Sri Lanka is a small island nation, shaped like a tear drop, situated less than 20 miles from the southern tip of India. Totaling to about 25,332 square miles (65,610 kilometers) it is a beautiful island with tropical beaches and all the year round luxurious vegetation. Sri Lanka has a tropical climate with temperatures averaging 80° degrees F (27°C) with no temperature changes from one month to another.

Sri Lanka's rich cultural heritage dates back to 2500 years. Buddhism was brought to Sri Lanka from India in 247 B.C. and gave birth to a rich and prosperous civilization since then. Buddhism as its main religion has touched and enriched every aspect of the society, tradition and culture. Even up to today the country remains as one of the strongest Buddhist countries.

Sri Lanka was comparatively a rich country - socially, culturally, economically and spiritually, until the 16th century when colonial powers came and conquered the country. First came the Portuguese in 1505 and ruled the country for one and half centuries, then came Dutch came in mid 1660s and conquered the country from the Portuguese. After one and half centuries of Dutch rule the British conquered Sri Lanka in 1797 and ruled the country until 1948. These were the super powers during those particular times in the history and they conquered the country for economic, strategic and religious reasons.

In 1948 Sri Lanka received independence from the British soon after India won independence from the British after strong struggles led by Indian national leaders like Mahatma Gandhi. In Sri Lanka winning independence was a peaceful process and during the post independent era for a long time there were no major changes in spite of the fact that country was free to carry out its own reforms. 500 years of colonial rule had overturned the country culturally, economically and to a certain respect spiritually.

Sri Lanka has been an independent nation since 1948 and was a comparatively a peaceful and calm country until two decades ago. Today it is undergoing serious turbulences because of an ethnic war that has been going on for nearly two decades when Tamil factions resorted to violent insurgent campaigns in seeking an independent Tamil state called Eelam in Northern Sri Lanka Today under the mediation of the Norwegian government there is a peace process to stop this 20 year ethnic war that killed more than 60,000 people and displaced more than two million people. The peace process is having successful headway.

The People

The population of Sri Lanka is 18.66 million and the population growth rate: 1.22 percent. Nearly 65% of the population is engaged in agriculture and live in rural areas.

•  Sri Lanka's population is multi-ethnic and multi-religious.
     Ethnically diverse population consists of:
     Sinhalese: 74 percent.
     Ethnic indigenous Tamils: 12.6 percent.
     Tamils of recent Indian origin: 5.5 percent.
     Muslims: 7.1 percent (Muslims are regarded as an ethnic community in Sri Lanka).
•  Religious diversity in Sri Lanka.
     70% are Buddhists
     17% are Hindus
     7 % are Muslims
     7 % are Christians
•  Official language is Sinhala with Tamil as the second language.
•  Sinhala is the language of the administration. It is the medium of instruction in the school system and in the university.
• 10% of the population can speak English

Economy

Sri Lanka is basically an agricultural country employing half of the labor force. However, it does not contribute as much to export earnings as industry, which is dominated by apparel manufacturing. Tea, rubber and coconut account for most agricultural exports. Sri Lanka benefits from foreign assistance and remittances from the nearly one million Sri Lankans who work abroad. The ethnic war has severely weakened the ability of the government to address economic issues especially because the efforts of the government to counter the rebel advances has led to drastic increase in government spending.

Below are some important statistics on the current Sri Lankan economy:
Gross domestic product (GDP): 1,400 billion rupees (15.7 billion dollars).
Outstanding debt (2001): 1,451 billion rupees (16.3 billion dollars).
GDP growth (2001): -1.4 percent.
Debt servicing cost (2002): 327 billion rupees (3.4 billion dollars).
Government Revenue (2002): 322 billion rupees (3.3 billion dollars).
Per capita income (2001): 840 dollars.
Inflation (2001): 14.2 percent.
Main exports: tea (700 million dollars), garments (2.3 billion dollars).
Main imports: oil (731 million dollars), textiles (1.3 billion dollars)

Government

Sri Lanka's central government is headed by a President, who is chief of State and head of government. Prime Minister enjoys limited power but the scenario is fast changing due to the fact that the president belongs to the party which was defeated at the most recent general election and the Prime Minister is the head of the party that won the majority of the seats in the parliament and the majority of votes. Parliament has 225 members. There are eight Provincial Councils that has most control over local affairs.

Some Highlights of the Sri Lankan Tradition

RICH DEMOCRATIC TRADITIONS

In terms of political rights Sri Lanka is a pioneer in giving voting rights to both men and women. This power to vote at an early stage has improved social welfare measures such as free education, free health services and similar services.

FREE EDUCATION

In Sri Lanka education is free even up to the university level. Free education was introduced in 1932 and even today a person can receive his/her education up to the Ph.D level without paying any university tuition. But the other side of the story is only .01 % of the population who enters the first grade get the opportunity to enter the university because of the severe competition for admission. During the last two decades there have been some private colleges that have sprung up but they do not enjoy that much prestige because of the tradition, in a system where the best goes to the state universities.

The down side of this scenario is that even those who are the highest achievers in academic performance, after graduation have to stay unemployed for a long time. The slow pace of the economy has not been able to absorb them.

Literacy

Sri Lanka has a high literacy rate. 90% of the population is considered literate, including high women's literacy rate. Three decades ago Sri Lanka used to be among the third highest Asian nation in terms of literacy. Here is a comparative perspective of the current literacy rates:

Health Care

Sri Lanka has a high health index:
   Life expectancy is about 70 for men and 74 for women.
   Birth rate is 1.25 %: Very low comparative to the developing world.
   Child mortality is 34 deaths per 1000: Considered as a good indicator
   Some breakthroughs in maternity leave are: paid leave for three months after child birth for the first two pregnancies. Nursing breaks for three months even after that. (These were introduced in 1993 as a ratification of ILO convention.)

Health care is free and provided by the governmentbut the services have deteriorated drastically over the years due to rising cost of health care and the increasing inability of the government to meet the costs.