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Subasinghe, Shalika

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Last updated: June 11, 2025
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Shalika Subasinghe is a consultant working with the World Bank Education Global Practice and Social Protection & Jobs Global Practice in the South Asia Region. Her most recent work focuses on projects and analytical work relating to early childhood development, skills development, jobs, demographic transition, public expenditure reviews, and social safety nets in Sri Lanka, and pension and social protection in the Maldives. Previously, she has published in the fields of marketing, consumer behavior, and education. Prior to joining the World Bank, she worked for Distance Learning Center Ltd, the Sri Lankan node of the World Bank’s Global Development Learning Network, as the learning and development manager, as well as in several universities in Australia and Sri Lanka where she lectured at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels. She is a Fulbright Scholar and holds a master’s in business administration from the University of New Hampshire (United States), a graduate certificate in university teaching and learning from Charles Sturt University (Australia), and a bachelor of commerce from the University of Colombo (Sri Lanka).

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    Enhancing Skills in Sri Lanka for Inclusion, Recovery, and Resilience
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-12-07) Sosale, Shobhana; Hong, Seo Yeon; Subasinghe, Shalika; Herat, Hiran
    Sri Lanka has confronted and is grappling with a number of exogenous shocks, including the devastating 2004 tsunami; the 2008 global recession; the COVID-19 global pandemic; and, more recently, the ongoing “triple crisis” (fuel, food, fiscal). The country is now at a crossroads. An ongoing process of strengthening skills and improving education will be crucial to Sri Lanka’s economic recovery. Sri Lanka is transitioning from a rural-based to a modern, urbanized economy, and better jobs are being created, especially in services. To remain globally competitive, the Sri Lankan workforce must gain the technical competencies and higher-order cognitive skills that meet the needs of local and foreign labor markets. As a result, Sri Lanka will need to transform its current skills development system and processes to align them to emerging jobs; improve their market relevance; and develop an effective, inclusive, and accessible education and training system for skilling, reskilling, and upskilling the stock and flow of the workforce. "Enhancing Skills in Sri Lanka for Inclusion, Recovery, and Resilience" addresses these urgent issues and provides recommendations for educators and policy makers.
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    Enhancing STEM Education and Careers in Sri Lanka
    (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-06-20) Subasinghe, Shalika; Sosale, Shobhana; Aturupane, Harsha; Holtz, Paul; O’Malley, Ann
    In recent decades, the Sri Lankan government has introduced reforms aimed at enhancing education access and quality, as well as emphasizing the importance of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), which are crucial fields for economic development and social inclusion. “Advancing STEM Education and Careers in Sri Lanka” examines how access to STEM education can affect enrollments at various levels (lower, upper secondary, higher education, and technical and vocational training) and careers in the labor market. The report also analyzes STEM education status by gender at the central, provincial, and district levels, and it highlights factors that enable and hinder the achievement of desired outcomes. The report offers a wide range of interventions to boost student access and teacher training, including developing digital learning materials and technology-based tools to broaden service delivery, facilitate learning, and support an inclusive public education system. In addition, it proposes policy options at the central and provincial levels. The findings and recommendations can be used to guide policy and investments to achieve the country’s potential to expand human capital, foster inclusion, contribute to economic development and competitiveness, promote recovery from the economic crisis, and build resilience.
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    Maldives Development Update, April 2014
    (World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-04) Gomez Osorio, Camilo; Abeygunawardana, Kishan; Sun, Changqing; Subasinghe, Shalika
    Real GDP growth in Maldives stood at 3.7 percent in 2013 and its outlook is positive at 4.5 percent for 2014. The tourism demand is slowly picking up and has a positive impact on growth in the non- tourism sectors. Chinese tourists continue to compensate for the weaker demand from Europe, but overall the length of stay has declined, as well as spending per tourist. Growth while dynamic was less inclusive, as the tourism industry is operating on an enclave model of development. The share of GDP from the primary sector, agriculture, mining and fisheries that employ the largest share of Maldivians in the outer atolls, was less than 0.3 percent of GDP in 2013. Loose fiscal policy in a context of moderating economic growth has led to rising macroeconomic imbalances. While revenue collection has been strong, over the past five years the gap between revenues and expenditures has widened, financed through unsustainable levels of public debt at increasing interest rates. The 2014 Budget comes with a record high envelope of MVR 17.95 billion (around 50 percent of GDP), about MVR 3 billion in new revenue measures, and an estimated 3.2 percent financing gap. Financing such high level of spending and meeting this ambitious financing gap would be difficult. Cash management will be tight through 2014. Inflation moderated to 6 percent in 2013 in 2013 although food inflation remained high.