Worker Population Ratio continues to grow, up by 5.8% in 4 years: Centre

An increase in the worker population ratio reflects the higher engagement of people in productive activities, said union minister Jitendra Singh

The Worker Population Ratio (WPR) has increased to 52.6 per cent in 2020-21 from 46.8 per cent in 2017-18, said Union minister Jitendra Singh on Thursday in a written reply to a question in Rajya Sabha. 

The minister said that the WPR has been showing a continuous upward trend in the last four years and this reflects the higher engagement of people in productive activities. He further added that the unemployment rate has witnessed a declining trend from 2017-18 onwards. 

"The government has taken various steps to deal with the problem of unemployment in recent times," said Singh. He added that employment generation and improving employability in the priority of the government.

According to the union minister, the central government has announced the 'Atmanirbhar Bharat' package to provide stimulus to businesses and to mitigate the adverse impact of Covid-19. He said informed that under this package, the government is providing fiscal stimulus of more than Rs 27 trillion. This package comprises of various long-term schemes/ programmes/ policies for making the country self-reliant and creating employment opportunities, he said.

The "Aatmanirbhar Bharat Rojgar Yojana" (ABRY) was launched with effect from October 1, 2020, to provide incentives to employers for the development of new jobs and the restoration of employment lost due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Benefits are being given to 6,013,000 recipients as of November 28, 2022.

Production Linked Incentive (PLI) programmes were introduced in Budget 2021-22 with an allocation of Rs. 1.97 trillion for a period of five years beginning in 2021-22. The government's PLI programmes have the potential to generate 6,000,000 additional jobs.