Policy and regulatory interventions for agriculture and food security

Agriculture is a crucial sector in Sri Lanka's socio-economy, contributing to economic growth, exports, and livelihoods of a significant portion of the population. In 2022, the agriculture sector accounted for 7.5% of the GDP, 21.8 percent of national export earnings, and employed 26.5% of the labour force. Agriculture plays a crucial role in alleviating poverty and food security in rural areas, where it employs over half the workforce. The sector produces over three-fourths of the country's annual food requirement, with fresh food imports accounting for less than a quarter. This paper focuses on the transformation of the food crop sub-sector in Sri Lanka, out of the two distinct subsectors (food crop sector and plantation sector) with different characteristics and issues. Sri Lanka's agricultural sector is experiencing a fast-shrinking share of the economy and a slow decline in the labour force. The sector's performance has been disappointing due to long-standing structural issues, such as small land holdings, low mechanization, poor technology adoption, high production costs, information and coordination failures, and incomplete property rights. The crises caused by these issues in the food crop production sector for decades are further exacerbated by climate change impacts.