Electricity hike - people hope for fair decision

Discussions on the proposed new electricity tariff structure are hotting up with several views being expressed by various segments of consumers.After publishing the new tariff structure, the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka (PUCSL) has called for written representations from stakeholders till March 28.

The National Movement of Electricity Consumers (NMEC) said last week that under the new tariff structure, the electricity rate for household consumers will increase by over 100 percent. Although the overall increase of rates was 27 percent, the rates for households was 68 percent, NMEC said.

There are several aspects to infrastructure. For instance despite high costs, the quality of our electricity is high compared to many competing countries and there were no blackouts in the recent past, Devaraj said.

The number of members of SLASSCOM has increased over the last few years to 143 and it indicates the growth of the industry and the industry will be able to achieve the $ 1 billion target by 2016 as anticipated. Today the industry earns over $ 500 million in export revenue.The IT BPO industry is not only among the top five gross foreign exchange earners, it is an industry where local value addition does not depend on imported raw material and depends almost 100 percent on local talent.

The industry has created white collar jobs in a comfortable environment which young people seek today. The industry is growing in the global competitive environment without protective mechanisms such as quotas. It is also a 'green' industry. It has over 35,000 employees. It will increase to 80,000 by the time it reaches a $1 billion industry. The role of SLASSCOM is demand generation and capacity building, he said.

- GW