Reiterating that Telangana is making good progress after coming into being in 2014, an Assocham study said the investment growth rate in the newest State during the past three years (2014-17) has been 68.5 per cent compared to the national average of 20.8 per cent.
Releasing the findings of a study – ‘Telangana: Economic Growth and Investment Performance, on Thursday here, its national secretary general DS Rawat and senior managing committee Babu Lal Jain said that Telangana had attracted total outstanding investments worth about Rs. 5.9 lakh crore as of March 2017. For comparison, Telangana, which was one of the three regions in the undivided Andhra Pradesh, secured Rs. 3.3 lakh crore worth of investments as of March 2012.
Telangana accounted for 3.3 per cent share in total investments worth Rs. 177 lakh crore attracted by the top industrial States across India for 2016-17, said the study by the Assocham Economic Research Bureau.
In terms of year-on-year growth in investment, Telangana (as part of Andhra Pradesh) had seen a 0.6 per cent growth in 2012-13 and 5.6 per cent in 2013-14. The growth in investment was 24 per cent in 2014-15 (after the State is bifurcated), 22 per cent in 2015-16 and about 12 per cent in 2016-17.
Over a fourth of the total investments attracted by Telangana are in the irrigation sector (28 per cent) as of March 2017. It is followed by non-financial services (25 per cent), electricity (18.5 per cent) and manufacturing (11 per cent). About 370 projects with investments worth about Rs. 4 lakh crore of the total investments attracted by the State are under different stages of implementation, said the study which analysed multiple growth parameters.
The under-implementation rate of projects was 78 per cent in 2015-16 and has reduced to 66 per cent in 2016-17. Nationally, it remained constant at 54 per cent for the past two years.
The study said the State’s economy accounted for over four per cent of share gross value added (GVA) across India as of March 2017. It said Telangana has outperformed the national average in terms of economic growth. The State recorded 8.5 per cent growth in 2016-17 when compared to the national average of 6.6 per cent during the same period. Agriculture recorded about 15 per cent year-on-year growth in 2016-17 after registering an over six per cent in 2015-16. It had shown a negative growth of ten per cent in 2014-15 due to deficit rainfall.
In services, the State recorded a ten per cent growth in 2016-17 compared to 8.4 per cent (in the region as part of AP) in 2012-13. The State’s industrial growth was 10 per cent in 2015-16 and 4.1 per cent in 2016-17 even as it registered a negative growth of 7.5 cent in 2014-15.
“The State is doing well in terms of growth. However, sustaining the growth will be a challenge and that should be the focus,” said Rawat.
Fast tracking irrigation projects, improving productivity and yield in agriculture through public-private partnerships and developing industrial sector will be key. The State should design policies to lure investments in biotechnology, solar energy, tourism to generate more employment opportunities for the youth, he suggested.
Source: Telangana Today