deepak mohanty : statistics in the reserve bank of india welcome remarks by mr deepak mohanty, executive director of the reserve bank of india, on the occasion of 6th statistics day conference, reserve bank of india, mumbai, 17 july 2012. * * * governor dr. subbarao, prof. r. radhakrishna, chairman, national statistical commission, dr. aurel schubert, director general, statistics department, european central bank ( ecb ), deputy governor dr. subir gokarn ; other distinguished speakers prof. j. r. varma, iim ahmedabad, prof. probal chaudhuri, isi kolkata and prof. amit bubna, isb, hyderabad ; deputy governors, colleague executive directors, distinguished guests from the financial sector and academia, members of the press, shri a. b. chakraborty, officer - in - charge, dsim and friends. i extend a warm welcome to you to this statistics day conference. 29th june is celebrated as statistics day to commemorate the sterling contribution of prof. prasanta chandra mahalanobis to statistics and the indian statistical system. in addition, the reserve bank also holds an annual statistics conference, which provides a forum for interface of our statisticians with academia, external experts and with operational departments. these two annual events provide us an opportunity to review the progress of statistical work in the reserve bank and guide us in setting the agenda for further work. i am sure, today ’ s conference theme, data gaps and central banking, will reinforce that process. in evidence - based public policy and decision - making mechanism, statistics is a critical tool. at the same time, statistics is a public good. over the years, there have been initiatives by the government, the reserve bank and professional bodies like the indian association for research in national income and wealth and the indian econometric society for identifying data gaps in the indian economy. the report of the national statistical commission has helped in identifying major gaps in economic database on india. in 2010, the national statistical commission had set up a number of professional committees to look into various issues relating to improvement in official statistics. the report of the reserve bank ’ s working group on surveys ( 2009 ) has also highlighted important data gaps. improving database is an ongoing process. while several initiatives have been taken at the national level to bridge data gaps, i will focus on the recent initiatives of the reserve bank. the reserve bank ’ s policy canvas is large

addition to transport and communication. in addition, the warehousing and supply - chain infrastructure will be critical to bolster value addition and productivity in the agriculture and horticulture sector. this will create employment opportunities in semi - urban and rural areas and promote inclusive growth. the demand for warehousing infrastructure has also gone up in tier - 2 and tier - 3 cities in the wake of steep jump in online trading. moreover, investment in intangible capital such as research and development and skill upgradation of human resource has strong and positive impact on productivity. some empirical evidence suggests that the impact of investment in intangible capital on labour productivity is more than investment in tangible capital. 4 16. seventh, a dynamic and resilient financial system is at the root of a stronger economy. india ’ s financial system has transformed rapidly to support the growing needs of the economy. while banks have been the primary channels of credit in the economy, recent trends suggest increasing role of non - bank funding channels. assets of non - bank financial intermediaries like nbfcs and mutual funds have been growing ; funding through market instruments like corporate bonds has also been increasing. this is a sign of a steadily maturing financial system – moving from a bank - dominated financial system to a hybrid one. substantial progress has been made to fortify internal defence mechanism of financial institutions to identify, measure and mitigate risks. this is a continuing process and efforts by all stakeholders have to be sustained. towards a more inclusive and sustainable economy 17. history shows that the impact of pandemics, unlike financial and banking crises, could be a lot more asymmetric by affecting the vulnerable segments more. the covid - 19 pandemic is no exception. within countries, contact - intensive service sectors employing large number of informal, low - skilled and low - wage workers have been hit harder. in several emerging and developing economies, lack of health care access has disproportionately affected the family budget of the poor. even education which was provided online during the pandemic excluded the 3 / 5 bis central bankers'speeches low income households due to the lack of requisite skills and resources. overall, there are evidences across countries that the pandemic may have severely dented inclusivity. 18. the global recovery has also been uneven across countries and sectors. advanced economies have normalized faster on the back of higher pace of vaccination and larger policy support. emerging and developing economies are