Three patents filed by the country's nanotechnology public-private partnership, the Sri Lanka Institute of Nanotechnology (SLINTEC), in the areas of fertilisers, apparel and rubber, could potentially result in a Rs. 9.55 billion positive impact for the country, based on combined savings and earnings, according to Prof. Veranja Karunaratne, a University of Peradeniya Chemistry don and SLINTEC's Science Team Leader.
One example given was the development of slow release fertilisers, which facilitates a controlled and sustained release of nutrients. This newly developed fertiliser significantly diminishes previously incurred, and expected, losses of 50% to 70% of urea which are a part of the fertilising process by making it more efficient. Additionally, the anticipated savings of as much as 10% of the urea, which would otherwise be lost, will result in Rs. 3 billion in estimated annual savings for the country. Aside from this, there are also benefits such as better crop yields, and quality, as well as less environmental repercussions.
He further revealed that SLINTEC was also working on private sector projects such as smart yarn, high end fabric, high performance tires and other rubber composites, smart agriculture and remote health montoring. A 1% value addition in terms of exports in related industries would add billions of rupees in earnings to the potential Rs. 3 billion annual savings from slow release fertiliser and, as a consequnce, lift nanotechnology's total economic impact in Sri Lanka to Rs. 9.55 billion per year, he noted.
At the same time, Prof. Karunaratne indicated that nanotechnology could also be used to add value to existing public sector mineral exports, such as for Ilmenite extracted from Pulmoddai in the North East, a substance for which the country is ranked ninth in terms of reserves as it has 18 million metric tonnes, or 2.6% of the world's reserves. He revealed that nanotechnology could be used to turn ilmenite, a commodity which was just at the first stage of value addition, into titanium dioxide, which is 40 times greater in price and widely demanded by the paint and printing ink industries which buy up 65% of worldwide supply annually.
Currently, Sri Lanka exports 80,000 metric tonnes of Ilmenite a year at US$ 8 million. However, the country could potenially earn US$ 100 million per year for just 40,000 metric tonnes of titanium dioxide. This is while the local paint industry spends US 12.5 million per year for 5,000 metric tonnes of titanium dioxide.
He also identified Graphite (from Bogala and Kahatagaha), Magnetite (from Matale), Montmorillonite clay (from Murukkan Bay in Mannar) and Vein Quartz (from Matale and Ratnapura) as other commodity-type minerals which were now being exported that could benefit from value addition, resulting in price increasing anywhere between a factor of 16, for nanosilica from vein quartz, to a factor of 25,000, for graphite-based carbon nanotubes and graphite oxide.
Prof. Karunaratne's comments were part of his recent presentation,"Economic Impact of Nanotechnology: Opportunities for Sri Lanka," held at the Central Bank's Centre for Banking Studies in Rajagriya last week, an event during which he also opined that currently there were only about 4,000 scientists working locally, while 50,000 Sri Lankan scientists were now abroad. He also added that, to truly become an innovation oriented culture, the country needed about 18,000 scientists working and publishing domestically. Also emerging, high technology product exports as a percentage of total manufactured exports was only 1.8% in 2008, equalling US$ 101.27 million. |
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