Sri Lanka has a great track record in raising living standards and reducing poverty, a World Bank report states.
In the decade preceding the Covid-19 crisis poverty was declining. The share of poor people came down from 16.2% in 2012-13 to 11% in 2016 — measured at the World Bank’s $3.20 international poverty line (in 2011 PPP).
Projections indicate that this figure fell further to 9.2% in 2019. Other measures of wellbeing also exhibited progress — maternal and child health outcomes improved over the past decade and access to electricity is now almost universal. These are highly commendable achievements. Such broad-based improvements in welfare are typically the result of improvements in livelihoods. “The key factor behind sustained poverty reduction was labour-income growth, particularly in non farm sectors.