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The Ninth Five Year Plan was announced in March 1996, to become a “moderately prosperous society” by 2000. However, it failed to meet its targets and was harshly criticized. In this blog post, we will take a closer look at the Ninth Five Year Plan and try to understand why it failed. We will also discuss the important objectives of the Ninth and Tenth Five Year Plans, and explain why they are so important for China’s future development.
Ninth Five-Year Plan of India
After the end of the eighth-year plan in India, the ninth five-year plan was started in 1997 and ended in 2002. Just like its predecessor, this too was focused on poverty alleviation and employment generation. However, the target set for reducing poverty during this period could not be met.
Ninth Five Year Plan objectives
The objectives of the Ninth Five Year Plan are
Quality of Life
The main intent of the Ninth Five Year Plan was to enhance the quality of life of nationals by delivering basic comforts and services.
Education
The target was to increase the Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in higher education to 15 per cent.
Employment
The target was to create nearly 50 million new employment opportunities.
Poverty Alleviation
The target was to reduce the incidence of poverty by half.
Self-Reliance
The target was to make the economy self-reliant by ensuring food security and
developing infrastructure.
However, the Ninth Five Year Plan failed to achieve its targets. The main reason for the failure was the global economic crisis in 1997-98.
Growth of Indian economy during Ninth-year plan
Here are the categorical growth rates of the Ninth-year plan
- Agriculture It dropped down from 4.60 % to 2.04 % per annum.
- Industry It dropped down from 7.58 % to 4.51 % per annum.
- Services It increased from 7.54% to 5.35% per annum.
Therefore, the total growth rate of the Indian Economy dropped from 6.68 to 5.35.
It was due to the global economic crisis.
The main objective of the Ninth and Tenth Five Year Plans is to achieve an average annual growth rate of seven per cent.
Failure of the 9th Five Year Plan Target
These were the reasons for the failure of the 9th Five Year Plan target
Weather Shocks
There was an El-Nino weather phenomenon in 1997 which resulted in floods across the country. This led to a shortfall in agricultural production and inflationary pressures.
The South-East Asian Financial crisis
This led to a slowdown in exports and investments and put pressure on the balance of payments.
High Oil Prices
This led to an increase in the import bill and put pressure on the balance of payments.
Sanctions by the International Community
After the Pokhran nuclear tests, the international community imposed sanctions on India. This led to a slowdown in economic growth.
Important objectives of the Ninth and Tenth Five Year Plans
The important objectives of the Ninth and Tenth Five Year Plans were as follows
- To achieve a rate of growth of at least seven per cent per annum
- To reduce unemployment
- To reduce poverty
- To improve the quality of life
- To achieve gender equality
- To reduce regional disparities
- To promote sustainable development
- To build an information society
- To make India a global player.
The Ninth Five Year Plan was formulated in 1997 and the Tenth Five Year Plan was formulated in 2002. Both these plans were based on the principle of balanced regional development.
The Ninth Five Year Plan was focused on the social sectors such as education, health and housing.
The Tenth Five Year Plan was focused on the infrastructure sector such as power, transport and communication.
Both these plans helped in the overall development of the country and achieved many of their objectives. However, they failed to achieve their most important objective of eradicating poverty.
Conclusion
The Ninth Five Year Plan was a resounding failure with regards to its main target- to achieve an annual growth rate of seven per cent. However, it did succeed in some important respects. The agricultural sector dropped by a few per cent and there was a significant reduction in poverty levels. The objectives of the Ninth and Tenth Five Year Plans were also important in terms of their focus on employment generation and poverty alleviation. Overall, the Ninth Five Year Plan was a mixed bag- with some successes and some failures. However, it is important to learn from both the successes and the failures to move forward and achieve even greater success in future five-year plans. Thanks for reading!
