Hyderabad|India|September'2010: The mid-term appraisal of the Eleventh Five Year Plan (2007-08 to 2011-12), prepared by the State Government, corroborates the Government's efforts in making rapid strides in agriculture, industry and service sectors. Despite global recession which had impact on the State, Andhra Pradesh witnessed reasonably positive growth rate. The State has performed well in all the sectors, particularly Service Sector.

Revealing this in a meeting with Chief Secretary S.V. Prasad and special CS, Planning, T. Chatterjee on the highlights of mid-term appraisal, the Chief Minister Dr K Rosaiah expressed his satisfaction over the overall performance of the State in various sectors in the last three years. A perusal of the progress achieved thus far during the 11th Five Year Plan suggests that much greater efforts are needed for improving implementation of social sector programmes. Good governance agenda that mitigates leakages in the delivery system is critical to achieve the goal of inclusiveness.

The Chief Minister was discussing about the various aspects of the development agenda and the measures to further streamline the delivery systems to ensure that no genuine beneficiary is denied his share in the welfare and development programmes of the Government. The Chief Secretary explained him about various achievements of the State during the mid-term Plan period.

The economy of Andhra Pradesh showed strong performance in terms of aggregate growth during the 10th Five Year Plan (2002-03 to 2006-07). The average growth rate of GSDP at 8.3% during the 10th plan period was higher than the all-India average GDP growth rate of 7.8%.

Dr Rosaiah was happy that the global economic slowdown had impacted some sectors during 2008-09, but, industry and service sectors showed resilience and bounced back in 2009-10. The effect of recession persisted and the economy did not fully recover in 2009-10, a year that has also witnessed unprecedented floods and drought in various districts as well as the agitation which incurred huge losses to the State ex-chequer. A 7% GSDP growth rate is estimated up to March 2011. In anticipation of the Planning Commission, GOI, Mid-Term Appraisal of the States for the Eleventh Five-Year Plan Performance, the Andhra Pradesh has itself conducted a mid-term appraisal of its performance in the first three years of 11th five-Year Plan(2007-2012). It is pertinent to note that this is the first time such a Mid-term appraisal is prepared for financial and physical performance of 23 different flagship development Programmes supported by the centre and State.

The Chief Minister said record food-grain production of 204.21 lakh tonnes aided by rainfall during 2008-09 and also this year has given a boost to agriculture sector. We are planning to achieve record food grain production of over 208 lakh MTs this year.

Various poverty alleviation and employment generation programmes being implemented along with better delivery systems and safety nets in the State in the recent times have helped the people in achieving better standard of living.

Over the years, the Industrial sector in the State has gained in strength. It has become possible due to policy initiatives put in place by the State. Establishing world class infrastructure and more importantly, making available power at cheapest industrial tariff helped a great deal. Determination to accelerate manufacturing sector growth by aggressively pursuing investor-friendly policies has started paying dividends to the State.

To achieve a GSDP growth rate of 9.5%, the Industry sector needs to grow at a much higher pace with manufacturing sector contributing to the bulk of the growth. It would require worldclass facilities like Ports, Airports, Expressways, quality power supply, water supply and Telecom and the latest agreement signed with the Larsen & Toubro for the prestigious Hyderabad metro rail project, a one of its kind project with highest ever investment of over Rs. 12,132 crore, is a firm step in this direction to enhance competitiveness of the State capital. All this would need substantial resources and surely requires Central support in the nature of adequate viability gap funding due to long gestation of these projects. Andhra Pradesh has already completed a good number of projects, some are under implementation and a few more are in the pipeline. The effort shall continue to do better and better. Within our resource limits and the proactive role of private entrepreneurs in the State, these projects are being planned and executed in a time-bound manner. Special Economic Zones are being promoted in different regions of the State to generate employment in export oriented manufacturing sector.

Andhra Pradesh is making all-out efforts to ensure rapid growth which are centred on inclusiveness and the Government is committed to promote financial inclusion by large number of programmes aimed specifically at the weaker sections, like MGNREGA, PMGSY and other Centrally-sponsored schemes in addition to the State-sponsored employment generation programmes. Development Mantra and Good Governance are key to the holistic development of the State, said Chief Minister Dr. K.Rosaiah.