Sri Lanka and Norway enter agreement to foster collaboration in ICT industry
The Sri Lanka Association of Software and Services Companies (SLASSCOM) and the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs have reportedly entered into a two-year agreement to foster collaboration in the ICT industry.
The relevant agreement was signed between the newly-appointed Norwegian Ambassador to Sri Lanka Trine Jøranli Eskedal and SLASSCOM Chairman Ranil Rajapakse.
Eskedal has been quoted as saying, “Norway is keen on working together with private sector partners in Sri Lanka. This partnership between SLASSCOM and the Norwegian Foreign Ministry will contribute to further increase private sector collaboration between our two countries. We are also pleased that this collaboration is in line with Sri Lankan government’s vision 2025 plan for the future of a digital Sri Lanka, which has an emphasis on IT education and harnessing future tech leaders.”
Meanwhile, Rajapakse has been quoted as saying, “This is a great testimony to the ties that have existed between our countries for many years. The knowledge solutions industry is currently our fifth-largest export earner and has the potential to play an even more significant role in the years ahead. We’re delighted that this partnership will enable SLASSCOM to influence many drivers in the industry, including capacity building, learning and to position Sri Lanka as an attractive destination for knowledge solutions.”
The local media has reported that this partnership is a continuation of a previous collaboration between SLASSCOM and Norway.
Accordingly, the areas for collaboration include encouraging entrepreneurship and knowledge exchange, increasing visibility on AI (Artificial Intelligence) awareness, and TechKids (Kids Can Code) to build future tech leaders. Also, the programme will enable three qualified Sri Lankan start-up companies to be showcased on the global stage at the Oslo Innovation Week (OIW) and is to also enable two Norwegian tech start-ups to travel and work in Sri Lanka for a few weeks.
Ambassador Eskedal has further noted that one of the key target groups of the project are girls between the ages of nine to 13 years who are interested in learning about coding, thus encouraging and providing girls with opportunities to start tech education from a young age.
A statement on the signing of the agreement has stated that building business linkages between Norwegian and Sri Lankan companies is a key objective of this programme, which will enable multiple networking and roundtable events to be organised to connect companies attending the OIW or during outbound missions.
The endevour is to also support the AI Asia Summit planned for November 2019 by providing access to speakers from leading Norwegian educational institutes.
OSL take:
Sri Lanka as a country has taken many steps to uplift and develop the ICT and digital infrastructure sectors in the country. The government of Sri Lanka has formulated a policy of encouraging businesses/investments related to these two sectors while providing incentives to such investments. Also, attention is also being paid to promote e-commerce and other digital platforms to encourage the concept of e-economy in Sri Lanka. All this has resulted in the expansion of business/investment opportunities in Sri Lanka’s ICT and digital infrastructure sectors and foreign companies could also make use of the industry collaborations Sri Lanka has with foreign countries like Norway.
| Article Code : | VBS/AT/22082019/Z_1 |