India generating more jobs than BRIC countries: study

Mumbai, June 20 (UNI) India has been generating more jobs than BRIC countries -- Brazil, Russia, India, China, said a study conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), a club of rich countries.

In a release issued here today, Indian Merchants' Chamber (IMC) president Niraj Bajaj said this reflects the fact that the Indian economy has taken off onto a higher and sustainable growth path.

There is a considerable optimism in the country about future prospects of growth and this is reflected in the growing demand for labour.

In the initial years of reforms, there was a lurking fear that India was probably heading for a ''jobless growth'', but the OECD statistics has allayed this fear, he added.

India had generated 11.3 million net new jobs annually between 2000 and 2005, which is over 60 per cent more than the 7 million new jobs created in China every year. Brazil clocked 2.7 million new jobs, which were created annually over the five-year period, while Russia saw some 700,000 new jobs added every year and India, thus, generated half the jobs in BRIC nations.

In Chamber's view, despite the good news, there can be no complacency. This is because the rural areas still need to traverse many miles on the growth path. The high disguised unemployment in rural areas still remains a matter of concern. (It estimated that there are 130 million surplus workers in rural India.), a release said.

The OECD report also said with 50.5 per cent employment to population ratio in India, the country has fared very poorly with at least 66 per cent in the other BRIC countries. These issues indicate that India still has a considerable way to traverse on the employment front, it added.

UNI