Faced with slowdown, the Planning Commission may lower the annual average growth target for the 12th Five-Year Plan (2012-17) to 8 per cent from 9 per cent envisaged earlier.

“The annual average growth rate in 12th Plan could be around 8 per cent. Achieving 8 per cent looks feasible,” the Minister of State for Planning, Mr Ashwani Kumar, said.

The Commission, he further, held a series of meetings to consider the impact of the global problems on the domestic economy and it was generally agreed that 9 per cent growth in the Plan, which began on April 1, 2012, would be difficult.

Hit by global woes and domestic problems, India’s economic growth rate slowed to a nine-year low both in the January-March quarter at 5.3 per cent as well as in 2011-12 at 6.5 per cent. In the current fiscal, the growth rate has been pegged at 7.6 per cent by the Government.

However, according to Mr Kumar, “the economic growth rate in 2012-13 would be around 7 per cent.”

In the Approach to 12th Plan, the Commission had said: “GDP growth target of 9 per cent for the 12th Plan is feasible from a macro-economic perspective ... we should aim for a average 9 per cent GDP growth rate in 12th Five Year Plan.”

In the Approach document, the Commission had projected the growth rate for 2011-12 between 8 to 8.3 per cent. On the basis of this projection, it has estimated the annual average growth rate at around 8.2 per cent during the 11th Plan.

Lower growth rate during 2011-12, the last year of the 11th Plan, would pull down the annual average for the entire five-year period.

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