TAG: Sri Lanka
Following a difficult climatic year that saw severe floods and drought weigh on growth, C-suite executives surveyed in OBG’s Business Barometer: Sri Lanka CEO Survey appear to be generally optimistic that clearer skies are ahead. Three-quarters of CEOs had positive or very positive expectations about local business conditions for 2018, with 56% forecasting GDP expansion to range 4-5%, which is broadly in line with the central bank’s estimates of 5-5.5%. However, if Sri Lanka is to reach the Vision 2025 target of becoming a knowledge-based economy, the ongoing “brain drain” will have to be addressed, with CEOs naming a variety of skills in need.
As the rhetoric from the US White House swerves from combative to compromise and back again, uncertainty in the global trading environment is creating potential pitfalls for emerging markets the world over. In the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), which counts China as its largest trading partner, member states watch with trepidation as President Donald Trump ramps up threats of levies on nearly all Chinese products shipped to the US.
