COLOMBO — More than 200 officials from Sri Lanka's central bank, licensed financial institutions, corporate entities, and public sector bodies have completed training in applying the country's Green Finance Taxonomy, part of a European Union-funded effort to direct more financing toward environmentally sustainable projects.
The taxonomy, developed by the Central Bank of Sri Lanka and published in May 2022, sets out a framework for classifying which economic activities count as environmentally sustainable across the public and private sectors. It is intended to guide lending and investment toward green, climate-resilient projects, but it has required supporting tools and guidance before financial institutions could apply it in practice.
The latest push followed a request from the governor of the central bank to the E.U.-funded Green Recovery Facility Project. Expertise France, the French government's technical cooperation agency, took up the work in collaboration with the central bank's Macroprudential Surveillance Department.
The initiative was carried out in two phases, according to the Central Bank. The first phase identified priority areas and assessed where institutions lacked the capacity to apply the taxonomy. The second phase produced practical tools, including reporting guidelines, sector-specific guidance, and a screening tool.
After those reporting guidelines were validated, a series of capacity-building and awareness sessions was held in May 2026. The sessions covered reporting requirements, guidelines for developing green financial products, and the tools created under the initiative, and drew participants from the central bank, financial institutions, corporate firms, accreditation and certification bodies, and public sector institutions.
The central bank's board has approved the framework, and officials said all related materials would be made publicly available.
The European Union has framed its support as part of a broader partnership with Sri Lanka under its Global Gateway and Indo-Pacific strategies, which prioritize a green economic recovery alongside governance and rule-of-law objectives. That cooperation is set out in the bloc's Multiannual Indicative Programme for the country.
