Sri Lanka approves free tourist visas for 35 countries including Thailand, Malaysia

By Reuters August 22, 2024 | 12:04 am PT

A surfboard is seen in the middle of an empty beach, near hotels at Unawatuna beach in Galle, Sri Lanka, July 4, 2019. Photo by Reuters

Sri Lanka's cabinet approved issuing free tourist visas to visitors from 35 countries including China, India and Russia and several Southeast Asian economies, a top official said on Thursday, in an effort to boost tourism and help revive its crisis-hit economy.

Tourists will be given 30-day visas under a six-month pilot program that will start from Oct. 1, said Cabinet spokesman and Transport Minister Bandula Gunawardana.

"The aim of the government is to transform Sri Lanka into a free visa country, much like Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam to tap into the benefits of a rapidly growing tourism industry," Gunawardana told reporters at a weekly cabinet briefing.

The extensive list includes Australia, Belgium, China, Denmark, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Nepal, Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Thailand, UAE, and U.K.

The country of 22 million people, famed for its beaches, ancient temples and aromatic tea, saw its tourism industry pummeled first by the Covid pandemic and then by a severe financial crisis in 2022 that saw mass scale protests and shortages of essentials such as fuel.

But the tourism industry is reaping the benefits of a turnaround that began last year with Sri Lanka clocking nearly 2 million arrivals by mid-August, for the first time since 2019.

The island is expecting to close the year at 2.3 million arrivals.

India is the largest source of tourists with 246,922 arrivals, followed by the U.K. with 123,992, latest data from the Sri Lanka Development Authority showed.

Sri Lanka earned $1.5 billion from tourism in the first six months of 2023, up from $875 million dollars during the same period last year, according to the central bank.