The Hon. (Prof.) L. M. Abeywickrama

¶ 01 Hon. Presiding Member, thank you for the opportunity to speak on the Mid‑Year Fiscal Position Report – 2024. Best wishes for the New Year to all.

¶ 02 While headline numbers—like a 34.2 per cent increase in tax revenue and a reduced deficit via spending restraint—look positive, the underlying social reality is painful. Production sectors have declined; agriculture grew the least—around one per cent last year—and over the past decade compound growth has been under one per cent due to ad‑hoc, leader‑centric policies.

¶ 03 Agriculture sustains a large share of our people, yet its contribution to GDP has sunk to about 6.9 per cent. Lives in agriculture are precarious. Unilateral decisions—like an abrupt switch to organic fertilizer and restrictions on inputs—caused collapse. South’s red rice scarcity stems from many farmers exiting cultivation due to input costs and constant undercutting policies.

¶ 04 Ill‑conceived projects—e.g., the salt‑barrier in Nilwala lower reaches of Matara—left over 10,000 acres of paddy unable to drain, removing them from production; farmers who once grew their own rice now buy from shops. A global expert friend once told me our agricultural story is “personal glories and lost opportunities.” Policies served to inflate leaders’ images and election fortunes, while abandoning the country’s true potential.

¶ 05 From paddy we currently realize only about 60–70 per cent of potential yields; in crops like maize, far less. Universities and research institutes have developed technologies, but the extension service was dismantled over decades. Today one extension officer covers 500–600 farm families across several GNs, getting Rs. 500 a month for fuel—barely one litre—making service delivery impossible.

¶ 06 About 14 per cent of our best cultivable lands lie in home gardens—36 per cent in districts like Matara. With 74,000 hectares of such land, we could support significant household production. But today monkeys and wild animals devastate gardens. Had we intervened ten years ago to manage populations, we could have avoided today’s extreme steps.

¶ 07 We have a plan—“A Prosperous Country – A Beautiful Life”—built on data and science, implemented step by step, not with false 2‑ or 3‑month promises. We ask the Opposition not to trip us, but to allow space to work. Our aim is to move away from vote‑chasing, regressive policies—such as favouring a narrow set of staples while ignoring sustainable traditional crops like finger millet—and to build a diversified, holistic, and resilient food system.

¶ 08 Thank you.