Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Madhya Pradesh had the largest forest cover of the country, 30 percent of its land mass, said vice chairman of the NITI Ayog Suman Bery here on Saturday.
Addressing the inaugural session of the Madhya Pradesh Foundation Day programme at Ravindra Bhawan, he added that this immense biodiversity wealth was not only an environmental asset but was central to India’s ecological security and global climate commitments.
Thanking chief secretary Anurag Jain for acknowledging NITI Ayog’s contribution in preparation of the Madhya Pradesh Vision Document, he said that the document was a citizen vision as it had been prepared in consultation with stakeholders.
He said MP bordered five states,connecting half of India’s population. Its geographic location had unmatched logistic and strategic advantage.
In 2022, PM Narendra Modi had made an important observation that in India, inclusion supported growth and vice versa, he said. “You cannot have growth in a viable democracy without inclusion.
The vision document of MP is an example of interdependence of growth and inclusion. Growth as an objective for India means if we can get more people into the labour force and increase their productivity it would result in higher growth,” he said.
He also spoke about increased productivity and other aspects related to it. Talking about the labour force, he said that male participation rate was as per international standard but the female labour participation rate had a lot of scope for improvement.
“The next decade is critical in terms of AmritKal. There is tension also on the technology front. India has successfully harnessed technology, including in ease of doing business. Now Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a new technology which helps in raising employment and productivity. It is a big challenge and opportunity for India,” he said, stressing that when states grew, the country marched forward.
