Strengthening Public-Private Partnership in Sri Lanka’s Infrastructure Development Project: The Colombo Port Case

Taekyoon Kim, Sang Jun Lee, and Manjula Pradeep

Infrastructure has been a key component to Sri Lanka’s economic and social development especially through Public-Private Partnerships (PPP), but Sri Lanka is currently at a crossroads in term of fostering its PPP framework for infrastructure. This study sets out to examine and delineate the current landscape as well as the future prospects of Sri Lanka’s PPP with the particular reference to the Colombo Port Expansion projects implemented since 1999 as a proxy for Sri Lanka’s outlook of infrastructure PPP. It further contends that a given rule-of-thumb on PPP projects is not feasible in developing countries given their economic and political volatility, but positive changes in government strategies and policies can be suggested for better practices and effectiveness in Sri Lanka’s infrastructure PPP. Rather than simply suggesting a positive-descriptive overview of the Colombo Port case, this study advances the proper management of the PPP unit as a critical juncture for strengthening the future landscape of Sri Lanka’s PPP initiatives.