Sri Lanka announces more financial relief to Ditwah-hit businesses

Sri Lanka on Thursday announced new financial relief measures, including one time grants and a new credit scheme to provide loans, for business owners whose enterprises were affected by Cyclone Ditwah. The announcement by the Ministry of Finance is an expansion of relief measures already announced in December. In the country’s deadliest disaster since the 2004 tsunami, more than 600 people died in rains, floods and landslides as Cyclone Ditwah struck Sri Lanka in late November.

An initial assessment had estimated that floodwaters inundated nearly 20 per cent of the country’s land area, exposing approximately 2.3 million people. The Government in December reserved LKR 500 billion for immediate recovery while saying the full cost of the recovery from the disaster would warrant $6-7 billion. Thursday’s announcement outlined assistance for affected individual, small and micro businesses.

These include a one-time grant of LKR 2,00,000 to restore businesses damaged by the disaster to a condition suitable for reopening for individual, small and micro-businesses registered with the Ministry of Industries and a similar amount for individual, small and micro-businesses registered with the Divisional Secretariat as a business entity.