Sheryl Sandberg once said “When it comes time to settle down, find someone who wants an equal partner. Someone who thinks women should be smart, opinionated and ambitious. Someone who values fairness and expects or even better, wants to do his share in the home.” When marriage bars the doors of opportunities for some girls, for Chairperson of Royal Touch Ceylon Tea and Ingine Lanka, Dr. Farida S. Bondarenko it was quite the opposite.
Her marriage paved the way for her to emerge as a businesswoman who ushered novel ideas into the business world dominated by men. Born in Colombo, receiving her education at Good Shepherd Convent she did not have time to pursue a career because of her early marriage. Yet she was able to uncover her talents in Russia as she accompanied her husband, a Russian Diplomat. Daily News Business this lady who is also an international business and investment consultant.
Q: How did you experience Russia at first, when you arrived there?
A: In 1998, I married a Russian diplomat and went to Moscow with him. It was at the end of August, when we arrived at Sheremetyevo Airport, that the Russian authorities announced a default - one of the most severe economic crises in the history of Russia. In addition to internal reasons, the crisis was influenced by two significant external factors: a sharp decline in world prices for fuel and energy complex goods (and Russia has always depended on their prices) and the crisis in Southeast Asia, which broke out in mid-1997. Without going into details, I will say that the crisis has undermined the confidence of foreign investors and the population in Russian banks and the state as a whole, the ruble has been devalued. Millions of people lost their savings, thousands of enterprises went bankrupt. The banking system was paralyzed for at least six months, and several major banks declared bankruptcy.
Q:How did you respond to this situation?
A: For a year,like everyone in Moscow, I was in a state of shock. But the shock passed, it was necessary to do something, find solutions from the created difficult situation. Having met with leading Russian politicians and businessmen, in 2000 I created the All-Russian Fund for Afro-Asian Development. I must say that in order to register the name “All-Russian Foundation” with the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation, it was necessary to open its representative offices in more than 40 regions of Russia. We have been doing this for almost two years.
Q: What is the main focus of All-Russian Foundation?
A: We focused on investments in the Russian regions: the regions were in urgent need of the latest foreign technologies of developed countries. The trade-in timber, hydrocarbons, oil and coal was successful. At the same time, Russian products in the field of mechanical engineering, machine tool construction, chemistry, and even the automotive industry were well bought by partners in Africa. Two years later, we decided to stop the work of the Fund, focusing only on cooperation with the countries of Northeast Asia. Even then, this region became a driver of global economic growth, and these countries began to be called “Asian Tigers”.
Direct dialogue with our Asian partners, who have become the most powerful industrial holdings with advanced technologies and huge investment and financial potential, has allowed us to find completely new ways of organising, managing and subsequently putting into effect mechanisms for foreign trade cooperation. Northeast Asia produces almost the entire range of modern products-from sophisticated equipment to light industry and agricultural goods.
Thanks to our work, Russian businesses have the opportunity to directly attract the capital of the Asian Tigers, implement their own investment and trade programs, and effectively use foreign trade and exhibition sites. Including, and maybe, first of all, electronic ones. It is no secret that we used the weak side of officials who work abroad - bureaucracy and disinterest in the result. A private company can do this much more efficiently and faster. However, you have to pay money for this.
Q: How did it make you feel to be a woman in business in another country?
A: Work has never scared me. On the contrary, I like to solve difficult technological and organisational tasks. I had to fly a lot around Russia, and it is very big: from Moscow to Vladivostok, even by plane, you have to fly for more than 9 hours!
In 2003, I was offered to become a member of the Club of the Council of Entrepreneurs under the Mayor and the Government of Moscow. It was a great honour for me. I don’t know about it now, but then I was the first Sri Lankan member of this Club. In the same year, I became the “Hero of the Year” according to the magazine “Ogonyok” - one of the most popular Russian magazines. Together with me, Valentina Matvienko became the “ Politician of the Year”. To this day, she is the Speaker of the Federation Council (the Upper House of the Russian Parliament), a Senator from St. Petersburg. It was then that I first received an invitation from her to this city, which I loved and accepted with all my heart.
In Russia, I began to be called the “Ceylon Princess” because I never forgot about my homeland. I used my popularity to promote Ceylon tea, together with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation and I also published a unique book “Russians in Ceylon” which includes rare documents from Russian archives that have never been published before about Russian-Ceylon diplomatic, trade and economic relations. The book aroused great interest - after all, the great Russian writers Chekhov, Bunin, and the last Emperor of Russia, Nicholas, visited Ceylon. I think, after reading it, many Russians wanted to visit our amazingly beautiful country.
Q:You also worked in Korea. What kind of experience did you gain there?
A: In 2010 President Vladimir Putin sent my husband to South Korea as a Trade Representative of Russia. The first year or two I was quite bored because sitting and doing nothing is not in my nature. I sat down for textbooks and defended my dissertation in absentia at the Moscow University of Finance and Law. After three years of study, constant flights to Russia and back, in 2015, I finally received a PhD (law) on the topic of protecting the rights of migrants in Russia. This topic has interested me for a long time since my time at the University. Unfortunately, I didn’t work a single day in my specialty.
At one of the business meetings, we met with representatives of a Korean company that worked in the field of alternative, namely wave energy. They have just completed the testing of new technologies, received a patent and all the necessary licences. They were going to try them out in Indonesia. That is when I suggested them to try it out in Sri Lanka instead of Indonesia. I must say that at this time a real boom in the field of alternative energy began in Korea. The government has set a task to gradually get rid of coal and nuclear energy in the next 15 years and increase the share of renewable sources to 20 % by 2030, to become a carbon-neutral country by 2050. Already, by the end of 2020, the installed capacity of solar energy alone in South Korea was 16 Gwt7. Therefore, the task set by the Government - to reach the target of 30.8 GW in 2030-looked quite achievable.
Speaking at the 2019 AFORE World Forum on Renewable Energy on Jeju Island (Korea) I suggested that Korean and international investors pay attention to Sri Lanka, which has everything necessary for the development of energy using the sun, water and wind. By that time, we had already been working with Koreans in Sri Lanka for two years on wave energy and we had something to say to foreign investors and specialists. We continued this work by organizing the Korean-Sri Lankan Forum “Creating Opportunities for Sustainability, Digital Technology & Investments” in 2020, which was attended by the Ambassador of Sri Lanka to Korea and the Korean Ambassador to our country.
Now I am the head of the company Ingin Lanka, which I created, which actively advises foreign investors who want to work in Sri Lanka in the field of renewable energy and tries to attract the latest technologies and financial resources in this area to our country.
Q: Does your business interest extend only to cooperation with Korea?
A: Of course not. As the Vice-President of the Korean-Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, I often had to meet with many Russian businessmen. Of course, they often talked about the possibility of Russian business working in our country.
The fact is that until recently, Russia was not well known in the field of developing alternative energy technologies. This was quite understandable: Russia has enough oil, coal and gas, unlike, for example, Europe or the countries of Northeast Asia. But gradually the Russians came to understand the global trend: oil and coal may run out. In addition, harmful emissions from their combustion will sooner or later cause issues with their export. And they began to seriously engage in the development of this area. Russia has internationally recognized developments and technologies, successes that they are ready to share with Sri Lanka. Now, having returned from Korea after 10 years of work, I am negotiating with the largest Russian players in the field of renewable energy and I hope that our negotiations will lead to practical results, as it happened with the Koreans.
Q: Do you currently live in Russia?
A: I live “in three countries”: my husband and son live in Moscow, my daughter is completing a master’s degree at Yonsei University in Seoul, and my business is now mainly in Sri Lanka.
Do you only overlook the alternative energy projects in Sri Lanka?
No, not only. In 2014, I created the Royal Touch Tea company in Sri Lanka. Unfortunately, there is little tea drinking in Korea. They mostly drink coffee. But 180 million people live in the Eurasian Union, which was created after the collapse of the USSR. In all these countries including Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, tea is traditionally very popular!
Unfortunately, now the import of Ceylon tea from Russia has left the first position, losing to Indian and Chinese. Teas from Kenya, Vietnam, Indonesia appeared on the market. I would like to continue to promote Ceylon tea, promote not only my tea but also other Sri Lankan companies that produce this wonderful drink to the markets of the Eurasian Union. I know that our embassy in Moscow is doing a lot in this direction, but the fact remains that Russia is now only the third-largest importer of Ceylon tea in the world. We need to change this situation.
But tea is only a part of our trade turnover. I believe that the Russian-Lankan trade and economic cooperation has great prospects! Even though the trade turnover of our countries is quite small, almost $500 million (the maximum figure was $ 732.6 million in 2013), the potential is enormous. Russia supplies us with mineral products, oil and products of its processing, chemicals, wood, pulp and paper products.
I believe that a serious market is a supply of generating equipment (turbine, generator and boiler equipment, as well as transformers for hydroelectric power plants and thermal power plants ( potentially “Power machines”), the construction of power plants (presumably ROTEC), the supply of gas turbine and gas pumping equipment (presumably “ United Engine Company”). I know that Novatek is studying the possibility of implementing gas industry projects in Sri Lanka, Gazprom Neft is planning to supply petroleum products, and KAMAZ and UAZ are planning to cooperate in the field of transport. At a meeting with AndreyBoguinsky, the General Director of the Russian Helicopters company, we discussed the possibility of technical support for Russian-made helicopters operated in our country and the sale of new machines.
Sri Lanka, in turn, has repeatedly expressed interest in cooperation in the field of information and telecommunications technologies. The Sri Lankan business has repeatedly stated its interest in acquiring Russian agricultural machinery, trucks, tractors and various industrial devices, which, perhaps, can not only be imported but also assembled in Sri Lanka for further export to other countries.
I am sure that by localising their production in Sri Lanka, Russian manufacturers will be able to supply their goods to the territory of SAARC countries, as well as countries with which Sri Lanka has Free Trade Agreements. With this, they will be able to significantly reduce their logistics costs and customs fees.
Q: What do you think is holding back the growth of trade turnover?
A: The weak point in our trade, I believe, remains the ignorance or inability of Russian businessmen to participate in regional and state tenders of our country. Now our team is ready to take on not only the commercial representation of Russian exporters when participating in tenders, but also in organising business missions to Russia and Sri Lanka, exhibitions and providing consulting assistance on standardisation, certification and conformity assessment of products of Sri Lankan and Russian exporters.
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