The Ceylon Association of Shipping Agents (CASA) is in strategic partnership with this year’s Colombo International Maritime Conference (CIMC), as they celebrate 50 years as an association, providing a yeomen service to the maritime industry.
The three-day conference is packed with topics that cover a variety of timely issues pertaining to the Maritime industry such as ‘Island in the ocean of opportunity – Unleashing Sri Lanka’s potential for investors and service providers’, ‘Sustainable Development Goals – role of the maritime industry’, ‘Port capacity in ASEAN/Asia region and connectivity with South Asia ports’, ‘The maritime ecology in building a maritime nation - The Norwegian experience’ and ‘Sri Lanka maritime industry vision, opportunities and way forward’ among many others. The Sri Lanka Maritime Week will commence with the e-launch graced by President Maithripala Sirisena and will be conducted via themed sessions that will explore the challenges and opportunities for the Sri Lankan Shipping industry. These thematic sessions will include ‘Sri Lanka Port industry – the investment opportunities and beyond’, ‘Sri Lanka as a regional ship registry hub – the way forward’ and ‘The New opportunity – Evolving cruise industry - the challenges for infrastructure and terminals and beyond’ and will explore both national and regional factors that affect Sri Lanka’s shipping goals. CASA, which is the ‘Voice of the Shipping Industry’ is partnering this initiative this year as the sole body which represents the Maritime industry in Sri Lanka. CASA, to an extent, functions as the marketing arm of the Sri Lanka Ports Authority and plays a necessary role in assisting the country in becoming a regional maritime hub – a goal that Sri Lanka has now moved closer towards with the calling of Mega Ships at the Port of Colombo which can accommodate deep draft vessels among the South Asian Ports.
CIMC, which is chaired by the Ports and Shipping Minister Arjuna Ranatunga, also has the Speaker of Parliament Karu Jayasuriya as the Patron. Rohan Masakorala is the founder and the CEO of the Shippers Academy whilst the Vice Chairman of CASA, Ruwan Waidyaratne also is the co-chair of the CIMC organising committee.
Speaking to us, Waidyaratne stated that, “CASA has recognised and embraced the challenging role the association has to play in the future to ensure that Sri Lanka becomes the maritime hub in this region.” He further stated thatthe strategic role CASA plays in organising forums such as the CIMC will certainly contribute towards realising this goal.
