Trinco Has More Up Its Sleeve

The Sri Lanka Export Development Board (EDB), under the Ministry of Industry and Entrepreneurship Development, took its regional export drive to Trincomalee on 1 October 2026, holding an SME Awareness Creation Forum aimed at helping small and medium enterprises and entrepreneurs with export potential. The programme brought together an Awareness Creation Seminar, Mini Exhibition and Business Clinic, covering EDB services, export market requirements and opportunities, and success stories from fruits and vegetables, processed foods, handicrafts and lifestyle products, and fisheries. Exportable products were displayed at the exhibition, while EDB officials and public and private-sector stakeholders worked directly with entrepreneurs at the Business Clinic to address individual challenges and help develop products meeting international standards.

The Eastern Province district was selected as part of the EDB’s strategic export development priorities, with particular attention to fisheries and marine products, agricultural products and tourism-related enterprises and their integration into export value chains. The forum was conducted under the National Export Development Plan as part of the EDB’s regional outreach programme, which seeks to take export promotion closer to entrepreneurs outside Colombo and connect them with global markets. Nine such forums have now been held across the country since 2017, the latest before Trincomalee being in Batticaloa in February 2025. The Trincomalee programme is expected to identify export-ready companies and develop them into future exporters, while also attracting local investment into export industries, increasing awareness of the New Exporter Development Programme among government officials, trade chambers and other stakeholders, and encouraging innovative, value-added products.

The programme was attended by Minister of Industry and Entrepreneurship Development Sunil Handunnetti, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Employment Arun Hemachandra, Trincomalee District MP Roshan Akmeemana, Trincomalee District Secretary Hemantha Kumara, EDB Chairman and CEO Mangala Wijesinghe, Eastern Province Department of Rural Industries Provincial Director Riswani Rifas, Divisional Secretaries, EDB Director of Regional Development D. M. P. Dissanayake, government officials, exporters and a large number of entrepreneurs. Addressing the gathering, Minister Handunnetti said tasks may appear impossible until they are accomplished and warned that giving up at the outset would make success impossible. He pointed to Trincomalee’s unique natural harbour, large areas of land still unused for industry and mineral resources in places including Kokkilai, Pudavakattu and Pulmoddai and in the surrounding ocean. He also said that the completion of the Colombo–Dambulla expressway would strengthen the Eastern Province’s position by providing better infrastructure for industry, employment and land, while stressing that such large ambitions can begin with small businesses working together. The EDB says it will continue taking export promotion into the regions as part of efforts to support regional economic development.