Fintech momentum rises, but bureaucracy delays threaten 2030 targets
Sri Lanka’s financial technology (fintech) initiative is gaining momentum on the surface, but a closer look reveals the challenge of turning official targets into lived reality.
Transactions are soaring, policies sound ambitious, and the promise of a US$15 billion digital economy by 2030 is on paper. Yet, many in the industry worry that the slow pace of government implementation may turn these dreams into moving targets.
The Central Bank’s latest data shows a surge in digital payments. In the first quarter of 2025, LankaPay’s online platform processed more than 404 million transactions, up nearly 48 per cent from a year earlier, with values almost doubling to Rs. 586 billion.
Campaigns such as the Central Bank’s Digital Payments Promotion effort and fee waivers by private banks like HNB dropping charges on LANKAQR transactions are nudging both merchants and consumers toward cashless habits.
Government leaders have gone on record with bold pledges. The Digital Economy Strategy 2030 sets out to build a $15 billion digital economy contributing 12 per cent of GDP. Deputy Minister of Digital Economy Eranga Weeraratne has described the goal as “ambitious but necessary”, pointing to digital infrastructure as the foundation for every future reform.
Specific targets are equally bold: 95 per cent financial inclusion, $100 million in fintech investment, doubling SME digital adoption, and boosting fintech graduate employment from 10 to 25 per cent.
But behind these targets lies a million dollar question: how? Fintech trade voices identify slow-moving bureaucracy and policy inconsistency as the main hindrances.
“The ecosystem is ready, but the officials have typically tied hands,” said one fintech entrepreneur, citing delays in approvals, cumbersome regulation, and shifting policy priorities that leave investors gun-shy.
Cash remains the unchallenged king of small transactions, and debit cards are employed more for withdrawing cash than making digital transactions. Rural connectivity gaps and device affordability pose other barriers
While initiatives like cross-border QR interoperability with Alipay+ may bring a tourism boost, the deeper structural change SME onboarding, human capital training, and investor confidence requires consistent and timely execution.
This is where critics say government machinery falls short. Strategies are written, but implementation often lags behind. The World Bank’s note on Sri Lanka’s digital ambitions highlighted the importance of coordination, yet domestic agencies still struggle to move in promptly.
Currently, the momentum is in evidence in numbers, but to maintain it takes more than advertising campaigns.
Unless bureaucratic bottlenecks are removed, the risk is that Sri Lanka will progress incrementally but fail to achieve its goals of transformation.
The 2030 digital economy vision is not impossible, but it demands a pace of delivery that the country’s slow policy machinery has yet to prove it can muster.
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