Indian economy sees encouraging turnaround signs: OECD

LONDON: Indian and Chinese economies are seeing encouraging signs of turnaround, while the situation is improving in most of the developed world, Paris-based think tank OECD said today.

The latest assessment from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) comes at a time when there are indications of slowing growth in India and China -- two of the world' fastest growing economies.

OECD's Composite Leading Indicator (CLI) -- that indicates turning points in an economy -- inched up to 97.9 in November compared to 97.8 in October.

"In the United States and the United Kingdom, the CLI continues to point to economic growth firming. In China and India, signs of a turning point are more marked than in last month's assessment," OECD, a grouping of mostly rich countries, said in a statement.

China saw its CLI rise to 99.7 in November as against 99.5 in October.

CLIs for Italy, Germany, France and the Euro Area as a whole, reflected stabilisation in growth prospects.

"Likewise, in Brazil and Japan, tentative signs of stabilising growth are emerging," it added.

In the first half of this FY13 (April 2012-March 2013) the GDP growth was just 5.4 per cent, and government expects an expansion of under 5.7 per cent for the whole fiscal.

To bolster growth, Indian government has in recent times embarked on reforms path, such as allowing foreign direct investment in multi-brand retail.

Among others, fiscal deficit is a major concern for the Indian economy. In October, Finance Minister P Chidambaram had suggested a fiscal deficit of 5.3 per cent of GDP in 2012-13 was "doable", followed by 4.8 per cent in 2013-14 and further gradual reductions to 3 per cent by 2016-17.