Editorial – September 2024
As we all know, India is the fastest growing large economy in the world, surpassing even the giants like US, China and Germany. We have seen more than two decades, 2000 till 2022, China continuously expanded its economy by double digit growth rate. Now it seems the Chinese economy is slowing down a bit. Many experts believe that China has crossed that fastest growth period in the famous economy growth curve. The US is struggling with its internal issues like illegal immigration, state centre relations and though their economy is growing, the growth rate is not satisfactory. EU is also fighting recession in most of its member countries and though Germany’s economy is supposed to be the strongest among EU countries, it is also facing a threat of recession. Whatever it may be, the fact remains that India’s economy is growing at a decent rate and would continue to do so in coming years.
I have repeatedly mentioned in this column that India’s economic growth is triggered by the infrastructure development and ‘steel’ is at the centre of infra development. One can not imagine infrastructure development without steel. Thus if India’s economy has to grow, it has to have a strong support from steel industry. This way, the growth of steel industry is directly related to the economic growth of the country. There may be temporary ups and downs in the journey but the overall direction is certainly north.
The infrastructure development led economic growth is the striking feature of not only India but is also true for the other south Asian countries as well. The economy will revolve around big infra projects but If we look around, most of the India’s neighbours are in trouble. Look at the situation in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Afghanistan, and Maldives. All these countries are facing the political crisis. Till last year, Bangladesh’s economy was doing quite well but the political instability has ruined it completely. A similar story in most of the other neighbouring countries. Friends, here is the opportunity for India. As the big brother, India is helping these countries to come out of the crisis, sometimes by giving aid and sometimes by giving business. I think the steel industry should look for more and more business with these countries. Our associations should invite the companies from these countries to their events, offer them memberships and spread our activities in these countries also.
This way, they can help the domestic industry and also the country to strengthen our influence in these countries, isn’t it ?