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India Policy Forum 2011 and The IPF 2011 Lecture CHALLENGES FOR INDIA IN THE 12TH FIVE YEAR PLAN 2012-17 Mr. Montek Singh Ahluwalia Deputy Chairman, Indian Planning Commission

New Delhi, Delhi, July 14, 2011 /India PRwire/ -- The IPF 2011 Lecture on Challenges for India in the 12th Five Year Plan 2012-17 was delivered on Tuesday July 12th in New Delhi by Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Deputy Chairman of the Indian Planning Commission. The Annual IPF Lecture is part of the India Policy Forum that took place on July 12th and 13th, organized each year in New Delhi by NCAER (the National Council of Applied Economic Research) and the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C.

In his wide-ranging lecture, Mr. Ahluwalia noted that the Indian economy will enter the 12th Plan period in an environment of great promise, but the next five years will also be a period of major challenges. The economy has done well on the growth front during the 11th Plan, but not so well on inclusion. He said that the central and state governments will have a crucial role to play in providing a policy environment that is investor-friendly and supports inclusive growth, a growth that will have to be largely led by the private sector. Mr. Ahluwalia emphasized four critical challenges facing the economy in the 12th Plan that are more serious than they were at the start of the 11th Plan, (a) managing the energy situation, (b) managing the water economy, (c) addressing the problems posed by rapid urbanization, and (d) protecting the environment in a manner that facilitates rapid growth.

In response to a lively and engaged question and answer session that followed, Mr. Ahluwalia gave his views on a large number of topics ranging from the prospects for industrial growth to the future evolution of the financial sector. He noted in the context of improving the implementation of government schemes that more and more emphasis would have to be given to devolution. He said that he would be very happy if the 12th Plan is seen as having taken a decisive step in the direction of much more devolution.

The IPF 2011 Lecture started with a welcome by Dr Shekhar Shah, Director-General of NCAER. Dr Shah noted the immense importance of the type of research and conversations that IPF generated, adding that the partnership between NCAER and Brookings has now become a regular and high quality part of the debate on policy reforms in India.

Prior to his lecture, Mr. Montek Ahluwalia, Mr. Nandan Nilekani, President, NCAER's Governing Body, and Dr. Shekhar Shah released the 2010-11 IPF Volume with the collected papers from the IPF Conference held in July 2010.

The 2011 India Policy Forum is the eight in the series of annual conferences that brings together high-quality research on the Indian economy with the research then published in the IPF Volume. This research seeks to address issues related to the scope, speed and desirability of economic reforms within India and their fundamental impact on the country's social and economic welfare. The need for such real-time quantitative analysis is particularly pressing for India, which is in the process of rapid growth, structural change and increased involvement in the global economy.

The IPF 2011, held over July 12 and 13th, covered a range of topics, including India's food subsidy programs and their efficacy, approaches to universal health care, the efficacy of capital controls in India, the significance of food inflation, and the state ownership of banking. The IPF 2011 ended with a policy roundtable on the topic of how India can move to a set of subsidies that can work much more effectively for the poor.

Notes to Editor

About NCAER: NCAER, established in 1956, is an independent, non-profit policy research institute committed to assist government, civil society and the private sector in making informed, evidence-based policy and program choices and in implementing and evaluating them. NCAER is India's oldest and one of its largest public policy research institutes. NCAER faculty undertake research studies at the request of government, industry, and corporate clients and they pursue independent policy research on a number of priority themes. NCAER faculty and project teams have particular strengths in the analysis and collection of large-scale data at the national, state, sector, industry, firm, and household level. For more information about NCAER and its activities, please visit www.ncaer.org.

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NCAER (National Council of Applied Economic Research) recent press release(s)


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