Plans to regulate wellness tourism in Sri Lanka

An article in the Sunday Observer describes the ongoing work, led by the Sri Lanka Export Development Board (EDB), to develop standards and regulation for the wellness tourism sector in the country. Within this sector, the EDB includes Ayurveda, the Western medical sector, yoga, meditation, spa and relaxation activities.

The article states that the Department of Ayurveda has drafted regulations to ensure quality, standards and safety. There will also be accreditation and guidelines for ayurvedic practitioners. With a view to ensure credibility of service, an Act will soon be introduced with specific rules and regulations.

The EDB is working in collaboration with the Department of Ayurveda to develop National Standards/Regulations for Ayurveda Private Healthcare Institutions to regulate the industry. According to this process, the Department of Ayurveda has now developed the ‘Draft Rules and Regulations on Traditional Medicine (Medical Tourism) Institutions’ (under Section 10 of the Ayurveda Act, No. 31 of 1961).

The article quotes Deputy Director, Technical-Medical, Ministry of Health, Nutrition and Indigenous Medicine, Dr. T. Weerarathna. A pilot project to set up wellness centres is currently underway to promote the sector in a regulated environment, he said.

The article also says that practitioners in the wellness tourism industry have endorsed the formation of the Sri Lanka Wellness Tourism Association (SLWTA).

The article explains that EDB has identified the health sector as a prominent export sector, and in 2017, the sector selected as the key focus sector in National Export Strategy (NES). The Wellness Tourism Strategy was developed as part of the NES of Sri Lanka with three main objectives with development and promotional activities in collaboration with the Ayurveda, Western medical and Tourism sector stakeholders.

  • The first objective concentrates on sector coordination and cohesion. The traditional wellness and the western medicine segments need clusters to organise and improve cooperation among stakeholders.
  • The second objective focuses on regulation and quality assurance through standardisation, licensing of activities and recognition of traditional healing in target markets and streamlining of institutional procedures.
  • The third objective focuses on gathering more information on the sector through more effective collection of statistics and sharing sector information, to the local population and to foreigners in target markets.