Indian economy

Articles related to the Indian economy

Renault-Nissan announce entry into low-cost car market in India

The battle is intensifying to develop, manufacture and sell low priced family cars to meet the burgeoning demand from consumers in emerging markets. Renault and Nissan announced today that they are entering into a joint venture with the India firm Bajaj Motors to jointly build a $2,500 car to compete with Tata Motors’ Nano mode. A new 400,000 capacity plant is being built in Chakan, Maharashtra and the aim is to bring the car to the market in 2011.

The Decoupling Debate

The D word - ‘decoupling’ - is at the heart of the debate regarding global economic prospects for 2008 and beyond.

The term refers to the shift by developing economies - and newly industrialising countries in particular - away from dependence on strong demand in the West for their products. 

Learning Lessons from: Naina Lal Kidwai

Last night at The Worshipful Company of World Traders’ Annual Tacitus Lecture, Naina Lal Kidwai spoke on “India’s emerging role in the global economy”. She is the CEO of HSBC India, the first Indian woman to graduate from Harvard Business School, and Fortune magazine listed her as the 34th Top Women In Business. I’m sure you’ve all been learning about the “glass ceiling effect” in your Work & Leisure modules, and she is a perfect example of an outright defiance of that. 

Indian economic growth set to slow

This BBC news report provides a good short case study on some of the causes of an slowdown in an economy. The expected rate of real GDP growth for India is forecast to dip in 2008. ‘High Indian interest rates have led to a stronger currency that could make the country’s exports more expensive on world markets’ and ‘India is expected to slow slightly in the coming year as a severe US downturn saps demand for exports.’ The article also emphasises how, despite a rapid economic transformation in recent years, the living standards of nearly seventy per cent of India’s population remains tied to the fortunes of her agricultural sector. India has grown by 9.4% and 8.7% in the last two years more than twice the average growth for the world economy as a whole. Inflation is running at just over 4 per cent a year. Although the article suggests that a US downturn will hit the Indian export sector, only 2.3 per cent of her exports go to the USA a contrast to China whose exports to the States are 7.3 per cent of her global export sales. 

An Evening with an Inspirational Economist

Halfway through Jim O’Neill’s talk to the Keynes Society last night I realised properly for the first time in several years why I teach economics. There are few subjects that happen in real time, in internet time – and few where there are so many constantly changing issues to confront and events and trends to make sense of. We live in utterly fascinating times, and lying just beneath the surface of so many of the critical economic and geo-political debates is a seismic shift in the global economy’s Teutonic plates. The rise of the BRIC economies and the Next eleven (N-11) was the subject of an inspiring talk by the Managing Director & Head of Global Economic Research at Goldman Sachs. 

Wolf on a Waking Giant

Martin Wolf is always eminently readable on globalisation. His recent book ‘Why Globalisation Works’ is widely regarded as one of the most complete and authoritative jusifications for the current wave of globalisation. Martin is on good form in a special report in the Financial Times this week on India and Globalisation.

He writes

‘India is not China. Its development path has been very different and, so far at least, its global impact far smaller. But it is now more open to the world economy than at any time in its post-independence history and more economically dynamic than ever before. India’s decision in the early 1990s to embrace the world economy, as part of a wider embrace of the market economy, has led to an accelerating opening up of its economy. While its impact on the world is still relatively modest, it will continue to grow.The impact on India itself is less modest and growing fast. Both sides – India and the world – will need to get used to the experience: they will grow much closer together in the years ahead.’

At the heart of the article is a neat comparison and contrast between the economies of China and India in terms of

Exports of merchandise products
Exports and imports as a share of national income - a guide to trade openness
The scale of current account surpluses and foreign exchange reserves
Inflows and outflows of foreign direct investment
Control of exchange rates

Read the rest of his article here