Center For International Development

Starting in November 2015, the Center for International Development’s Growth Lab has been engaged in economic policy research with the Government of Sri Lanka. Led by Professor Ricardo Hausmann, the team has focused on a single question: what is holding back investment in Sri Lanka – especially in new and non-traditional export-oriented sectors – and what can the government do about it? In this podcast, members of the Sri Lanka team explain what they learned from the project which includes: First, a lack of new economic “knowhow” has meant that there are few easy opportunities for innovative investors to exploit. Next, the investors who do arrive find significant roadblocks to their success; these include policy barriers to reaching markets and key inputs, and infrastructural gaps at the regional level. Today on CID’s Speaker Series podcast, Anna Mysliewic, Masters in Public Policy student at the Harvard Kennedy School, interviews Dan and Tim, who share their learnings from the project and how they partnere