Providing a vision and way forward, Kant outlined the strategies for change as India takes over the leadership of the G20…reports Asian Lite News
G20 Presidency of India aims for inclusive, resilient and sustainable growth, Amitabh Kant, G20 Sherpa of India said at the Distinguished Public Lecture entitled: ‘India’s Presidency of G20: The Way Forward’ to mark the inauguration of the Jindal Global Centre for G20 Studies at OP Jindal Global University (JGU).
Amitabh Kant dwelt on a wide-ranging overview outlining India’s political and development narratives, key priorities, initiatives to reshape and reconfigure the world and how India is planning to execute the meetings for G20 ahead of the Leaders’ Summit in September 2023. “G20 is important because it comprises of about 85 per cent of the global GDP and about 78 per cent of the global trade, 90 per cent of the patents in the world and nearly two-thirds of the global population. The G20 Presidency moves from one country to another every year and different countries have different perspectives and priorities. It is very important to study, examine and analyse this as G20 is essentially an economic group for development and growth.”
“This is a period of great upheaval and turbulence across the world. The post-Covid era has seen nearly 200 million people fall below the poverty line. Nearly two decades of work done to alleviate poverty has been eliminated while a third of the world is facing recession. There’s a challenge with almost 75 countries in the world facing a global debt crisis. And on top of all this, there’s a huge challenge of climate action and climate finance. There is a geopolitical crisis in Europe right now with a war going on for over a year and in addition to all this, you’ve seen the financial crisis or the Silicon Valley Bank collapses in the United States of America and the cascading impact that you can have in other parts of the world.”
Providing a vision and way forward, Kant outlined the strategies for change as India takes over the leadership of the G20. “The first and foremost is the political narrative which India puts forward, the second is the priorities to shape the world and thirdly how well do we execute this presidency on ground. It’s important to understand this because in the last few years, India has done a huge amount of digital transformation. India today does about 11 times more payments than what United States and Europe do together. During COVID, we provided 2 billion vaccinations to our citizens, which was all done digitally. A study by the Bank of International Settlements said that (the digital milestones) India has achieved in the last eight years, what would normally have taken 50 years.”
“Regarding our priorities for G20, the world is facing huge recessionary trends across the world. It’s important that we talk about inclusive, sustainable growth, because without growth we will not be able to lift people above the poverty line and growth alone will have a huge impact on the lives of citizens in the global south. India aims to work with the rest of the world to drive inclusive, resilient and sustainable growth,” Kant outlined. “Thirdly, we face the challenge of climate action and climate finance. As India becomes more industrialized, we will become the third biggest polluters in the world. And therefore India must become the first country in the world to industrialize without carbonizing the world.” (ANI)
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