Canberra, Nov 03: Australia is looking to benefit from the fast growth in information technology and business process outsourcing sectors in India, on the back of the ongoing global Information and Communications Technology revolution.
Australia's Treasury Secretary Ken Henry was quoted in media reports here as saying," it is true that India gains from being able, because of Information and Communications Technology developments, to export services to the industrialised world, the ICT revolution, initiated in Silicon Valley, and considered by many to have given America new economy status in the 1990s."
The global race toward Communication and Information Technology, which was changing the economies of all industrialised countries, allowed business to cut costs, to the benefit of consumers, Henry said in a speech to the Melbourne Institute's Economic and Social Outlook Conference in Melbourne as reported by Dow Jones newswires.
"The external stimulus to the minerals sector has not translated into the sort of generalised inflation shock we saw in the 1970s, because we have greater relative wage flexibility, the exchange rate has appreciated...Macro policy has remained credibly anchored, and as a consequence inflation expectations are also relatively well anchored," he said.
However, he warned the current growth in Australia was unlikely to be sustained, with the drought and the aging population threatening the current 'Boom Times'.
Although, state and federal government are committed to reforming water and energy markets, have to work harder to deliver on their promises to develop national markets in these areas, he added.
Bureau Report
