"Sri Lanka has confronted and is grappling with a number of exogenous shocks, including the devastating 2004 tsunami; the 2008 global recession; the COVID-19 global pandemic; and, more recently, the ongoing “triple crisis†? (fuel, food, fiscal). The country is now at a crossroads. An ongoing process of strengthening skills and improving education will be crucial to Sri Lanka’s economic recovery.
Sri Lanka is transitioning from a rural-based to a modern, urbanized economy, and better jobs are being created, especially in services. To remain globally competitive, the Sri Lankan workforce must gain the technical competencies and higher-order cognitive skills that meet the needs of local and foreign labor markets. As a result, Sri Lanka will need to transform its current skills development system and processes to align them to emerging jobs; improve their market relevance; and develop an effective, inclusive, and accessible education and training system for skilling, reskilling, and upskilling the stock and flow
