India is witnessing green shoots of recovery and the economy, which had been bruised due to the nation-wide lockdown, is expected to bounce back soon, Amitabh Kant, CEO, Niti Aayog said.

International Monetary Fund has projected a GDP contraction of 4.5 per cent for India. Other rating agencies have also projected severe contraction in India’s economic growth.

“We are already witnessing emergence of green shoots in the economy. We are seeing that key sectors like fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) etc have already come back. I am optimistic that we will bounce back with vengeance,” he said while addressing a session on ‘Role of the Creative Economy in Nation Building’ with Ajit Mohan, vice president and managing director, Facebook India.

Kant underlined the need to identify about 12 sectors which can drive growth. “All of us need to be very clear that the pandemic is a massive challenge not just for India but for the world. Every crisis is also an opportunity. We must pick-up areas of growth, which will help us emerge as winners for tomorrow,” Kant said, adding that artificial intelligence (AI), genomics, mobility, drones, creative industry along with media and entertainment, will play a key role. “These sectors will take India to a sustained level of growth in the next 10-12 years and create a vast number of jobs,” he added.

Kant also said that innovation will be critical in the new normal arising in the wake of the Covid 19 pandemic. The people who will survive will be those who will work with technology, capturing the sunrise sectors of growth while data and the use of AI will drive the growth, he said.

Talking about Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat program’ Kant said that through this, the government has brought radical reforms in various sectors like micro small and medium enterprises (MSME) and agriculture. However he noted that Atmanirbhar Bharat was not about isolation. “It is about becoming a global champion,” he said..