Tag: Northern Province
OPINION – Northern Investment Summit, Jaffna January 2026
By Jekhan Aruliah When the topic of the Northern economy comes up, Jaffna is often criticized for living on remittances. Small transfers, perhaps a hundred US dollars a month, sent by hard working people overseas to their families in Jaffna and the Northern Province. These gifts are said to be ruining Jaffna youth and the […]
The Chamber of Northern Exporters (CNE) Delivering Goods and Services From Jaffna and the Northern Province
By Jekhan Aruliah We have heard it so many times, “We must export more!”. We have heard it from politicians and economists and assorted commentators of assorted quality through miscellaneous channels. “We must export more” deserves the internet acronym SOTBO. Internet slang for a “Statement Of The Bleeding Obvious”. A statement so basic, so self-evident, […]
David Pieris Group Launches Northern Entrepreneur Seed Fund
By Jekhan Aruliah I first met Mr David Pieris in 2021. David came for tea at my place in Jaffna on one of his business visits to the North. The David Pieris Motor Company (DPMC) has operated in the North for decades including throughout the Sri Lanka civil war. David told me of his vision […]
Sri Lanka’s Economy, Hare or Tortoise?
By Jekhan Aruliah I was listening to a very eloquent speaker on YouTube. He commented, as our public speakers often do, that we in Sri Lanka are a blessed nation. Blessed with abundant natural assets, our forests and beaches etc, and copious human talents. And yet this blessed nation is chronically poor and in 2022 […]
Diaspora investment in Mullaitivu, Mullai Milk Processing Industries
By Jekhan Aruliah Mr S.Thavaseelan, known as Seelan, was born in Kayts a town at the Northern end of Jaffna’s Velanai Island. His father, who delivered letters for the Ceylon Post Office, died when Seelan was 4 years old. He left the young family with a government pension which his mother supplemented doing other jobs. […]
Dragonboats come to Jaffna
By Jekhan Aruliah Northwind Projects, a team promoting sporting and other activities in the Northern Province, successfully brought together the Sri Lankan Navy, the Northern Provincial Council’s Ministry of Education, Cultural Affairs, Sport and Youth Affairs and the Jaffna District Fishermen’s Co-operative Society Union’s Federation. They came together to kick-off dragonboat racing, canoeing, and the […]
Thinking about investing in the Northern Province?
By Jekhan Aruliah A few years ago I was speaking with a main board director of one of Sri Lanka’s largest companies. I asked him, a Jaffna Tamil gentleman approaching retirement, why his company still had not invested in the North several years after the war had ended. What he said put simply is there […]
‘s Institute of Medical Sciences bringing medical careers and care to the Northern Province
By Jekhan Aruliah During the 2020 COVID-19 “Corona” Virus pandemic we really loved our health workers. We all loved them because COVID-19 hit everyone. Not through infection but through curfews. Businesses closing, shopping & socializing banned, incomes lost, economic hardship, and the stress of being locked in with our loved ones. Diseases are usually suffered […]
BBK Partnership, Jaffna’s accountants to the World
I first heard of the BBK Partnership Sri Lanka in 2015. I first spoke with its co-founder Anandan Arnold in 2018, and finally met him in March 2020 at a hospital in Manipay Jaffna. He was dressed rather informally for a Partner of London’s BBK Partnership of Chartered Accountants. Anandan (pictured below on the right) […]
Uki offers an alternate route from the Northern Province into the tech industry
By Jekhan Aruliah Does Sri Lanka need more university graduates? Sri Lanka has tens of thousands of unemployed graduates. Every now and then the government brings thousands more of them into the Public Service, further bloating an already bloated service. In December 2019 a government minister promised jobs for all 64,000 (his figures) unemployed graduates! […]
Tourism, the Northern Province Game Changer
By Jekhan Aruliah Tourism is the single most game-changing opportunity for the North. Game changing because for those visitors with eyes to see and ears to hear it opens a wide window to all the other non-tourism opportunities in this province. As they enjoy the hospitality, the food, the sites and the scenery a few […]
Will Jaffna International Airport help the Northern economy take-off at last?
By Jekhan Aruliah The opening, strictly speaking the re-opening, of Jaffna International Airport (IATA airport code JAF) in October 2019 was one of the more startling events in the North since the end of the Sri Lankan Civil War in 2009. In the North we held our breaths as the promise, unfulfilled for years, approached […]