The Hindu Business Line : `Reforms should follow agriculture, industry, service sequence'

Structural changes in economy should follow agriculture-industry-service sequence in order to improve employment. Jumping to services directly from agriculture is not the solution, Prof Mahendra Dev, economist and Director of CESS (Centre for Economic and Social Studies), said.

Delivering the keynote address at the `Retreat on rural development - Afro-Asian perspective' here, he said the country should strive for high agriculture growth of four per cent and a growth rate of 10 per cent in industry to achieve a better structural change.

He pointed out that India jumped from agriculture to services without concentrating on manufacturing.

Prof Mahendra Dev said it was important to have economic reforms in relation to socio-economic environment. "The economic reforms may not be sustainable if the burden falls disproportionately on the poorer sections of the population," he cautioned.

Safety nets

Talking on safety nets, he felt that these interventions were not a panacea for poverty reduction. These were only one component of the overall country's poverty reduction strategy.

Stating that targeting was crucial for the success of the safety net programmes, he felt the need for participatory approaches and social mobilisation to improve delivery of these interventions.

Mr Chandrasekhar Sahu, Union Minister of State for Rural Development, said the Afro-Asian nations needed to review the progress of measures to achieve the millennium development goals. "This is very important to evolve an action to achieve these goals," he said.

Growing gap

The Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, Dr Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, said there was a huge mismatch between growth of urban areas and rural areas. While growth rates in industries and services sectors, which were restricted to urban centres, were very high, growth of agriculture sector was very low.

"The benefits of economic growth taking place in urban areas are not percolating down to rural areas," he said.

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