address. I have no reason to deviate from it this year. This year’s theme is Export Growth for Sustained Development. Why this theme was selected will be made clear soon. Before that, let me briefly explain what and why is Sustained Development?

Sustained development is continuous high  economic growth, with inclusiveness, over a  long  period of time - say six to ten years. Inclusiveness means equitable distribution of the benefits of  development among  the entire people of the country. Sustained development is necessary for the continuous improvement of the quality of life  of a people. After all, this should be  the ultimate aim of all development. High economic growth is necessary for sustained development but it is not sufficient without inclusiveness.

Economic growth is measured by the rate of growth of GDP, which is simply the rate of increase in the net value of goods and services produced within a country during a year. In the last half century (1961-2011), Sri Lanka  did not have any period of sustained economic growth. In this whole period of fifty years there were only three years, 1968, 1978 and 2011 which had a growth rate of more than 8% (8.2 % in 1968 and 1978 and 8.3 % in 2011)

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