• A growth rate of 9% is essential to generate enough jobs and achieve universal prosperity, according to a vision document released by NITI Aayog.
  • An annual rate of growth of 9% by 2022-23 is essential for generating sufficient jobs and achieving prosperity for all.
  • Later in the report, NITI Aayog said the target should be 8% growth over the period 2018-23.
  • This will raise the economy’s size in real terms from $2.7 trillion in 2017-18 to nearly $4 trillion by 2022-23.
  • Besides having rapid growth, it is also necessary to ensure that growth is inclusive, sustained, clean and formalised.
  • On boosting economic growth, the document identified two key steps for increasing the country’s investment rate and the tax-GDP ratio.
  • To raise the rate of investment (gross fixed capital formation as a share of GDP) from about 29% in 2017-18 to about 36% of GDP by 2022-23, a slew of measures will be required to boost both private and public investment.
  • India’s tax-GDP ratio of around 17% is half the average of OECD countries (35%) and is low even when compared to other emerging economies like Brazil (34%), South Africa (27%) and China (22%).
  • To enhance public investment, India should aim to increase its tax-GDP ratio to at least 22% of GDP by 2022-23.
  • While demonetisation and GST have and will continue to contribute positively.
  • Efforts need to be made to rationalise direct taxes for both corporate tax and personal income tax.
  • There was a need to ease the tax compliance burden and eliminate direct interface between taxpayers and tax officials using technology.
  • In agriculture, emphasis must shift to converting farmers to ‘agripreneurs’ by further expanding e-National Agriculture Markets (e-NAMs) and replacing the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) Act with the Agricultural Produce and Livestock Marketing (APLM) Act.
  • The creation of a unified national market, a freer export regime and abolition of the Essential Commodities Act are essential for boosting agricultural growth.
  • A strong push towards ‘Zero Budget Natural Farming’ (ZBNF) techniques that reduce costs, improve land quality, and increase farmers’ incomes.
  • In the infrastructure section, it said the share of freight transported by coastal shipping and inland waterways will be doubled by 2022-23.
  • Initially, viability gap funding will be provided until the infrastructure is fully developed.
  • An IT-enabled platform would be developed for integrating different modes of transport and promoting multi-modal and digitised mobility
  • In order to enhance rural connectivity and access to government programmes,by the end of 2019 all 2.5 lakh gram panchayats will be “digitally connected” under the Bharat Net programme.
  • In the next phase, the last mile connectivity to the individual villages will be completed.
  • The aim will be to deliver all government services at the State, district, and gram panchayat level digitally by 2022-23, thereby eliminating the digital divide

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