Sri Lanka's Solution

Reminder: ESL Daily has expanded and can now be viewed at www.blog.esldaily.org

The past few years have been tough on Sri Lanka's economy. If it's not a civil war, or a tsunami, then it's the English language bringing woes to the small island country. As India continues to dominate the global outsourcing business, Sri Lanka is missing out because of the small number of graduates with sufficient English language ability to compete in the global marketplace.

The solution to this problem is an English Task Force, proposed by Amba Research in response to a call made by the country's Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) firms for investment to improve English standards. Sri Lanka annually rejects thousands of students at its universities due to a lack of proper educational facilities. One of the results of this is that foreign businesses tend to overlook the country because of the small talent pool. "(Sri Lanka) sits in the right place geographically, it has the right kind of robustness around IT infrastructure in the country and there is a great education history that is recognized around the world for its high quality." With the right educational infrastructure in place and university graduates with the right skill sets, i.e. English language proficiency, Sri Lanka might be able to grab a piece of the coveted American outsourcing market that right now belongs to India and China.

Full Story

Jim Korea