Bhubaneswar, 11/01/19: In a rapidly changing business environment where Industry 4.0 has become a buzzword in India and across the globe, the main challenges facing an emerging economy like India are job creation, innovation and inclusivity, said Dr. Tapan Kumar Chand, CMD, NALCO, at an International Conference on ‘Issues and Challenges of Business in Emerging Economy’.

At a gathering of industry captains, academicians, foreign delegates, research scholars, and policy-makers from India and abroad, Dr Chand said, ‘’India is the fastest growing large economy with a dream of becoming the third largest economy. As per estimates, from the current $ 2.57 trillion, India is aiming to reach $ 5 trillion by 2023. The question is can the economy be tripled by 2030.’’ Dr. Chand went on to add that India certainly has the demographic dividend on its side to dream big, but there needs to be productive engagement of the working population and the skill-sets needs to be cultivated strategically to yield the desired impact on the economy.

Speaking at the inaugural session of the two-day International Conference organized by Birla School of Management under Birla global University, Dr. Chand also spoke on the importance of gathering Data and how it will help the industries and policy-makers to decide on what kind of interventions can help the economy.

‘’We are already in the middle of the 4 th Industrial Revolution, where robotics, Augmented Reality, Internet of Things etc will decide the future course of action for industries. But the technological disruption will also mean a certain section of people will lose jobs. MEMEs will be the driver for creation of jobs. To address this challenge, NALCO, being a Mother Plant, has already taken steps. The Angul Aluminium Park will provide the MSME sector in procuring raw materials at economical rates from NALCO and the Navratna PSU Company will also lend marketing support to MSMEs to help the sustain in the long run,’’ said Dr. Chand.

Other notable speakers of the inaugural session were Prof. Sudhakar Panda, VC, Birla Global University, Prof. & Dr. Rado Bohinc, Former Dean, faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, Europe, Dr. Gerald Goh Guan Gan, Dean, Faculty of Business, Multimedia University, Malaysia and Dr. S.K. Acharya, Former CMD, NLC India, among other stalwarts.