A trilingual nation by 2020, Lanka's target

by L.S. Ananda WEDAARACHCHI

Sri Lanka hopes to be a trilingual nation by 2020, said Secretary to the President Lalith Weeratunga. He was addressing the 10th anniversary of "Room to Read" in Colombo recently.

He said President Mahinda Rajapaksa is very keen that everyone should learn a second national language - Sinhala or Tamil which are also official languages, so that the reconciliation process will be facilitated. Emphasis is laid on English as it provides access to Universal knowledge. It is vital to improve the reading habit of children, reading paves the path for greater learning, he said.

Sri Lanka has been enjoying free education up to university since 1945. The government allocates 3.9 percent of the GDP at present for education and hopes to increase it to five percent so that the beneficiaries could reap greater benefits, the Secretary said.

"School children from rural areas make it a habit to visit Temple Trees. They need facilities to improve their studies. There are over 9,800 schools with a 4.2 million student population. Sri Lanka's literacy rate stands at over 93 percent at present. We hope the IT literacy rate would reach 50 percent by the end of year 2012, he said.

Children in the villages are very creative despite the lack of basic facilities. However, they live better lives in harmony with nature. On the contrary, children in urban areas enjoy better facilities. By setting up libraries and improving the reading habits the lot of village children could be enhanced, Weeratunga said.