The Hindu Business Line : 11th Plan to focus on agriculture, water management: Montek

AGRICULTURE and water management would be the thrust areas for the Eleventh Five Year Plan to maintain a GDP growth rate of more than eight per cent, according to the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia.

At an interactive session with the Financial Writers' Forum, Mr Ahluwalia said, "there is lot of rethinking on the strategy on agriculture. The Government had set up two expert committees headed by Mr R.A. Mashelkar and Mr M.S. Swaminathan for upgradation of agriculture universities to focus more on research."

The committees have already submitted the reports and they would provide valuable inputs for evolving the strategy for the farm sector, he said. Mr Ahluwalia said that water management would be another thrust area in the Eleventh Plan as Rs 80,000 crore would be required to provide a minimum water facility for carrying out dry-land farming in areas "It is quite clear that farm sector has under performed since 1996-97 and it is our intention to give special attention to this sector," he said.

Mr Ahluwalia also pointed out that the other thrust area is likely to be infrastructure development, where the role of public-private partnership would be encouraged to bring about qualitative and quantitative improvement.

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