Top 10 Sectors to Drive Exports & Jobs

If Sri Lanka is to move from roughly $99 billion to $150 billion, sentiment will not get us there. Exports will. Jobs will. Foreign exchange will.

Here are the ten sectors most capable of doing both — earning dollars and employing Sri Lankans at scale.

High-Yield Tourism

Not backpacker volume — premium yield.
Luxury eco-resorts, wellness tourism, marine tourism, MICE (meetings and conferences), cruise handling, boutique heritage properties.

Tourism is labour-intensive and dollar-generating. Every hotel room creates jobs upstream — food supply, transport, design, digital marketing.
Scale target: $8–10 billion annual receipts.

Apparel 2.0

Apparel remains Sri Lanka’s largest merchandise export. But the next leap is not more T-shirts. It is technical textiles, sports performance wear, sustainable compliance manufacturing, rapid-response design production.

Move up the value chain and you protect jobs while raising margins. Target: $8–9 billion exports with higher per-worker productivity.

ICT & Knowledge Services
Software development. AI support services. Cybersecurity. Global accounting and legal back offices. This is clean export revenue. High salaries. Urban youth employment.It scales without shipping containers.

Target: $5+ billion services exports. Logistics & Port Services

Colombo is already a transshipment hub. Expand into value-added logistics — warehousing, cold chain, distribution hubs, maritime services, ship repair. Ports create high-skilled and semi-skilled employment with strong tax contribution.

Value-Added Agriculture & Food Processing

Stop exporting raw tea and spices. Export branded, processed, packaged goods. Coconut-based products, nutraceuticals, spice blends, ready-to-eat food. Agriculture must become an export engine, not subsistence politics.

Renewable Energy & Energy Services

Lower energy cost equals export competitiveness. Solar, wind, grid modernisation, battery storage, green hydrogen pilots.
Energy investment creates jobs and reduces import dependence.

Gems, Jewellery & Design

Sri Lanka mines stones. It must export finished luxury. Certification, branding, global retail links. High margin. Skilled employment. Strong FX inflow.

Electronics & Light Manufacturing

Precision assembly, components, small electronics manufacturing. With correct policy stability, this can integrate into Asian supply chains. Jobs + exports.

Maritime & Ship Services
Ship repair, bunkering, maritime training, marine engineering. Sri Lanka sits on major trade lanes. Geography must become industry.

Education & Medical Services Exports
Private universities attracting foreign students. Medical tourism with regional patients.
Service exports that generate FX while building domestic capacity.

What This Means

To reach $150 billion: Exports must grow aggressively. Private sector must expand payrolls.Government must stop being the largest employer. Policy stability, anti- corruption enforcement, and regulatory speed are the foundation. No investor commits to a country where rules shift. No entrepreneur scales in an environment of uncertainty.

Sri Lanka does not lack talent. It lacks structural discipline.

If these ten engines are prioritised with seriousness, coordination and governance reform, $150 billion is not fantasy.

It is math. The question is whether the country chooses growth — or comfort.