“Not concerned about economic competition, but about doubling farmers’ incomes”

SURESH PRABHU, Minister of Commerce and Industry

While addressing his session ‘India’s Role in the World’, Minister of Commerce and Industry, Suresh Prabhu, said India wasn’t really competing with China on economic growth. Instead, it was concerned about doubling farmers’ incomes in the next five years. When noted journalist Fareed Zakaria, who moderated the session, asked the minister how India planned to beat China in near term, Prabhu said: “We are not in competition with any other country in the world. India is growing at close to 8 per cent and by this rate it would be a $5 trillion economy in just a few years. We are not very much concerned about economic competition, but how to double farmers’ incomes in the next five years. Economic growth of 8 to 9 per cent in India will be a reality soon.”

Speaking on archaic labour laws, land acquisition and massive logistics costs in the country, Prabhu said: “For the first time, the government has created a logistics department in the commerce ministry and the department is working to make logistics 100 per cent digitalised to make sure logistics cost is down.” When a panellist asked whether India has any plan to introduce quota for women-owned business in the government contracts to promote them, the minister said: “Instead of giving reservations to women, we should empower them to earn on their own. If all the women in India get only minimum wage, the GDP of the country will rise by 1 to 1.5 per cent.”