Experts urge business to turn blue growth into conservation-driven investment

‘We cannot really talk about a resilient blue economy, we cannot really talk about a regenerative blue economy if we do not set the stage for regeneration and the maintenance of these ecosystem services.’

Prof. Terney Pradeep Kumara, Director General of the Coast Conservation and Coastal Resource Management Department, issued this cautionary message as experts from the government, financial, tourism, aquaculture and conservation sectors called for a fundamental rethink of how the country exploits its vast marine resources.

He made the remarks at a high-level panel discussion on ‘The Next Wave of Blue Growth: Private Sector Entry Points for Productive Investment, Conservation, CSR and Blue Finance’, held during ‘Biodiversity Sri Lanka’s Biodiversity Action Forum 2026’ at the Shangri-La, Colombo recently.

Kumara said the natural ecosystems underpinning the blue economy must be treated as the country’s productive infrastructure, rather than as resources that can be endlessly exploited.

The country’s more than 1,350-kilometre coastline and vast Exclusive Economic Zone encompass a remarkable mosaic of mangroves, mudflats, lagoons, sandy and rocky shores, coral reefs and seagrass ecosystems, he said.

‘These different ecosystems, with their unique service provision, are providing the infrastructure for blue growth, Kumara said, questioning whether the country was adequately protecting and maintaining that infrastructure.

He stressed that a genuinely regenerative blue economy could not be built by concentrating only on individual marine protected areas.

‘What we have are landscapes, reefscapes or seascapes where mosaics of ecosystems are interlinked together with the socio-economics of our own systems, he said.

Marine protected areas should therefore serve as cornerstones, while marine spatial planning and wider seascape management must determine how conservation, industry, fisheries, tourism and other activities can coexist.

Sivalingam Sivakanthan, Head of MIS, Strategic Planning and Sustainability at DFCC Bank, said the bank’s issuance of Sri Lanka’s first-ever blue bond in 2025, raising nearly Rs. 3 billion (USD 10 million), demonstrated that investors were willing to put money into sustainable marine and coastal initiatives.

But he warned that simply raising capital was not enough.

‘We don’t want to consider it merely as an instrument for finance. Instead, we want to essentially set the stage for something which is credible, Sivakanthan said.

A credible blue finance framework, he explained, requires a clear definition of eligible projects, a strong pipeline of investable initiatives, robust governance and, critically, the ability to demonstrate measurable environmental and social impacts.

Entrepreneur Shan Meemanage offered perhaps the clearest illustration of how conservation and commercial interests could converge.

‘I was not thinking anything about sustainability. All I was thinking was profits. That’s private sector, right? he told the forum.

He described how his company developed hatchery production, stocked reservoirs and established buy-back arrangements with fishermen, eventually expanding the model to more than 100 reservoirs.

The tourism sector, too, has substantial room to diversify its relationship with the ocean, said Harshini de Silva Pandithasekaran, Head of Sustainability at Aitken Spence Hotels.

She said the industry remained heavily dependent on the conventional “sun, sea and sand” tourism model despite the extraordinary diversity of Sri Lanka’s coastal landscapes and marine ecosystems.

Pandithasekaran noted that international visitors often appreciated the geographical and ecological character of destinations — including bays, coastal formations and other natural features — providing opportunities to develop more diversified and nature-based tourism experiences.

From CSR to long-term conservation partnerships

Moderated by Dr. Sandun Perera, Programme Coordinator of IUCN Sri Lanka and Director of Biodiversity Sri Lanka, the session sought to move the conversation beyond conventional corporate social responsibility towards long-term conservation partnerships that deliver measurable outcomes.