The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has said that India’s slowing economy is dragging down the global growth rate. Closer home, in Goa, industrialists are facing the toughest times of their lives. Not one sector is spared from the slowdown.
It is high time that the State government gives an impetus to the local industry. There are four main government departments concerning the industrial sector “ Directorate of Industries, Trade and Commerce (DITC), Investment Promotion Board (IPB), Factories and Boilers and Goa Industrial Development Corporation (GIDC).
The government must closely monitor the workings of these departments to understand where they are lagging behind. The industrialists complain a lot about GIDC. It is really difficult to get a new plot within industrial estates. Are we to believe that not a single sick unit is operating in the State?
GIDC must repossess plots from sick units and allot them to genuine cases. The IPB has not been able to become the single-window-clearance-system despite several assurances from the government. Work is going on to amend the Investment Policy, which is 6-years old, to make IPB more effective.
But, it has taken too long. Even though IPB has been around for more than five years, yet industrialists have a lot of trouble getting all the approvals from the government. Time and again, attempts are made to improve the functioning of all the departments, but not much result is seen on the ground.
The two flagship projects of the previous state government “ Tuem Electronics City and Chimbel IT Park “ are in limbo. Years after years are spent on these projects, but nothing to show. Not a single large industry has made Goa its base in the last 2-3 years.
It clearly paints a sorry picture for a state like Goa, which has high literacy rate and several top educational institutes to boast about. The problems of tourism are well known. Foreign tourists are abandoning Goa for other destinations.
Those, who are still coming, are budget category tourists, who don’t add much to the economy. Amidst a lot of hype, Goa International Travel Mart (GITM) happened in October last year. But, has the Tourism Department shown whether GITM resulted in anything positive or not?
Goa’s economy is not well diversified, as it depends almost entirely on mining and tourism. This means that the impact of slowdown is even worse here than in other parts of India.
Goa may be smaller than most districts of India, but, it has all the departments to take care of its industries. Chief Minister Pramod Sawant must ensure that those departments work to give a fresh lease of life to the industries. Or else, the State’s economy will cripple under the impact of slowdown.
