Letters: Leverage services

The editorial, "Power for the course" (August 26) has hit the nail on the head. It is good to know that there is considerable improvement in our power generation situation but the real - and decidedly bigger - problem is stagnant demand. That official figures show robust economic growth but the power demand doesn't reflect that can mean either enhanced "captive generation" - which may not be captured fully in the official figures - or a vast improvement in "energy efficiency" of our industry, agriculture and domestic use. If indeed the latter is true, we have a reason to rejoice.

"Low hanging fruit" in our war on energy shortages as well as climate change mitigation strategies are clearly improvements in energy efficiency.

Any energy saved is energy generated.

On the bigger issue of stagnant demand, if official growth figures are actually not sound, we have a major problem. With almost everything in place - (i) considerable opening up of foreign investment in virtually every sector; (ii) decent lending rates from banks; (iii) fair progress on skill development initiatives; (iv)a good monsoon - where is the problem? Why are industrialists not upbeat about new investments? Are we still focusing on the services sector, which has a much lower use of energy per unit of value added?

If the answer is tilts more towards the last conjecture - emphasis on services - there is no need to worry. We are more competitive in this sector and must, therefore, leverage it fully.

Krishan Kalra, Gurgaon

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