The Central Bank has identified 19 cities in 11 countries for an aggressive campaign to persuade expatriate Lankans living there to bring their foreign exchange savings back to Sri Lanka.

Speaking to the Sunday Island from Kuala Lumpur where he was attending a regional meeting of Central Bank Governors, Mr. Ajit Nivard Cabraal said that responses up to now have been "excellent."

"We have teams right now in Canada, the US, UK, France, Abu Dhabi and Dubai," he said. "This week we have people in Australia and New Zealand pushing this effort."

Cabraal said that money was already flowing in and expatriate Lankans were already in the process of opening accounts.

"This is happening quite rapidly," he said.

A Sri Lankan doctor who lives in Australia and comes here frequently has been e-mailing expatriate friends pointing out that "we are getting less and less interest on our fixed deposit investments from the banks in Australia."

He said that within the last three months annual rates have dropped from 7.5% to 3.6% and more cuts are anticipated during the next few months.

Pointing out that this will cause sleepless nights, depression, illnesses and anger in families and also lead to restriction of lifestyles, he said that people of Lankan descent living in Australia had a solution.

This was to take advantage of the 5% tax-free interest offered by commercial banks here for holdings in NRFC accounts. He expected that unlike in Australia, it was most likely that the rates in Sri Lanka will go up as the Central Bank was on a campaign to persuade expatriates of Lankan descent to invest their money in these accounts.

"Central Bank of Sri Lanka guarantees 100% security and safety for such accounts and one could move these accounts elsewhere at will with no restrictions," he said. "Please give serious thought to this as I have. Remember you are also helping the land of your birth of which you have many happy memories."