CII Communique - December, 2010

india & the world
Ben J. Verwaayen, CEO, Alcatel-Lucent, France; Arvind Mayaram, Additional Secretary & Financial Adviser, Ministry of Rural Development,
India, Ellen Kullman; Om Prakash Bhatt, Chairman, SBI, India; Elisabeth Comstock, Senior Vice-President and Chief Marketing Officer, General
Electric Company, USA; Sriram Raghavan, CEO, Comat Technologies, India; and Nik Gowing, Main Presenter, BBC World News, UK
that need to be addressed, including poor infrastructure
and redundant labour laws. Mr Jim Quigley, Global
Chief Executive Officer, Deloitte, USA, felt that India
maintained an edge with respect to other Asian countries.
Mr Pradeep K Dhoot, President and Vice Chairman,
Videocon Industries, India; called for making the ‘Made in
India’ brand synonymous with quality and durability.
Speaking on ‘Actions for Modernizing India’s Agriculture
Sector’, Mr Bhupinder Singh Hooda, Chief Minister
of Haryana, said that declining farm output can be
attributed to fragmented land holdings, degradation of
soil, imbalanced use of fertilizers, inadequate availability
of quality seeds, poor mechanization, depletion of water
resources, knowledge gap and poor dissemination of
technology. There appears to be a technology fatigue
and the link between the laboratory and the field is weak.
In order to meet the technological gap, there is a need
for greater need public private partnership, he said.
According to Dr Ashok Gulati, Director, Asia, International
Food Policy and Research Institute, India needs to use
resources to invest in rural infrastructure such as roads,
which would be 8 to 10 times more productive than
giving subsidy in the form of free power. Dr Robert N.
Subbaraman, Chief Economist, Nomura International,
Hong Kong, felt that the
rise in food prices is a
structural issue, and supply
side bottlenecks need to be
addressed.
Mr Chengal Reddy, Co-
Chairman, Indian Farmers
and Industry Alliance, said
the potential of Indian
agriculture can only be
realized if there is greater
p a r t n e r s h i p b e t w e e n
David Tweed, International Economics Editor, Bloomberg Television;
Sunil Bharti Mittal; Rajat M. Nag, Managing Director-General,
Asian Development Bank, Manila; and Hari S Bhartia
industry and the farm sector. Mr Raj Jain, President
and CEO, Wal-Mart India, and Mr Jerry Steiner, Executive
Vice President, Monsanto Company, USA, were of the
view that the Indian agriculture sector has great potential;
however, restrictive legislation inhibits a partnership of
government and corporate sector.
Using the available sources of energy more frugally and
reducing wastage is the key to address the challenge
of energy scarcity and ensure its widespread availability.
This was the main takeaway from the plenary session
on ‘Empowering the Underpowered: Actions for Energy
Infrastructure’. The panelists were of the view that
information technology could help and that off-grid
solutions and proper pricing could promote energy
efficiency. To ensure availability, there is a need to reduce
the waste in the use of energy resources.
Technology can also play a key role in encouraging rural
entrepreneurship and generating greater employment in
rural areas, stressed the session on ‘Innovating Rural
Entrepreneurship towards Employment’. Mr. O P Bhatt,
Chairman, State Bank of India, said that the private sector,
the government, the banks and the non-bank institutions
must work together to achieve greater benefits for the
poor.
Mr. Arvind Mayaram,
Additional Secretary and
Financial Adviser, Ministry
of Rural Development,
India, expressed the need
for greater Public Private
Partnership to develop
entrepreneurship in rural
areas. The government
has been taking several
initiatives, which include
plans for connecting all the
12 | December 2010 Communiqué