Investment in education appears to be related to people’s success in making many decisions concerning
their working life. Higher education, in particular, promotes more efficient decision making processes
related to labour market through the acquisition of information that has a positive impact on occupational
choices. As a consequence, the labour market situation of higher education graduates is better, in general,
than that of non-graduates through various aspects. Therefore, higher education has to play a vital role in
the economy by supporting the country’s economic objectives as well as in diffusing and applying new
knowledge and developing a qualified indigenous labour force. Labour force participation is one of the
key labour market measurements in an economy and it gives an indication of how many people of
working age actively engaging in labour market. The majority of the population of Sri Lanka consists of
women but their participation in the labour force has been comparatively lower than men. However, there
is some gap between men and women participation in labour force and existing statistics reveals that
female labour force participation is quite low. In 2012, the male labour force participation was around
66.8 percent while its equivalent female labour force participation stood at 29.9 percent. The participation
of women in labour force is still considered low although it has substantially increased over the years.