Recovery tracker: Higher mobility, power generation as Covid cases decline

Traffic congestion is rising again in major cities

Weekly indicators of economic activity showed signs of improvement as Covid-19 cases continued to decline across India.

India reported fewer than 35,000 daily cases as per the latest reported government numbers. People have been stepping out more as cases declined.

Mobility data from search engine Google shows retail and recreation visits are now higher than they were before the pandemic. Goole uses anonymised location data to track visits to various categories of places compared to a baseline value in early 2020. Visits are now 1.86 per cent higher than before the pandemic took hold. Workplace visits are now 5.14 per cent higher (see chart 1).

Traffic congestion on Monday morning 9 a.m. is higher than it was in the previous week. Mumbai’s traffic congestion was down 52 per cent lower than 2019 compared to 66 per cent in the previous week. New Delhi traffic congestion was down 38 per cent compared to 48 per cent previously (see chart 2).

The number of vehicles being registered across the country is lower than in 2019. The gap has been narrowing. People registered 335,363 vehicles in the latest week. This is 15.1 per cent lower than in 2019. The gap was 17.6 per cent in the previous week (see chart 3).

More people are flying by air. The number of passengers is 1.8 million compared to 1.4 million in the previous week. The number of flights is up at 13,253 compared to 11,738 previously (see chart 4).

The Indian Railways showed slower growth in the goods it carried. Quantity growth for the latest week was 6.88 per cent compared to 8 per cent in the previous week. Freight revenue grew 8.91 per cent compared to 12.2 per cent in the previous week (see chart 5).

Power generation picked up pace last week with winter coming to an end and temperatures rising in most parts of the country. Power utilities across the country generated 3993 million units of electricity on average per day during the week ended February 13, 2022 (based on reporting day numbers) up 4.2 per cent from 3,833 MUs during the corresponding week in FY21. The generation was however up nine per cent over the corresponding week in FY20. The power generation last week was up 1.2 per cent week on week (see chart 6).

Business Standard tracks these indicators as a way of getting a weekly picture of how the economy is doing. Official macroeconomic data is often released with a lag. Analysts globally have been tracking similar indicators. They give a sense of how the economy is reacting to the ebb and flow of cases and restrictions. Google data is released with a lag. The latest is as of February 10. Traffic data is for Monday, February 14. All other numbers are as of Sunday, February 13.