Sri Lanka, April 10 -- Sri Lanka's public investment drive continues to be hampered by delays, with project execution heavily back-loaded and an average 50.3% of disbursements taking place in the fourth quarter during 2019-2024, according to insights shared at the 'Asian Development Outlook - April 2026' event held in Colombo yesterday.

The trend reflects persistent bottlenecks in procurement, land acquisition, feasibility assessments, and inter-agency coordination.

"Line ministries often lack the technical capacity to prepare bankable projects, while weak monitoring systems limit the timely identification of bottlenecks," officials noted.

Citing International Monetary Fund research, the discussion highlighted that a one percentage poi...