15th Plan lacks instrument to achieve the growth target

Kathmandu, Apr. 5: Planners have said that the fifteenth 5-year plan lacks instruments to achieve the ambitious growth and development targets set in its draft.

They said that it was good to have ambitious plan and programmes to keep the economy vibrant but they maintained that it would have been better if the models of resource generation and timely implementation of the programmes were included in the new periodic plan (2019/20 – 2024/25).

A two-day meeting of the National Development Council (NDC) approved the draft of the 15^th plan on Thursday with some amendments.

Former vice chairman of the National Planning Commission (NPC) Dipendra Bahadur Chhetri said that given the special circumstances such as the implementation of federalism and stable government after decades, it was normal to have 'ambitious' programmes in the plan.

"In order to move forward with the political change and to meet the aspirations of the people, the government has set high growth rate and proposed some ambitious programmes," he said.

But, he maintained that since the stable government was facing challenges to meet the capital expenditure targets and had reduced the ceiling of the capital budget, chances to have a dramatic improvement in the implementation system in the near future looked impossible.

Stating that the growth targets in agriculture and industry sectors were quite high, he suggested that if the government had to realise the growth prospects, current working style and culture should be corrected and mindset of the political leaders and bureaucracy should also be changed.

The plan aims at achieving an average of 9.4 per cent annual economic growth over the next five years. It envisions creating macroeconomic stability in the country and increasing economic growth rate up to 10.3 per cent by the end of the planning period. 

Likewise, former VC of the NPC Rabindra Shakya also said that the ambitious programmes were needed to give extra dynamism to national development.

"But all government mechanisms should be strengthened and developed to meet the targets. Since the planning document lacks the planning and programmes of the State and local governments, it lacks the scenario of the State level growth," he said.

Shakya said that the government should have developed plans for the States and local bodies before creating the national planning strategy.

"Provincial plan play a vital role in achieving the national development targets," he said. According to him, the 15^th plan misses the share of provincial plan and development in the national economy.

He suggested increasing the national savings since the country might face resource crisis for the effective implementation of the development projects without higher national saving. 

Former member of the NPC Dr. Sumitra Amatya praised the 'ambitious' elements in the plan and suggested the government should make it executable.

"It would have been better if the plan had clearly mentioned the responsibility of the federal and sub-national governments in the long-term development," she said.

She said that the government wanted to attract an impressive amount of private and foreign investment to back the development investment, but the draft of the plan lacked the strategies to attract private development financing.

According to her, the plan should also have covered the areas like activating the citizens, enhancing the capacity of bureaucracy and changing the mindset of the leadership.

Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 6 April 2019.