Business & Economy

Against odds, India growing
fast, says World Bank 

What is India News Service, Wednesday, 29 Sept 2004, 2200 hrs IST

The World Bank focussed this year on India, China and Uganda because these countries, despite their difficulties, managed to grow fast and reduce poverty.

 "We wanted to study how they did it," World Bank's senior vice-president Francois Bourgiognon and chief economist Warrick Smith, lead author of World Development Report 2005 and World Bank/International Finance Corporation vice-president for private sector development Michael Klein told reporters on Tuesday.

Citing the success of countries such as India, China and Uganda, the World Bank's World Development Report emphasises that everything does not have to be done at once. Rather, significant progress can be made by addressing important constraints that face firms and by sustaining a process of ongoing improvements

Govt ask PSUs to pay more: The Centre announced austerity measures to save Rs 2,000 crore a year.

Oil prices top $50:  Crude oil topped the psychological milestone of $50 a barrel today for the first time and a Saudi oil official said the world's largest petroleum exporter would raise its production capacity by 15 per cent in a bid to calm the markets.

Centre offers to meet BPO firms halfway: It said taxation of BPO units would be guided by double taxation treaties. 

Cabinet to take up aviation FDI: Foreign direct investiment in domestic private airlines is likely to be hiked to 49 per cent.

SAIL nod for Indian Iron merger: The Steel Authority of India Limited's board of directors today agreed in principle for the merger of the company's wholly owned subsidiary, Indian Iron & Steel Co. Ltd (IISCO), with the parent company. 

IBM builds world's fastest supercomputer: IBM on Wednesday claimed it has built the world's fastest supercomputer, wresting the title from Japanese company NEC. The new supercomputer, dubbed Blue Gene/L, claimed to sustain speeds of 36 teraflops (36 trillion calculatons per second), surpassing Japanese 'Earth Simulator' which has a speed of 35.86 teraflops.

New range of cordless phones from Bharti: Bharti Teletech, a fixed line phone manufacturer, announced that it is targeting 27 per cent growth in the sale of phones to take it to five million units in 2004-05. 

Ratan Tata to step down in 3 years: Ratan Tata, Chairman of the $14.25 billion Tata Group, has hinted that the days of his family being at the helm of one of India's biggest industrial groups may be numbered.

ICICI Bank nominees fail to get on Fed Bank board: The curtains came down on Federal Bank's AGM on Tuesday. Voting and counting extended till 3 a.m. in the morning.

Shantha Biotech vaccine unit on stream: The new GMP compliant vaccine manufacturing complex of Shantha Biotechnics, comprising three production suites and an utility block, was inaugurated by the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, Y. S. Rajasekhara Reddy, at Medchal.




Overall:

India did well despite odds: The World Bank gave the country a pat for doing well despite the difficulties it faced.

IBM broke the speed record: It said it had built the fastest computer ever.

Oil prices soared: The markets got jittery as the price per barrel crossed 50 dollars.