ECONOMYNEXT – Sri Lanka is expecting to initiate prompt discussions with the United States to gain relief from 44 percent tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump on exports from the Indian Ocean island.
President Anura Kumara Dissanayake appointed a committee to review the tariff and recommend measures.
“A discussion was held at the Presidential Secretariat between President Anura Kumara Disanayake and the Committee appointed to submit recommendations on the new U.S. tariff system,” a statement from the President’s media office said.
“During the meeting, the Committee’s proposals concerning the country’s strategic response to the imposition of these new tariffs, as well as the next steps that should be taken was reviewed in detail.
“Furthermore, the Sri Lankan government is expected to initiate prompt discussions with the U.S. government regarding possible relief measures.”
Sri Lanka is protectionist with large taxes imposed to support a few politically connected businesses and farmers, pushing up domestic costs and making the country non – export competitive.
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A 20 percent Trump style tax was imposed on imported in 2025, which could result in taxes paid by the public being lost to domestic assemblers.
Rather than asking nicely for import taxes to be lowered as in the past, President Trump said by slamming taxes, other countries would now to ‘anything’ for us.
“And those tariffs have come in, and every country has called us,” Trump told reporters in Air Force One Thursday.
“That’s the beauty of what we do. We put ourselves in the driver’s seat. If we would have asked some of these countries, almost most of these countries, to do us a favor, they would have said, no, now they’ll do anything for us.”
US became a model free trading, liberal nation during the so-called Great Moderation period from of the 1980s and 1990s, where it attracted large volumes of foreign capital making it run trade deficits and import labour.
However after printing money to reflate the economy from around 2000, firing a massive credit bubble, which then led to repeated repeated bouts of stimulus, the US now has high inflation and massive deficits.
In the social unrest of inflation and already high taxes, Trump was elected. Trump now wants to cut taxes and is partly using border taxes as a replacement.
The Committee is represented by Senior Economic Advisor to the President Duminda Hulangamuwa; Secretary to the Ministry of Finance Mahinda Siriwardana; Governor of the Central Bank Nandalal Weerasinghe; Secretary to the Ministry of Trade A. Vimalaneththiraja.
Chairman of the Export Development Board Mangala Wijesinghe; Senior Director General (Bilateral) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Dharshana M. Perera are also on the committee.
Chief Economic Policy Advisor at the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce Shiran Fernando; Group CEO of Brandix Ashroff Omar; Co-Founder of MAS Holdings Sharad Amalean; Chairman of the Heyleys Group Mohan Pandithage and Ananda Caldera make up the rest of the committee. (Colombo/Apr05/2025)
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