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THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:The State government is for consensus on the problems being faced by the people Chief Minister Oommen Chandy has said.
Inaugurating an interaction session with selected college students from across the State on the Kerala Perspective Plan 2030 at the Old Assembly Hall here on Thursday Mr. Chandy said the government was for consensus on the growth plan.
The Chief Minister said there were no differences of opinion on the approach adopted by political parties for the State. Consensus was lacking on prioritisation of the needs.
The UDF government was for change and development without harming environment. The government was trying to formulate a growth plan for the next 20 years for overall development he said.
Mr. Chandy sought the cooperation and suggestions from the youth for the proposed growth plan.
The government would seek the suggestions from the youth before finalising the plan. Political consensus was also needed he added.
Deputy Leader of the Opposition Kodiyeri Balakrishnan said the projects should go on even if there was a change of government.
Vice-chairman of the Kerala State Planning Board K.M. Chandrasekhar presided over the function.
Planning Board members and Government Secretaries participated.
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:The draft of the State Planning Board ’s ambitious Kerala Perspective Plan 2030 was presented before vital stakeholders of the future namely students here on Thursday.
Around a 100 post-graduate students and researchers from various institutions across the state including those from the universities of Kerala and Calicut Central University at Kasargod College of Engineering Trivandrum Institute of Management Kerala participated in the programme.
“We are a passing generation and so the major stakeholders of this long-term plan are today’s youth” said K M Chandrasekhar vice chairman Planning Board which jointly organised the day’s event with the Institute of Parliamentary Affairs.
Following addresses by Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and Deputy Leader of Opposition Kodiyeri Balakrishnan a presentation on the Perspective Plan was made by a team from National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) one of India’s premier economic research institutions which prepared the Plan.
Aradhana Agarwal Professor of Economics Delhi University who represented NCAER explained to the students about the Plan including the highlights of the perspective Plan and its relevance and the proposals and challenges faced by each sector.
“It is uncertain whether Kerala’s current growth momentum can be sustained with the current business-as-usual approach for the next 20 years” she said.
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Kerala Perspective Plan-2030 prepared by the National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) raises a concern. The Kerala state might soon have to deal with the Dutch Disease a negative development trend pushed by several positive development indicators.
Dutch Disease is defined as development that results in a large inflow of foreign currency with an increase in exploitation of natural resources and a simultaneous decline in the manufacturing sector.
“Kerala has a growthrate of 8% at present but the state is still considered as investor-unfriendlywith negligible employment opportunities for the educated. At least 77% growth in Kerala comes from construction trade transport communication hotel and restaurants real estate ownership and other services but most of them are essentially low productivity sectors due to absence of competition economy of scale and technological advancement. It is thus assumed that after a point oftime these sectors will slow down and the growth rate will be pulled down below 4%” said Dr Aradhna Aggarwal senior fellow at the council.
The perspective plan is an initiative of the planning board that is being touted asa first in the country to evolve a consensus for long-term planning. The government had entrusted the council to prepare a draft which will form thebasis of the Vision-2030 programme launched by the UDF government.
DrAradhana said it was high time that Kerala found a strategic framework for sustainable and inclusive growth based on experiences on a global scale else the state would soon be under the threat of ‘Dutch Disease’. The number of unemployed youth has touched 40 lakh in the state and this will result in a paradoxical situation called ‘Resource Curse’.
The report pointed out that economic development requires continuous upgrading of resource allocationfrom low productivity to high productivity tradable sectors. The high productivity tradable sectors are characterised by technological progresscapital accumulation and economy of scale. However in Kerala growth is not accompanied by the required structural transformations either in the terms ofgross state domestic product or employment.
The draft Kerala PerspectivePlan 2030 says the state’s current rate of high economic growth in the range of about 10 percent cannot be sustained if it continues to depend solely onremittances from abroad and tourism.
The Perspective Plan which seeks to transform Kerala into a high income state by 2030 wants the state to opt for a course correction and adopt health and education as the new engines of growth.The draft said that the state had crossed the threshold of a lower middleclass income economy. So the livelihood approach should (now) be replaced by anentrepreneurial approach.
Prepared by the New Delhi-based think tank National Council of Applied Economic Research the plan was presented to MLAs at the Old Assembly hall here on Wednesday.
It says the main forces of consumption-driven Kerala’s growth are: remittances tourism and constructionactivities which are highly vulnerable to internal and external factors.
If these growth drivers slow down the state’s economic growth couldslow down to below 4 percent in the next 10 years. The social gains achieved by the state in the health and education sectors it noted have not translated into an economic growth for the state.
In this context the plan calls for transformation of the social sectors into productive sectors. For this the state should do global marketing of its social gains and create education and health hubs in each district.