Sri Lanka mulls FTA with Indonesia

President Maithripala Sirisena and visiting Indonesian President Joko Widodo have drawn their attention towards signing a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) to promote bilateral trade between the two countries, President Sirisena’s media division said.“During this meeting, the leaders drew their attention to sign a free trade agreement to promote bilateral trade between the two countries,” the President’s Media Division said in a statement. It was only early this week that Sri Lanka signed a comprehensive free trade agreement with Singapore.

Sri Lanka already has FTAs with India and Pakistan and is working towards getting into more bilateral trade agreements with several other countries including Bangladesh and Malaysia. In the pipeline is also an extension to the current FTA with India.

President Sirisena met his Indonesian counterpart at the Presidential Secretariat on Wednesday.

President Joko Widodo visited the country on a two-day state visit, on an invitation extended by President Sirisena.

During the meeting President Sirisena requested the Indonesian president to encourage Indonesian entrepreneurs to explore investment opportunities in Sri Lanka.
The leaders also discussed further strengthening of the cooperation in the apparel sector.

The Indonesian president paid special attention to the request made by President Sirisena to provide assistance to Sri Lanka to utilize marine resources around the island in a productive manner for the economic development of the country.