Tourism industry can be strong by benchmarking apparel and tea

Panel discussion with industry leaders SLITO President Harith Perera, THASL Vice President Angeline Ondaatje, former BOI and NCED Tourism Cluster Chairman Lalith De Mel, OIC Tourism Police Prabath Vidanagama, Bates Chairman Nimal Gunawardena 

and E Marketing Eye CEO/MD Rajitha Dahanayake

The flagship project Sancharaka Udawa of the Sri Lanka Inbound Tour Operators Organisation (SLITO) education staged at BMICH saw some key personalities addressing the industry on the key challenges faced by the industry. Dr. Rohantha Athukorala addressing the forum on ‘Reputation Management in the Destination Marketing’ said one of the biggest issues in the tourism industry of Sri Lanka is that in relating to other industries like tea and tourism the tourism private sector is weak to drive in reforms to make the industry market driven.

“When we see the intervention of the private sector of the Apparel, Tea, IT/BPO, Cinnamon and Rubber industry make to national policy, the tourism industry comes out not strong enough,” voiced Athukorala, who has hands-on experience of being the former Chairman of Sri Lanka Export Development Board, Sri Lanka Tourism Promotions Bureau and the 30 billion rupee retail organisation – Lanka Sathosa.

The speaker went on to justify that for an effective destination reputation management program, it is mandatory to have a strategic brand building model and an effective crisis management process led by dynamic leadership. On the former, there has been a perennial issue as the industry has been not strong to exert pressure like what the apparel and tea industry did on issues alike GSP+ and the Glyphosate as a case in point. 

Dr. Athukorala tracked back to the famous ‘Miracle of Asia’ campaign that was cancelled on the day of launch around seven years back – after having developed all material. Then, around three years back around five days before the top seven global ad agencies were to present the campaign whilst the board of directors/chairman was dissolved around a month back, sadly the tourism industry had done backdoor intervention but failed. The tea industry and apparel sectors on the other hand somehow achieve the end objective, said the Former Executive Director of the pivotal policy making body National Council for Economic Development under the Ministry of Finance/Presidential Secretariat when the country achieved a 7% plus GDP growth. 

Athukorala then tracked back to the apparel industry that began operations in the early ‘80s and at that was termed mere ‘contract manufacturers’ and some even used to refer to the industry as tailors but, thereafter with some strategic thinking by the industry with strong influencing to the policy makers has given leadership globally by making Sri Lanka the fashion apparel of the world for ethically manufactured clothing. This has given teeth to the industry in competing with price savvy merchandise coming in from Cambodia, China and Bangladesh. Today this noble industry is targeting a 7.5 billion dollars plus in export revenue by making Sri Lanka an apparel hub in Asia for R&D, technology sharing for fast fashion which is a case study to the world, opined the speaker.

Then, focusing on Ceylon tea he showed how the tea industry of Sri Lanka with strong leadership is slowly but surely taking the same route with the recent award of Sri Lanka being the first ozone friendly certified tea producing nation of the world. Athukorala then tracked back and showed to the eminent gathering on how Ceylon tea has carved out the current strong position globally with some key strategic moves in the last 30 years even with all the challenges that a commodity can be up against. Starting from the times that the plantation industry was nationalised in the 1970s when it came under government control it went on in the 1980s to make a bold decision to make the Colombo auction control the global demand chain by breaking away from the great London auction system which has held ground for many years. The Colombo Auction commanding the highest values for tea globally is a testimony that this decision was correct, he explained to the audience.

Thereafter in the 1990s the supply chain was privatised to management companies which gave the opportunity for new thinking to be introduced to the industry with strong R&D power and capital infusion that resulted in Sri Lanka demonstrating the best performing country globally for value addition tea at commanding 43% which again was a strong move by the industry. Today, we see that Ceylon tea has taken the high ground with some focused decisions on conforming to global standards on MRL levels and has gone further by developing a new standard for tea that has resulted in Ceylon tea being the first certified ozone friendly tea globally that no other tea producer has received within the industry. This is the kind of leadership and pressure that the private sector needs to exert on the policy makers which the tourism industry must emulate. It is a new skill that one must have today, said Athukorala.

Post the keynote a panel discussion was staged with the industry leaders like SLITO President Harith Perera, THASL Vice President Angeline Ondaatje, Former BOI Chairman and NCED Tourism cluster Lalith De Mel, OIC Tourism Police Prabath Vidanagama, Bates Chairman Nimal Gunawardena and E Marketing Eye CEO/MD Rajitha Dahanayake.