Uttar Pradesh Can Play Significant Role In Driving India's 'Mission 2047': World Bank

Lucknow: Uttar Pradesh can play a significant role in driving India’s 'Mission 2047' to make the country a developed nation or 'Viksit Bharat' when it completes 100 years of Independence, Martin Raiser, World Bank Vice President, South Asia Region has said.

Raiser during his interactions which Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and chief secretary Manoj Singh held discussions on how the World Bank could help UP become a USD 1 trillion economy.

"We are at the beginning of a new (lending) strategy cycle for India and those strategy cycles are usually for four-five years. Part of the work we are trying to do is map out what we can do in the long term.

"If all the ideas that we discussed with the UP CM and chief secretary over the last two days result in World Bank projects, I think we could reach, in the next two-three years, (lending or monetary support) of USD 1 billion or more,” Raiser said.

UP, he added, could play a significant role in driving India’s 'Mission 2047'.

"I think UP is clearly ready to be the lighthouse in terms of agriculture modernisation...also in the reform of the education sector, in air pollution management and a host of other sectors," Raiser added.

In the past 10 years UP has roughly grown at 6 per cent, at the same rate as India's. The agriculture sector grew by 2.5 per cent.

"There is an upward potential on the agriculture side and that was thus a key focus of our discussions," he said, adding as the country’s largest state, UP could have a significant share in World Bank's lending programme.

"We don’t reserve amounts of money for individual states. World Bank has been most successful in areas important for the country as a whole. We have found states that have been pioneers of reform in those areas. Then they become the lighthouse and others start to copy," he said.

On the possibility of UP becoming a USD 1 trillion economy, Raiser said, "I think that’s entirely feasible... but you need the reforms to drive it and this is true not just for UP but for India as a whole. Currently, the challenge is to sustain this rate of growth for several decades and then that’s entirely possible,” he said.

The World Bank, he said, "is preparing a project to help UP modernise its agriculture, increase yields, reduce excessive use of fertilizers, use water more efficiently and also help farmers diversify from the traditional cash crops to more higher value added products." Also, he added, UP’s ODOP or one district, one product scheme has potential to link farmers directly with consumer markets.

Elaborating about the new strategy cycle for India, Raiser said it would help in significantly raising lending support for the country.

"We have just introduced some reforms in the World Bank that allow us to do more with the capital that we have. We used to be about USD 33-35 billion a year… as a result of reforms we might go up to USD 45 billion, even further. India has traditionally taken about 10 per cent of all lending from IBRD.

"So when we were doing USD 35 billion, India was getting about 3.5 per cent of that. If we are going to be USD 45 billion, India could be getting 4.5 per cent, even higher. That’s a significant expansion. We have a significant number of ideas that we are exploring,” he added.