Governance reforms to eliminate corruption and ensure equity in basic services like education, water and sanitation were urgently needed to sustain India's current rate of growth, a World Economic Forum (WEF) report said Saturday.
The report came on the eve of a three-day India Business Summit beginning in New Delhi on Sunday, with 700 business, political and civil society leaders from 36 countries to discuss the opportunities and challenges facing India's future business landscape. The conference is being organised by WEF in collaboration with the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).
The key themes to be discussed at the summit are competitiveness, inclusive growth, infrastructure and risk management to address key challenges to future growth, CIIpresident Sunil Bharti Mittal said.
India's External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Finance Minister P Chidambaram, Commerce Minister Kamal Nath and Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia are scheduled to address the meeting.
The India@Risk 2007 report, that examines six global risks critical to India's future, will be released at the summit. The report, jointly compiled by the WEF and CII, says India stands at a point where the prospect of sustaining 8-10 per cent growth is achievable, but a number of basic challenges acting as a handbrake on development need to be urgently addressed.
The government and civil society need to collaborate on reforms to eliminate corruption and ensure equity in provision of basic services such as education water and sanitation, the report says. "Much can be gained by removing constraints inherent in inefficient government bureaucracies, complex tax regulations and labour market rigidities," it says.
The report identifies six key risk areas facing India. These include population growth, a growing fresh water shortage, the need for public-private partnerships to shape appropriate water policies, the need to balance trade-offs between environment and growth, and the need for long-term policies to combat spread of high-mortality disease and pandemics in a country of over 1 billion people.
India's vulnerability to external economic turbulence like oil price peaks could also derail growth, the study says. "In the short term, three economic threats loom large: a rising rupee, an oil price shock and a collapse of asset prices (especially property or shares), triggered by a global re-appreciation of risk," Gareth Shephard of the WEF's Global Risk Programme said.
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