Indian Economy : News,Discussions & Updates
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At $365 Billion, Tata Group's Market Value Is Now Worth More Than Pakistan's GDP
Tata Group's market capitalisation can now bigger than the entire economy of Pakistan as several companies of the conglomerate gave massive returns in one year. The market capitalisation of Tata Group stood at $365 billion while IMF estimated Pakistan's GDP to be almost $341 billion. Separately Tata Consultancy Services which is valued at $170 billion -India's second largest company- is roughly half the size of Pakistan's economy.
Tata market cap now bigger than the size of Pakistan's economy
Tata Group companies' market capitalisation stood at $365 billion. The IMF has estimated Pakistan's GDP to be around $341 billion.
India eliminates extreme poverty.
By Surjit S. Bhalla and Karan Bhasin
March 1, 2024- Data now confirms that India has eliminated extreme poverty.
- India should now graduate to a higher poverty line, which would provide an opportunity to redefine existing social protection programs in order to give greater support to the genuine poor.
Photo credit: Shutterstock/SNEHIT PHOTO
India has just released its official consumption expenditure data for 2022-23, providing the first official survey-based poverty estimates for India in over ten years. The previous official survey was conducted from 2011-12, and the absence of up-to-date data for India has added considerable uncertainty to global poverty headcount ratios.
Before presenting the results, a quick methodological note is in order. India has two different methods for estimating consumption expenditures: the Uniform Recall Period (URP) and the more accurate Modified Mixed Recall Period (MMRP). The URP method asks households questions on their consumption expenditures over a uniform recall period of 30 days. The MMRP asks household consumer expenditure on perishables (for example, fruits, vegetables, eggs) for the last 7 days, durable goods for the last 365 days, and expenditure on all other items for the last 30 days. India officially shifted to the MMRP, the standard in other countries, beginning with the 2022-23 survey, though it previously experimented with both methods.
Comparable poverty estimates for India are available for the period 1977-78 to 2011-12 using the URP method and from 2011-12 to 2022-23 using the MMRP method for the purchasing power parity (PPP)$ 1.9 (international extreme poverty) and PPP$ 3.2 poverty lines (recommended line by the World Bank for lower middle-income countries such as India).
What do the data show?
Growth: Real per capita consumption growth of 2.9% per annum (pa) since 2011-12; rural growth at 3.1% pa was significantly higher than urban growth of 2.6%.
Inequality: An unprecedented decline in both urban and rural inequality. The urban Gini (x100) declined from 36.7 to 31.9; the rural Gini declined from 28.7 to 27.0. In the annals of inequality analysis, this decline is unheard of, and especially in the context of high per capita growth. We offer some explanations below on why this may have happened, but more work will be required to fully explore the issue.
Poverty: High growth and large decline in inequality have combined to eliminate poverty in India for the PPP$ 1.9 poverty line. (Here we use the PPP$ 1.9 line [2011 prices] rather than the PPP$ 2.15 line at 2017 prices because the former closely corresponds to the official India Tendulkar poverty line.) The Headcount Poverty Ratio (HCR) for the 2011 PPP$ 1.9 poverty line has declined from 12.2 per cent in 2011-12 to 2 per cent in 2022-23, equivalent to 0.93 percentage points (ppt) per year. Rural poverty stood at 2.5% while urban poverty was down to 1%. For the PPP$ 3.2 line, HCR declined from 53.6% to 20.8% (almost 3 ppt per year). Note that these estimates do not take into account the free food (wheat and rice) supplied by the government to approximately two-thirds of the population, nor utilization of public health and education.
The data show a strikingly lower number of poor people in India, at both thresholds, than those estimated by the World Bank. That institution relied on the Consumer Pyramids Household Survey, a privately provided data source, to derive poverty numbers of 10% (at $1.90) and 45% (at $3.20) in 2020, despite well-known problems with that data explained by Bhalla, Bhasin and Virmani (2022).
Time for a higher poverty line
In the chart below, we show India’s HCR for both the 1.9$PPP and the 3.2$PPP from 1977-78. The change in slope of the HCR for the higher 3.2$ poverty line reveals the extent of inclusive growth experienced in India over the last decade.
Poverty HCR (2011 PPP 1.9$)
Poverty HCR (2011 PPP 3.2$):
Given the near elimination of extreme poverty, we outlined the need for India to transition to a higher poverty line in an earlier article. The decline in HCR for both the poverty lines illustrates this point, as we can see not much decline can occur at the lower poverty line. Incidentally, the decline in HCR at the higher poverty line is remarkable given that in the past it took 30 years for India to witness a similar decline in poverty levels as now witnessed over 11 years.
How and why the results
The relatively higher consumption growth in rural areas should not come as a surprise given the strong policy thrust on redistribution through a wide variety of publicly funded programs. These include a national mission for construction of toilets and attempts to ensure universal access to electricity, modern cooking fuel, and more recently, piped water. As an example, rural access to piped water in India as of 15th August 2019 was 16.8% and at present it is 74.7%. The reduced sickness from accessing safe water may have helped families earn more income. Similarly, under the Aspirational District Program, 112 districts of the country were identified as having the lowest development indicators. These districts were targeted by government policies with an explicit focus on improving their performance in development.
Key takeaways
Official data now confirms that India has eliminated extreme poverty, as commonly defined in international comparisons. This is an encouraging development with positive implications for global poverty headcount rates. This also means that time has come for India to graduate to a higher poverty line much like other countries. The transition to a higher poverty line provides an opportunity to redefine existing social protection programs particularly with the objective of better identification of intended beneficiaries and providing greater support to the genuine poor.
India eliminates extreme poverty | Brookings
Not sure how well a person can survive on 15k a year. Even if it's a family of 4, it's 60k a year. The same figures at $3.2 are 25k and 100k.
add all the freebies and you will find that it is possible. Education, medicine, healthcare, pakka house, wheat/rice, lentils are free and you get LPG subsidy plus 6k/annum in cash as a small farmer over and above the MNREGA. Education includes mid day meal plus cash for books and uniform for children. A family of five will end up paying only for vegetables, cooking oil and electricity provided they are living in a 2 room pakka house. two LED bulbs and two fans is all they need to pay for in cash besides 500/- for LPG cylinder. All this will not cost over 3k/month.
Cabinet Approves $1.3 Billion Outlay For 'India AI Mission'
The Union Cabinet on Thursday approved the 'India AI mission' with an outlay of Rs 10,371.92 crore for a period of five years, to give a further push for Artificial Intelligence in India. The announcement was made by Union Minister Piyush Goyal at a cabinet briefing, where he reiterated the need to have a robust environment for promoting the tech in the country.
"The IndiaAI mission will establish a comprehensive ecosystem catalyzing AI innovation through strategic programs and partnerships across the public and private sectors. By democratizing computing access, improving data quality, developing indigenous AI capabilities, attracting top AI talent, enabling industry collaboration, providing startup risk capital, ensuring socially impactful AI projects and bolstering ethical AI, it will drive responsible, inclusive growth of India's AI ecosystem," the government said in a release.
All set to be implemented by the ‘IndiaAI’ Independent Business Division (IBD) under Digital India Corporation (DIC), this mission is set to have eight components including IndiaAI Compute Capacity, IndiaAI Innovation Centre, a dataset platform among others. The government also plans to generate highly skilled employment opportunities with this mission.
As part of building a mega computing facility, the government aims to add AI compute infrastructure of 10,000 or more Graphics Processing Units (GPUs), built through public-private partnership. "Further, an AI marketplace will be designed to offer AI as a service and pre-trained models to AI innovators. It will act as a one-stop solution for resources critical for AI innovation," the government said.
Moreover, the innovation centres will undertake the development and deployment of indigenous Large Multimodal Models (LMMs) and domain-specific foundational models in critical sectors.
As for education in AI, the government plans to roll out IndiaAI FutureSkills, which is conceptualized to mitigate barriers to entry into AI programs and will increase AI courses in undergraduate, masters-level, and Ph.D. programs. Under the mission, the government will also set up Data and AI Labs in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities across India.
Cabinet approves 'India AI Mission' with an outlay of Rs 10,371.92 cr for five years
The Union Cabinet has approved a Rs 10,371.92 crore 'India AI mission' for five years to promote Artificial Intelligence in India. The mission aims to establish a comprehensive ecosystem for AI innovation, democratize computing access, improve data quality, develop indigenous AI capabilities...
Seems the cost for buying compute time on the cloud is going to get a lot cheaper for Indian AI startups.
forex reserves: India's forex reserves surge by $6.55 bn to $625.63 bn as of March 1 - The Economic Times
India's foreign exchange reserves have risen by $6.55 billion to reach $625.63 billion for the week ending March 1, as per the latest data from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). This follows a previous increase of $2.98 billion to $619.07 billion for the week ended February 23, 2024.
forex reserves: India's forex reserves jump to over two-year high of $636.1 bn - The Economic Times
India's foreign exchange reserves saw a substantial increase of $10.47 billion to reach $636.1 billion for the week ending on March 8, as per the latest data released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). This follows a previous surge of $6.55 billion, bringing the reserves to $625.63 billion for...
Yo !!! 
‘The Taste of India’ takes a big leap, launches fresh milk in the US
By Prashant Rupera / TNN / Updated: Mar 23, 2024, 09:32 IST
Amul expands to the US with fresh milk, planning to introduce various dairy products. Partnering with MMPA, the brand aims to fulfill Modi's vision of becoming a global dairy giant.
VADODARA: Just a month after Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked it to emerge as world’s largest dairy, ‘The Taste of India’ has taken a big leap by launching fresh milk in the USA. It is for the first time that Amul’s fresh milk range has been launched outside India.
The Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), India’s dairy giant, has partnered with the Michigan Milk Producers Association (MMPA), America’s tenth largest dairy cooperative, for this. The partnership was announced at the 108th annual meeting of MMPA held at Novi, Michigan on Thursday.
The partnership between GCMMF, the world’s largest farmer-owned cooperative, and the 108-year-old MMPA is a continuation of Amul’s relations with Michigan. Dr Verghese Kurien, the founder chairman of GCMMF who is credited for ushering in the White Revolution in India, was an alumnus of Michigan State University.
On February 22, Modi had asked farmers of Gujarat to turn Amul into world’s largest dairy while addressing a gathering at the golden jubilee celebrations of GCMMF at Narendra Modi stadium in Ahmedabad.
“We are very honoured and pleased to enter into an association with MMPA. This association will ensure all our American and Indian consumers are nourished and energized with the goodness of Amul milk,” Jayen Mehta, managing director of GCMMF, told TOI.
“It is our great pleasure to bring ‘The Taste of India’ to the world in alignment with the vision of the PM to make Amul a global dairy brand,” he said.
Amul has launched its range of fresh milk in one gallon and half a gallon packs under the same brand name and composition that is popular in India - Amul Gold (with 6% milk fat), Amul Shakti (with 4.5% milk fat), Amul Taaza (with 3% milk fat) and Amul Slim n Trim (with 2% milk fat).
The fresh milk variants will be available at leading Indian grocery stores throughout the East Coast and Midwest markets of the US.
After launching the fresh milk variants, Amul is planning to launch other dairy products, including curd, buttermilk and paneer, in the US market to cater to the ever-growing demand from the Indian diaspora there.
Following the launch of fresh milk variants, GCMMF will be also launching mass media campaigns, including its popular TV commercial ‘Doodh Doodh Piyo Glass Full Doodh’ in the USA.
Amul will be using MMPA’s superior technology for rolling out the fresh milk products in the USA. Established in 1916, MMPA is a member-owned and operated milk marketing cooperative known for producing high-quality, award-winning dairy products. MMPA serves members in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Wisconsin.
It has four certified processing facilities, including a cheese plant in Indiana, a dairy product plant in Ohio and two dairy ingredient plants in Michigan.
Amul brand with a turnover of more than US$10 billion handles more than 11 billion litres of milk every year. It exports its wide range of branded milk and milk products to more than 50 countries around the world, including the USA.
GCMMF — with 18 member unions in Gujarat having 3.6 million dairy farmers — procures 30 million liters of milk every day and processes it across 100 dairy plants in India and markets more than 50 categories of products.
‘the Taste Of India’ Takes A Big Leap, Launches Fresh Milk In The Us | Vadodara News - Times of India
‘The Taste of India’ takes a big leap, launches fresh milk in the US
By Prashant Rupera / TNN / Updated: Mar 23, 2024, 09:32 IST
Amul expands to the US with fresh milk, planning to introduce various dairy products. Partnering with MMPA, the brand aims to fulfill Modi's vision of becoming a global dairy giant.
VADODARA: Just a month after Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked it to emerge as world’s largest dairy, ‘The Taste of India’ has taken a big leap by launching fresh milk in the USA. It is for the first time that Amul’s fresh milk range has been launched outside India.
The Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), India’s dairy giant, has partnered with the Michigan Milk Producers Association (MMPA), America’s tenth largest dairy cooperative, for this. The partnership was announced at the 108th annual meeting of MMPA held at Novi, Michigan on Thursday.
The partnership between GCMMF, the world’s largest farmer-owned cooperative, and the 108-year-old MMPA is a continuation of Amul’s relations with Michigan. Dr Verghese Kurien, the founder chairman of GCMMF who is credited for ushering in the White Revolution in India, was an alumnus of Michigan State University.
On February 22, Modi had asked farmers of Gujarat to turn Amul into world’s largest dairy while addressing a gathering at the golden jubilee celebrations of GCMMF at Narendra Modi stadium in Ahmedabad.
“We are very honoured and pleased to enter into an association with MMPA. This association will ensure all our American and Indian consumers are nourished and energized with the goodness of Amul milk,” Jayen Mehta, managing director of GCMMF, told TOI.
“It is our great pleasure to bring ‘The Taste of India’ to the world in alignment with the vision of the PM to make Amul a global dairy brand,” he said.
Amul has launched its range of fresh milk in one gallon and half a gallon packs under the same brand name and composition that is popular in India - Amul Gold (with 6% milk fat), Amul Shakti (with 4.5% milk fat), Amul Taaza (with 3% milk fat) and Amul Slim n Trim (with 2% milk fat).
The fresh milk variants will be available at leading Indian grocery stores throughout the East Coast and Midwest markets of the US.
After launching the fresh milk variants, Amul is planning to launch other dairy products, including curd, buttermilk and paneer, in the US market to cater to the ever-growing demand from the Indian diaspora there.
Following the launch of fresh milk variants, GCMMF will be also launching mass media campaigns, including its popular TV commercial ‘Doodh Doodh Piyo Glass Full Doodh’ in the USA.
Amul will be using MMPA’s superior technology for rolling out the fresh milk products in the USA. Established in 1916, MMPA is a member-owned and operated milk marketing cooperative known for producing high-quality, award-winning dairy products. MMPA serves members in Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and Wisconsin.
It has four certified processing facilities, including a cheese plant in Indiana, a dairy product plant in Ohio and two dairy ingredient plants in Michigan.
Amul brand with a turnover of more than US$10 billion handles more than 11 billion litres of milk every year. It exports its wide range of branded milk and milk products to more than 50 countries around the world, including the USA.
GCMMF — with 18 member unions in Gujarat having 3.6 million dairy farmers — procures 30 million liters of milk every day and processes it across 100 dairy plants in India and markets more than 50 categories of products.
‘the Taste Of India’ Takes A Big Leap, Launches Fresh Milk In The Us | Vadodara News - Times of India
Ultimately every country/integrated bloc sees that they will need some strategic independence in semi-conductors, among other things. As you both have noted these decisions are not founded in making profit but rather securing resouces. Gone are the days with highly efficient - gangly globe stretching supply chains, everything vital to a nation's prosperity will be near-shored or friend shored at best.
Even the friend-shoring has limits, nations with very close relationships will struggle to yield dependence to one another. Look at the reaction that the US is giving Japan for trying to acquire US Steel, even though the deal is arguably good for the firm. The deal looks like it will be pushed through despite the Biden administration and Congress' efforts, and this is even after the Japanese PM gave a glowing speech to Congress praising the US' hegemony. It won't be decided until after the election, but don't be surprised by a hail-mary rejection due to undisclosed national security concerns.
The EU will want independence over the US, especially after these past few years, so they will pursue their own path. No side will be eager to invest in India's strategic security until the latest cream of the crop tech is a generation behind. India will have either have to attract the talent/investment itself or develop it's own high end semi-conductor industry from scratch.
@Parthu ; @randomradio
Even the friend-shoring has limits, nations with very close relationships will struggle to yield dependence to one another. Look at the reaction that the US is giving Japan for trying to acquire US Steel, even though the deal is arguably good for the firm. The deal looks like it will be pushed through despite the Biden administration and Congress' efforts, and this is even after the Japanese PM gave a glowing speech to Congress praising the US' hegemony. It won't be decided until after the election, but don't be surprised by a hail-mary rejection due to undisclosed national security concerns.
The EU will want independence over the US, especially after these past few years, so they will pursue their own path. No side will be eager to invest in India's strategic security until the latest cream of the crop tech is a generation behind. India will have either have to attract the talent/investment itself or develop it's own high end semi-conductor industry from scratch.
@Parthu ; @randomradio
Taiwan's developed, but the pay is still low. At least half that of the US even after all the pay hikes.
The tariffs don't matter. The real reason is the dumb leftist govt in the US has introduced DEI in the chips industry.
I guess things will change with Trump at the helm.
Yep, all strategic sectors in India need to be developed from scratch. Even AI and quantum computing. The Chinese are doing it by offering fat paychecks to Taiwanese experts. I won't be surprised if they catch up with the West over the next 5-10 years.
China could also count on mis-steps with people like Liang Mong-song - honestly a revolutionary in the IC world who was pushed to the side due to corporate politics and was nabbed by SMIC. I linked an interesting documentary about him. He is also the one who was responsible for China's push into the 7nm zone.
India might be able to rely on talent from the plethora of H1-b's and NRI's in the future. A lot of Silicon Valley has Indian origins. I know the meme that a lot of them have worthless degrees but there are many highly skilled ones as well. It might not be today but in the future India would do well to attract them back.