News
Expert advises public, private sectors invest in modern technology as in HK, Taiwan, Singapore
Long-term solutions even after present pandemic
By Rathindra Kuruwita
The public and private sectors should invest in the latest technologies to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and remotely identify those who had contracted the virus to minimise disruptions to the economy, Pharmaceutical and healthcare management consultant Dr. Sanjaya Perera told The Island yesterday.
Dr. Perera said that since 2020 three lockdowns had been imposed, but the country had not benefited.
“We have also imposed lockdowns at the wrong times. We allowed people to party in April 2021. We also relaxed too fast when experts said we have the delta variant in Colombo. Everyone agrees that closing the country almost at regular intervals is bad, we have to take steps so that this doesn’t happen,” he said.
Perera, who works as a consultant in East Asia and Europe said that investment in new technology and adhering to strict travel guidelines had helped many institutions to function without continuous disruptions. Last year, a number of institutions had introduced machines that could easily detect those with COVID-19 and protect those who worked in air conditioned environments, he said.
“For example there are new technologies like infrared thermal monitoring, which are widely used in Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong. High-performance infrared thermal cameras are set-up at airports or at entrances to offices to capture people’s thermal images in real time, easily identifying people with fever. There are new machines powered by artificial intelligence that can identify those who have 0.01 higher temperature. These machines can also work as an attendance register that can be accessed by HR officers from anywhere. I am glad that some top private firms have already set up these machines,” he said.
Perera said that Sri Lanka had kept its airports open for the most part of the pandemic and a number of COVID-19 infected people had come through without detection. Health sector unions had called for stricter measures but the government had cited inconveniences to passengers for not implementing tougher policies.
“Singapore Airport is now using a breath test to detect Covid-19 that gives accurate results within a minute. A person blows into a one-way valve mouthpiece, and compounds in the person’s breath – think of it as a breath signature – are compared by machine learning software against the sort of breath signature that would be expected from someone who’s Covid-positive. We can clear passengers in minutes. If the government wants to keep the airport open it should invest in these technologies,” he said.
Dr. Perera pointed out that SARS-CoV-2 could remain on various surfaces and that caused serious issues when schools, offices and factories were open. The virus could remain outside, especially in places that were not exposed to the sun and in air conditioned places.
In the past year researchers had looked at UV radiation, in particular UV-C to inactivate different viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, he added
“With machines that emit UV-C radiation you can easily disinfect surfaces. If you place such a machine near an AC machine, it can kill most of the viruses there. There are also handheld devices that people can use to disinfect documents, pens, and other things that you touch. Another technology we can use is pathogen testing. We can place this unit at the office, and it will capture pathogens that people at work emit. At the end of the day, a lab can test and find out if a person there has contracted COVID-19. This way we don’t need to check everyone at work, we can just check the people who came on that day,” he said.
Dr. Perera said that while some of those technologies were expensive, investing on the long term solutions and protocols would benefit the economy greatly in the long term. Already the government spent large amounts of money on testing, quarantining and treating people and frequent lockdowns too had cost colossal sums, he said.
“Also these investments are not only for COVID-19. Even if COVID goes away, we can still use this equipment to make the office environment safer for the workers. A healthy workforce is good for business and both the private and public sector must understand this,” he said.
[Prime Minister’s Media Division]
[Prime Minister’s Media Division]
… warn of dire consequences
A group of trade unions and civil society groups has requested President Anura Kumara Dissanayake to abandon his government’s controversial plan for the proposed tripartite management of the EPF.
The group has told the President: “We strongly object to the government’s plan to transfer the EPF to a tripartite board—jointly promoted by the Employers’ Federation of Ceylon (EFC), International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Labour Organisation (ILO)—and to increase the investments of those funds within private equity and debt markets.
“While the EFC and the government jointly project this plan as a ‘modern governance framework’, it poses a serious threat to the EPF’s financial stability, fiduciary conduct, and returns to workers’ life savings, with severe consequences for broader macroeconomic stability. Rather than replacing the corruption existing in the public sector, this tripartite framework paves the way for a corporate takeover of the EPF. Through this, the fund is exposed to unlawful business practices such as insider trading using internal information of EPF investments, conflicts of interest and corporate bailouts of unstable private companies.
“Sri Lanka’s corporate sector has a tremendously negative track record, which you alluded to during your victorious election campaign in 2024. This was recently unravelled by the multi-billion-dollar illicit capital flight through trade misinvoicing, which your administration is now actively working to curb in the imports sector.
“The recent banking sector fraud exceeds Rs. 13 billion; widespread corporate tax evasion destabilised the fiscal position (Sri Lanka Auditor General’s Department Annual Reports) and consequently inflated the tax burden on the general public. The EFC has found it convenient to remain silent about these crimes, possibly assuming that their silence would preserve their social standing. Considering this inherent corruption within Sri Lanka’s corporate sector and its disregard to the living standards of the general public, there is no realistic basis to integrate corporate interests to actively manage the EPF. The corporate sector of Sri Lanka has not developed sufficiently on technical and ethical grounds to safely entrust the largest retirement savings pool in the country. The EPF is a captive fund that has no mechanism for the owners to divest if the management is corrupt. This further increases the possibility of corporate fraud when the management of the fund is jointly held with the corporate sector.
“Furthermore, during the recent public discussion with trade unions, Deputy Minister of Finance Dr. Anila Jayantha pointed out that the domestic debt restructuring (DDR) would inflict a loss of Rs. 600 billion to the EPF. Our independent calculations—formally submitted as an affidavit to the Supreme Court approved by the Federation of University Teachers’ Associations in 2024—reveal that nominal loss alone is Rs. 634.4 billion. When factoring in foreclosed reinvestment returns, the true loss skyrockets to Rs. 1,711 billion, wiping out 48% of the fund’s projected gross income for the 2023 – 2028 period. Under the pretext of safeguarding the banking system, this colossal robbery preserved high yields on government bonds held by commercial banks and high-net-worth individuals, subsequently reaping them astronomical profits. Now, the exact same plunder is rearing its head again disguised as a tripartite committee.”
“The main arguments supporting our resistance and viable alternatives for optimising EPF management directly under the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL), are outlined below.
“Objections to the government’s tripartite proposal:
1. The “International best practice and conflict of interest fallacies”
The government holds that tripartite management of pension funds is the “international best practice” and that there is a “conflict of interest” in CBSL managing the EPF. They are key pillars justifying government’s tripartite proposal.
These two positions are shockingly misleading given that four of the five largest pension funds in the world, in Norway, Japan, the U.S., and Singapore, are managed directly by state bodies or central banks. Therefore, ‘international best practice’ in pension fund management is the exact opposite of what the government and the IMF are proposing. We hence reject these baseless positions.
2. Corporate captivity and bailouts
It is clear that the EFC is desperately pushing for this proposal at a time of global uncertainty, to cushion the effects of the crisis and maximise gains. Under corporate influence within the proposed tripartite board, the private conglomerates can use the multi-trillion-rupee EPF to continue their unstable commercial operations without having to risk their own capital or savings to do so. This will severely erode the financial stability of the EPF and its returns.
3. Risk of front running
“Because the EPF is a colossal fund, its investment decisions can alter asset prices. This creates immense monetary value for the information generated by its investment decisions. Corporate representatives on the proposed tripartite board will be perfectly positioned to use this information to trade ahead of the EPF (front-running), buying assets cheaply and dumping them onto the EPF at inflated prices for guaranteed corporate gain, resulting in a reduction of returns to the EPF.
4. Unavoidable loopholes
“Presence of a separate group of investment analysts, trade union representatives and government officials within the proposed tripartite structure cannot prevent pre-market corporate access to EPF’s investment decisions. Investment proposals made by the analysts has to be first approved by the proposed tripartite committee, making it impossible to prevent corporate access to insider information on EPF investments.”
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