For two years the international tourism industry has been facing irreparable losses. As such, our country's third largest economic partner, the tourism industry, has been weakening since the beginning of 2019 and is still making all preparations to recover.

It is a well known fact that the loss of tourist arrivals due to the Corona epidemic for almost two years has caused a severe setback to all the tourism industries in our country. There are no healthy returns to this industry. All the sectors related to tourism are affected by this and are currently in a state of great concern. Another concern is that many of the companies and restaurants involved are currently in bankruptcy. Even small hotels that make a living by relying on this industry are now hanging out with the banner that it is for sale. On the other hand, the tourism industry, which was started with government loans and bank loans, is now unable to repay the loans and is suffering from interest and not knowing what to do.

Hundreds of tourism-related employees, on the other hand, have lost their jobs and many ordinary and short-term contract workers have been laid off, leaving tourism service providers in dire straits. The biggest concern is that the decline of this sector has affected all the sectors related to it layer by layer. Its implications have had an indirect or direct impact on the economy of our country. The consequences are far-reaching and far-reaching. Although the loss of foreign exchange has a direct impact on the economy, of course indirect indirect impacts are of great importance. Sri Lanka received $ 4.4 billion in foreign exchange from tourism in 2018. The terrorist attack in the following years and the ensuing epidemic caused a massive setback in Sri Lanka's foreign exchange earnings through tourism. Tourism, which accounted for 15% of the country's revenue, is expected to generate 12.5% ​​of revenue growth in the coming years. But Govt did not allow that.

Economists estimate that without the corona epidemic, the country's tourism revenue would have been $ 5.5 billion. But the real situation is that by 2020, Sri Lanka's foreign exchange earnings from tourism will be only $ 0.95 billion. So the foreign exchange loss that year alone was estimated at US $ 4.55 billion. This is a loss of 5.3% of Sri Lanka's GDP.

That is why the Sri Lankan government is seeking the help of the people to rebuild the tourism sector by giving priority to all categories to improve this. At a time when tourist arrivals around the world are currently being diverted to our country from all sides, our country should welcome it and unite to develop the industry with a freshness, freedom from contagion and a new glow.