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SRI LANKA
Tour
Overview - Colombo
- Geography
- History
& Government
- People
& Culture - The
Economy - Gallery
The Economy
The foundation for economic development was laid in
the second half of the 19th century, when coffee and
tea plantations were established in the hill country
surrounding Nuwara Eliya. The national economy is heavily
dependent upon agricultural exports. Tea is by far the
most important export crop. Others are rubber, coconuts,
and spices, especially cinnamon. The principal ports
are Colombo and Galle. Breeding grounds of the pearl
oyster are located in the Gulf of Mannar off the northwest
coast. More than 80 percent of the people work on small
subsistence farms, where the main food crop is rice.
Rice output grew in the 1980s as a result of the expansion
of land available for cultivation and from the impact
of the Green Revolution. The nation has been self-sufficient
in rice since the mid-1980s.
Sri Lanka is rich in industrial rocks
and minerals such as graphite, mica, silica sand, quartz,
feldspar, and gemstones. The nation is the world's largest
producer of graphite, a form of carbon that is used
in the making of lead pencils. Long known as a land
of gems, the island has 44 varieties of precious and
semiprecious gemstones including sapphires, rubies,
aquamarines, moonstones, topazes, garnets, amethysts,
and zircons.
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Friendly Page: Sri Lanka Economy
DATES AND COSTS
5-20 March, 2006 $4734 per
person, twin share, from Australia return or $3234 joining
in Sri Lanka.
4-19 March 2007
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