Jayanth R Varma, who is a member of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), has said the Russia-Ukraine conflict is likely to have adverse effects on both economic growth as well as inflation and policy makers must remain alert and ready to respond rapidly to the emerging situation. Varma said inflation is higher than target, though it is within the tolerance band.
Further, listing challenges faced by the Indian economy, he said while the economy has yet to recover from the cyclical economic slowdown which began around three years ago, investment has remained subdued during this period, and private consumption has not fully recovered from the pandemic. The economy faces new stresses emanating from geopolitical tensions, he said, adding that inflation is higher than the target though within the tolerance band.
He stated RBI projected 2022-23 inflation to be not much above the target of 4 per cent, but the degree of confidence in this point estimate is quite low, and there is a non-trivial chance of inflation ending up above the tolerance band. Besides, he noted that the opposite is also true and the possibility of inflation being much lower than the estimate cannot also be ruled out. He pointed out that the reason why it is so difficult to forecast inflation (both in India and globally) is that supply disruptions have been a big contributor to rising prices, and it is hard to say how long these disruptions will last. He said the pandemic shifted demand from contact intensive services to goods.
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