Vision
“Raising living standards of the people through international trade relations”
Mission
“To develop and promote Sri Lanka’s foreign trade relations at bilateral, regional and multilateral levels by the effective implementation of government trade policy, with a view to raising the standards of living and realizing a higher quality of life through the increase of total production, income and employment levels, thereby actively contributing to the overall economic growth of Sri Lanka.”
The DoC is responsible for foreign trade policy formulation, and all related coordination and implementation matters, with the objective of developing and promoting Sri Lanka's foreign trade relations at bilateral, regional and multilateral levels.
Structure
The Department of Commerce is headed by the Director General of Commerce, and its work is carried out under four divisions, namely, Multilateral Trade Affairs, Bilateral Trade Relations, Regional Cooperation and Trade Promotion.
Major Activities for the Year 2019
- Continuation of participation at WTO deliberations at ministerial and senior official levels.
- Negotiating for special and differential treatment for Sri Lanka as a developing country and Special and Vulnerable Economics (SVE)
- Monitoring of Trade Policy Reviews of major trading partners of Sri Lanka
- Negotiating for Geographical Indications (GI) for tea, cinnamon and sapphires
- Educating business community on the tariff and non-tariff measures of Sri Lanka’s trading partners
- Seeking technical assistance for human resource development from the institutions such as World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), International Trade Centre (ITC) and other intuitions
- Continuous evaluation of developments of Free Trade Agreements (FTAs), Preferential Trading Arrangements (PTAs) and Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreements (CEPAs) of other countries that have an impact on Sri Lanka’s trade
- Conducting awareness campaigns for the business community
- Dealing with CEPAs with India & Pakistan
- Conducting review meetings to address issues emanating from PTAs, FTAs
- Conducting Joint Commissions with China, Egypt, Russia, Malaysia, Turkey, Kuwait etc
- Working on Trade and Investment framework Agreement (TIFA) with USA
- Working on European Union (EU) Cooperation
- Conducting market surveys for diversification of products & markets
- Organizing/coordinating of Sri Lanka’s participation in trade fairs
- Organizing inward and outward trade delegations
- Serving the trade inquiries received from Sri Lanka and abroad
