SLES to find solutions to reduce the threat of skills shortage

Friday, 21 June 2013 03:57 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

The fifth session of the Sri Lanka Economic Summit (SLES) will discuss the challenges of demographic changes and skills gap. The focal point of the discussion would be to assess potential gaps and find solutions to reduce the threat of skills shortage through growth and competitiveness and provide recommendations. The session will have two keynote presentations and a panel discussion to discuss the foregoing issues and the way forward. Focus on health and education in the past led to an improvement in the country’s social indicators to the levels of emerging economies, including

reduction in birth rate and increase in life expectancy. Coupled with a change in lifestyles has made Sri Lanka a country with one of the fastest aging demographic profiles, specifically for a developing country. This would lead to a decline in the proportion of persons in the employable age. The size of the labour force will be further constrained by the high level of out migration from Sri Lanka. The poor response in skills development in conjunction with the requirements of the demands in the labour market is another aspect that affects the availability of labour. The keynote speaker, Dr. W. Indralal De Silva, is a Senior Professor of Demography (Chair) and Dean of the Faculty of Arts, University of Colombo. He has extended his services to several government institutions, NGOs and private sector organisations during the past decades. He has published a number of books and monographs and presented over 40 research papers at international conferences and has also published over 60 research articles in reputed local and international journals. His research interests have been on fertility, mortality, migration, ageing, population and labour force projections, family change and reproductive health in developing counties with special emphasis on Sri Lanka. Professor De Silva obtained his Bachelor’s degree in development studies (statistics) from the University of Colombo in 1977 and his Master’s and Doctoral degrees in demography from the Australian National University in 1985 and 1990 respectively. He was a Visiting Professor at the National University of Singapore in 2004, Harvard School of Public Health during 1996-98 and a Visiting Fellow at the Australian National University in 1990-91. His speech will cover the Sri Lanka’s demographic profile and its future outlook. The speech will be followed by a presentation on human resource challenges by Dr. Nisha Arunatilake, a Research Fellow and Head of Labour, Employment and Human Resources Development research at the IPS. Nisha Arunatilake has collaborated with, and being a consultant to, the World Bank, Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI), International Labour Organization (ILO), Save the Children, and the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ) in numerous research studies. She has served on national level committees on labour, employment, human resource development, health sector reform, and tobacco and alcohol policy formulation. At present, she serves on the National Advisory Committee on Manpower Planning of the Ministry of Labour Relations and Manpower Planning. The panel discussion will be moderated by Ravi Peiris, Director General, Employers Federation of Ceylon. The distinguished panel will consist of Donglin Li, Country Director of ILO, Dr. Surath Wickramasinghe, President, The Chamber of Construction Industry, Anura Lokuhetty, Past President, The Tourist Hotels Association of Sri Lanka and Dr. Ramani Gunatilaka, Consultant. The Sri Lanka Economic Summit is scheduled to be held on 9, 10 and 11 July at the Cinnamon Grand. Colombo. For more information and registration on the Sri Lanka Economic Summit, please visit www.chamber.lk and contact the Ceylon Chamber of Commerce on 115588805 or [email protected].