India will roll out further measures to protect growth and jobs as the global economic slump worsens, the acting finance minister said on Friday, days after a survey showed firms sacked half a million workers in the December quarter. Pranab Mukherjee, also the country's foreign minister, said India's economy was expected to grow 7 percent in the 2008/09 fiscal year, far slower than the previous year's 9 percent.
But he warned the ferocity of the global crisis was not showing any signs of abating. "When necessary, the government will take further steps to ensure that labour intensive sectors are less adversely affected," he told a news conference. India's government has cut interest rates, slashed duties and pledged extra spending to prime the economy and stem job losses as it prepares for general elections due by May.
A government survey released on Wednesday showed 500,000 workers lost their jobs in the December quarter, while an export lobby group projected the figure to climb to 10 million in the year to March-end.
Mukherjee is scheduled to present the government's interim budget in parliament on February 16, and Indian industry expects more stimulus measures for a slowing economy. Mukherjee said Asian nations have the capacity to take contra-cyclical steps to drive their economies forward on the strength of domestic demand and called for closer regional co-operation.
"A regional financial architecture, drawing upon the high currency balances in Asia, would mitigate the severity of the economic crisis for us," he said, adding a co-ordination mechanism could help improve surveillance and prevent another crisis.