Abstract:
Sri Lanka‘s rate of open unemployment compared with other countries in the Asian region
has been considerably high throughout the decades after 1950s. For solving this problem
industrialization was promoted, first, following import substitution industries and then,
particularly after 1977 adopting a policy of following export oriented industrialization. Most
of the industries started under this latter policy were labour intensive industries. Out of them
garment industry became the most prominent and absorbed a considerable rate of labour,
providing employment particularly for females. Now this industry has become highly
competitive since other similar countries such as Bangladesh, Vietnam etc. too have
expanded this industry and are competing with the Sri Lankan products in the same western
world markets. This study through literature review mainly identified low level of labour
productivity as the most significant factor that has greatly reduced the competitive strength of
the Sri Lankan garment industry. Accordingly, the study was carried out setting
five specific research objectives and condensing them into three major hypotheses.
Hypotheses were tested by collecting information taking a convenient sample of 98
operational grade workers in the garment factories in the Katunayake Free trade Zone,
through administering a questionnaire for which the validity and reliability were tested with
Cronbatch‘s Alpha method. In addition, various secondary data sources were also used. As
such a mixed methodology of inductive and deductive was employed in carrying out this
study.
The study going to a deeper level identified a number of factors which have contributed to
lessen the labour productivity particularly of operational level workers in the industry.
Accordingly, certain problems related to factory layout have mainly contributed to reduce the
labour productivity. Among other factors that have contributed to reduce productivity, the
study found that lesser degree of motivation prevailed among workers, high labour turnover,
less improvement of skills, inadequate salary levels and time based payment methods
including various harassments and suffering from poor working and living conditions.
Finally, study based on its research findings, a set of policy recommendations are given along
with suggesting some areas for further research to make the Sri Lankan garment industry to
be more competitive.
