The term social business first emerged in Nobel Laureate Prof. Muhammad Yunus’ book, ‘Banker to the Poor,’ wherein he describes the concept of social entrepreneurship. It has since then taken on a life of its own and in effect has become a new paradigm of study and practice in the world of business, banking and ...

PARIS/LONDON (Reuters): Leading members of the Group of 20 nations are prepared to trigger an emergency meeting to address soaring grain prices caused by the worst US drought in more than half a century and poor crops from the Black Sea bread basket. France, the United States and G20 president Mexico will hold a conference ...

By Cassandra Mascarenhas The technical sessions of the Association of Professional Bankers’ 24th anniversary convention were held yesterday, bringing the APB’s flagship event to a close. Aptly themed ‘Sustainability in volatility: The bankers’ challenge,’ each technical session explored an area that could throw obstacles in the path of bankers and the line-up of speak...

Sunil S. Sirisena has been appointed as the new Chairman of the National Savings Bank with effect from 13 August 2012. He is a senior officer in the Sri Lanka Administrative Service and prior to this, he has served as the Secretary to the Ministries of Education, Co-operatives and Internal Trade and Foreign Employment Promotion ...

By Nisthar Cassim The world’s leading nutrition, health and wellness company, Nestlé said last week Sri Lanka is a high growth market with strong upside in tandem with improving socioeconomic development aided by the end-of-war benefit. “We are experiencing double digit growth in Sri Lanka and see very positive prospects going forward. Our commitment to ...

Reuters: Japan’s economy expanded just 0.3 percent in April-June, half the pace expected, fuelling concerns growth will continue to flag as a rebound in consumer spending starts to lose momentum and Europe’s debt crisis weighs on global demand. The data provides further evidence of a global slowdown raising expectations in financial markets that policymakers will ...

Boeing and Malaysia Airlines celebrated the direct delivery of the airline’s 75th 737 aircraft during an event at Boeing Field early this week. The airplane, a Next-Generation 737-800, arrived in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia yesterday. “The 737 has been an amazing airplane for our airline,” said Ahmad Jauhari Yahya, Group Chief Executive Officer of Malaysia Airlines. ...

Reuters: US employers in July hired the most workers in five months, but an increase in the jobless rate to 8.3 per cent kept prospects of further monetary stimulus from the Federal Reserve on the table. Nonfarm payrolls rose 163,000 last month, the Labour Department said on Friday, breaking three straight months of job gains ...

A student of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Sri Lanka (CA Sri Lanka) has brought honour to her motherland after winning the best presentation award in the SAFA category at the International Conference for CA Students in India recently. Cooray, who delivered a thought-provoking presentation titled ‘Walk the Talk: Presentation and Communication Skills – ...

WASHINGTON (Reuters): Economic growth slowed in the second quarter as consumers spent at their slowest pace in a year, increasing pressure on the Federal Reserve to do more to bolster the recovery. Gross domestic product expanded at a 1.5% annual rate between April and June, the weakest pace of growth since the third quarter of ...

by Sarath De Alwis The crisis is not in our system of higher education. The crisis is in not knowing what higher education is. Arrogance of presumed superior knowledge of the policy makers and dogmatism of the teachers has precipitated a debate that reflects a pedantry of crisis proportions. We do not seem to have ...

‘Apata Galapena Arthika Kramaveda’, a Sinhala economic article collection book by Dr. Rohan Samarajiva, expert on infrastructure policies and C.J. Amaratunga, veteran journalist, will be launched at 4p.m. on 6 August, at the auditorium of the Bandaranayaka Institute of International studies. The book is analysing how the theories relevant to infrastructure sectors such as roads, ...

LOLC Group Managing Director and CEO Kapila Jayawardena and Executive Director Kalsha Upekha Amarasinghe have joined the Board of Brown and Company as Non Executive Directors. The move follows LOLC acquiring 55% effective control of Brown and Company recently via a Rs. 1.3 billion deal.Despite selling out his stake, Ajith Devasurendra remains as Non Executive ...

BULAWAYO, Zimbabwe, (IPS): The Global Environment Facility (GEF) is ready to be a catalyst for transforming the way the global environment is managed, said the next CEO and chairperson of the multilateral institution, Dr. Naoko Ishii, in this interview with Tierramérica *.  The GEF recognises the inseparable linkage between environmental and economic well-being, which was ...

By a Special Correspondent A year or back from today, Sri Lankan economy had been sailing strongly amidst global economic typhoons. Most of the macro variables were reflecting peace dividends and rejuvenated hope. However, by mid 2011, the country’s trade deficit, fuelled by credit expansion was signalling early signs of an economic turmoil. Perhaps being ...

Marketing process for sales persons Under the marketing concept, the firm must find a way to discover unfulfilled customer needs and bring to market products that satisfy those needs. The process of doing so can be modelled in a sequence of steps: the situation is analysed to identify opportunities, the strategy is formulated for a ...

An important feature of the recent Sri Lanka Economic Summit, which both the Guest Speaker Gurcharan Das, Author, Columnist and Management Consultant and Keynote Speaker Dr. Kalpana Kochar, Chief Economist – South Asia of the World Bank, referred to were the opportunities presented to Sri Lanka by the ongoing process of globalisation and particularly the ...

Another round of elections has been fixed and the country is turned into election mode. Elections are said to be a benchmark of democracy, and then why are we bothered when more and more elections are held? More and more elections, have we correspondingly increased democracy in Sri Lanka? What does an election mean and ...

By Shamil Samsul Mueen 1. Introduction The global financial crisis has raised imperative issues concerning the stability and reliability of existing financial systems. This has driven an extensive global re-examination on the competence of the existing financial architecture and the search for a more enduring solution. As a result an increasing interest in Islamic finance ...