National Transport Policy draft open for public comments

by Gamini WARUSHAMANA

[email protected]

The Ministry of Transport has released the draft of the National Transport Policy for public comments.

It is available at the Ministry and at all the department’s head offices under the Transport Ministry. Public comments will be entertained till October 15.

Under the new national policy, the Government will take a demand driven approach in providing transport services.

The new policy reckons transportation as a non commercial venture and added that it should ensure equity and equal right to access for all.

Under the new policy the Government has broadly recognised transportation as an essential service sector for the economic and social development of the country and therefore, expects to regulate it in a similar manner the health and education sectors are regulated.

However, the new policy also recognises the private sector’s role in the sector and added that it will encourage market forces to develop the sector while regulating the safety, quality, standards, environmental aspects, fair competition and pricing.

The railway has been recognised as the first priority in the passenger transportation and the policies have been focused to shift people from private transport modes to public transport modes.

The Government will encourage the shift of passengers from highways to railways to improve productivity of land and energy usage, protect the environment and minimise the cost to make it affordable for people.

The Government will also develop various transportation modes to give a better choice to the people.

The Government will open investment opportunities for the private sector in the transport infrastructure sector and this will be restricted to strategically important areas.

The Government will own the strategically important transport sector enterprises and invest and intervene to put an end the monopolies. The Government will also invest in areas where the private sector is not willing to invest in and in areas where markets fail in achieving the objectives. In the next five years, the Government will invest 1.5% of GDP on transport sector development and thereafter it will maintain 1% of the GDP investment annually.

Under the policy, the Government targets to capture 25-40% of the bus transportation to the SLTB and compete with the private sector to increase its market share.

It also expects to make the SLTB to stand on its own feet and not depend on Treasury subsidies.