Sri Lanka revises import license fee for tea re-exports

Sri Lanka has cut an import license fee of 1.0 percent of import valued with freight charged on flavoured and non-flavoured tea and replaced it with a 1,000 rupee fee, according to a government notice.

The Minister of Development Strategies and Trade Malik Samarawickrama which was raised in February 2016.

The import license fee are issued by gazette using the powers of the Import and Export Control At of 1969.

The import control law and licensing is a key piece of legislation which promotes corruption, with licenses being used to give privileges to some importers.

The abolition of the import control law can bring substantial freedoms to citizens, liberty advocates say.

he 1960s, when the law was brought, was a turbulent time in the global economy as the US Federal Reserve got embroiled in a series of monetary and fiscal mis-steps which were transmitted through the Bretton Woods soft-peg systen and evenually led to its collapse in 1971-73.

Sri Lanka and the world buffeted by high import prices as the US printed money to fight the Vietnam war, gold and commodity and oil prices shot up.

At the time the administration of Prime Minsiter Dudley Senanayake was also deficit spending to finance the so-called 'Green Revolution' as food prices went up.

The budget deficit expanded from 588 million rupees in 1967, to 686 million in 1968 and 769 million in 1969.

In 1968 with 'economic growth' soared to 8.2 percent and Sri Lanka's foreign reserves collapsed from 55 million dollars in 1967 to 40.0 million in 1969.

Source:- Economynext.com