It’s not easy to walk a few hundred yards in Sri Lanka without seeing some form of cricket being played, the sport unquestionably fascinates and grips the country.
Team Tourism had developed a penchant for getting involved with cricket matches during the week and managed to organise a match against the local team. On Friday morning all the boys, decked out in Durham Uni polo shirts, headed off in a minibus to the local cricket ground to take on Weligama’s finest. In true British style we took to the pitch in the searing heat of the midday sun and this, together with an obvious lack of talent, led to an utterly catastrophic defeat at the hands the skilful Sri Lankans (so much so there was time for us to play a second game!).

Most of the group then headed over to the beautiful nearby beach at Marissa to spend the afternoon and wile away the final few hours on what had been a fantastic trip. The next day we waved goodbye to our excellent hosts at Jaga Bay hotel and begun to reflect upon our experience during the rather gruelling 28 hour trip back to the UK.

I think almost everyone that travelled to Sri Lanka was struck by the overwhelming hospitality of the people and the beauty of the area we visited. Although all the groups studied various different topics and identified numerous areas for ‘improvement’, we also realised that the people were happy and had no burning desire change the way they led their lives. Who are we necessarily to impose our western values of ‘more is good’?

As far as cinnamon is our project looking at the application of fair trade in cinnamon is concerned, our concluding thoughts centred on other options. Foremost amongst these was the opportunity for the industry in Sri Lanka to capture more of the value that is being generated by the supply chain through processing. The price that raw cinnamon fetches in the Colombo wholesale market constitutes only a miniscule fraction of retail price in your local supermarket.

This trip undoubtedly forms one of the highlights of our MBA programme and we look forward to hearing about the experiences of future MBA students in Weligama.