For a recent Roundtable on green finance with financial institutions and development partners, CSF had the opportunity to provide inputs into the design of the session and provide concluding insights at the end of the session. This Analytical Note serves as a recap of the key findings and takeaways on the progress of implementing green finance in Sri Lanka, the near-term prospects, and current and emerging challenges to be tackled.

On the 7th of March 2024, Centre for a Smart Future and Colombo Urban Lab hosted an event called, “Communicating Crisis”. The event featured a panel discussion on Sri Lanka’s path to a just recovery, anchored to key questions. How do economic indicators compare with people’s lived experiences? How can civil society and the media amplify voices from the ground?

As Sri Lanka endures mounting pressure on public finances and explores new avenues for funding conservation efforts, CTFs have emerged as a promising mechanism that could provide long-term financing for its Protected Areas (PAs). David Meyers, Executive Director of the Conservation Finance Alliance (CFA), spoke at a recent Knowledge Roundtable organised by CSF on Conservation Trust Funds. Read our Analytical Note Edition 3, which summarises the key takeaways and insights from David Meyers and discussion generated by the participants.

While data and numbers offer helpful insights, the picture it paints is almost always incomplete without an understanding of how those numbers were arrived at—how data is collected, and the sensitivities that enumerators need to be mindful of when conducting large scale surveys. Understanding the methodology of conducting such surveys add an important realistic dimension to policies that are solely data-driven.

This infographic provides an overview of settlements in the City of Colombo. The map shows the distribution of settlements in Colombo, with the most number of settlements concentrated in Colombo North. The data shows that most settlements have upgraded on-site, and that compared to other cities in the Global South, Colombo’s settlements are smaller and fragmented, with no trend of sprawling slums and shanties to be found.

How we talk about the urban poor is situated in a broader context of urban development and competing ideas of what Colombo should and will look like, and such words sanction the exclusion of the urban poor from the city.  It is crucial that our terminology reflects the complexity of ground level realities, particularly when Sri Lanka’s difference is erased and subsumed by other South Asian narratives.