WHY NOT SRI LANKA? සිංහල

Starter Kit. Idea 434 of 500. Cluster 22

Customs-paperwork offices in the district towns, so the exporter does not travel to Colombo

Back to the idea

Written for this site as a starting point, not from the book. Rules and fees change: ask the bodies named below before you spend money.

The mechanism, from the book

The village cannot get a box to the container port. The gap is small firms, not big ones.

The first step

Ask five exporters in one district town how many trips they make to Colombo each year to clear paperwork, and what each trip costs in fares, nights away and lost work. Then ask a licensed customs broker in Colombo whether they would take referrals, or open a desk, if you sent them regular clients. The proof is five exporters who would pay a fee to stop travelling.

Who pays first
A small district exporter who loses days to Colombo trips for paperwork and would pay a local fee to have it handled nearby.
What leaves today
Distance from the paperwork pushes small exporters to sell through Colombo middlemen; a local brokerage lets them ship under their own name.

Ask first

  • Sri Lanka Customs. Ask which export documents can be prepared away from Colombo, and by whom.
  • Sri Lanka Export Development Board. Ask which exporters in the district town might use a local paperwork office.

Check before you spend

Confirm that you work under a licensed customs agent, what the agent may lawfully do for clients, and how documents travel safely between the town and Colombo.

Find out these three numbers

  1. How many trips to Colombo does each exporter make a year?
  2. What does one of those trips cost in fares and lost work?
  3. What would a licensed agent charge to work with your office?

A comparison from the book

Singapore and Sri Lanka. Chapter Fourteen

"This is the cheapest honesty technology ever invented, and it frees every small business from the queue at the same time."

Every trip the exporter does not make is a day of work back. Sell that day.

The test

Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?

WITH500BUSINESS IDEASTO STARTTOMORROW

From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.