On 29th of January 2018, the Economic Survey India 2018 was tabled in the parliament by the minister of finance under the guidance of the Chief Economic Advisor, it was also released to the press and for the common public. Usually, the Economic survey is produced one day before the budget is tabled in the parliament but this time it has been tabled three days earlier.
Cabinet Minister of Ministry of Finance: Shri Arun Jaitley
Focus Area: Education, Employment and Agriculture
Real GDP (2017-18): 6.75% (expecting growth rate for this fiscal year)
GDP prediction (2018-19): 7-7.5%
Pink Color Economic Survey
The pink color theme refers to gender equality and women empowerment.
Shri Arun Jaitley shows special focus on Son Meta preference and gender.
The survey suggests three basics dimensions of gender:
Agency: Agency related to decisions related to their own health, household purchase, visit family and relatives, own earnings, and decision about contraception
Attitude: Attitude related to violence against women, ideal number of daughters relatively ideal number of sons
Outcome: outcome related to son preference studied by sex ratio of last child, female employment, education level, choice of contraception, marriage age, birth of a first child and physical or sexual violence faced by women
Outlook for Economic Survey India 2018:
12% growth in GST revenues with better buoyancy than previous taxes; GST council shows that cooperative federalism is a technology for reforms in several other areas.
The ratio of domestic saving to GDP reached 29.2 % in 2013 to a peak of 38.3 % in 2007, before falling back to 29 % in 2016, the post which it has been growing due to demonetisation.
India’s agriculture sector is likely to grow at 2.1 % in 2017 – 18 followed by industry at 4.4 % and services at 8.3%.
India’s understanding of the private sector has moved away from ‘crony socialism to stigmatized capitalism’.
Policy vigilance is needed in the coming year if high oil prices persist or stock prices correct sharply. Rising oil prices affect consumption and hold back real economic activity.
Growth is picking up because the temporary impact of demonetisation has dissipated. Exports have picked up and manufacturing sector growth is about 11.3%. India’s external sector to remain strong on likely improvement in global trade
Tech-Enabled initiatives to bring transparency and accountability for enforcement of labour laws. As India emerges as one of the largest economies, it needs to gradually move from being a net consumer of knowledge to becoming a net producer.
Swachh Bharat initiative improved sanitation coverage in rural areas from 39% in 2014 to 76% in January 2018.
Food grains productions have increased but due to the growing migration of Men, Feminization of Agriculture sector is there. India also celebrates women’s farmer day.
Need to address the issues of pendency, delays and backlogs in the appellate and judicial arenas towards Ease of doing business. Tax departments have a large number of cases filed and poor success rate.
On the Ease of doing business, the economic survey highlights that India has leapt 30 ranks over its previous rank of 130 in the World bank’s latest doing business report 2018.
Credit rating company Moody’s investors’ services have also raised India’s rating from the lowest investment grade of Baa3 to Baa2.
Growth in the Indian economy is due to investments, not due to savings.
Consistent rise in Jan Dhan accounts indicates financial inclusion at the lowest levels. Fall in zero balance accounts indicates increasing use of banking services.