‘Protecting local industries critical for growth’

By Sanjeevi Jayasuriya

Protecting local industries that generate employment and value-addition is important to sustain economic growth.

The way forward for this country is to invest more on research and development where policy directives help groom industrialists. Special emphasis should be on those using locally-produced raw material for manufacturing, Cosmetic Manufacturing Association of Sri Lanka, Founder Chairman Samantha Kumarasinghe told Sunday Observer Business.“The country’s policies should facilitate the growth of local entrepreneurs and industrialists. No growth is possible without developing local talent.

Samantha Kumarasinghe

The indigenous companies should be allowed to grow and multinational companies (MNCs) should not be permitted to dominate the market and thereby eliminate local industries, he said. Sri Lanka should have both the capacity and capability to position our country without giving into to Western pressure.

It should have sufficient funds by developing indigenous businesses and a collective effort and financial strength is necessary to fight these dangerous elements.

Kumarasinghe who is also the Chairman of Nature's Beauty Creations Ltd which markets products under the brand name Nature's Secrets said that if an effective out-grower program is not in place, Sri Lanka will not have sufficient ingredients to run the ayurveda treatment process in ten years time.

The international holistic medicinal market is expected to become an $ 5 trillion business by 2015 and Sri Lanka should focus on capturing a portion of this lucrative avenue of income by ensuring that there is a continuous supply of medicinal plants as raw material. “We need to have plantations to support the ayurveda sector and it is vital to revive the dying Hela Veda process which is unique to Sri Lanka. The therapies under this process are fading and measures need to be taken at national level,” he said.

“We are working towards making Nature’s Secrets, a global brand for cosmetics. We are well established in Bangladesh since 1996 and export our products to Germany and Switzerland at present.” “We have proved beyond any doubt that the we are capable of producing world-class products by entering a new industry. A large part of our expenditure is on research and development and currently it is close to 3 percent of our turnover,” Kumarasinghe said.

Nature’s Beauty Creations possesses two state-of-the-art manufacturing plants and a bottle manufacturing plant in Millewa in Horana. The tissue culture laboratory is a strength to its manufacturing process. This company was awarded the National Green Award under the pharmaceutical and cosmetic category for two consecutive years and is the only company in the sector to be recognised at national level.