Talking about digitization, one of the largest and fastest growing digital population of the world is in India. With 560 million internet subscribers in September 2018, India spots second position in the list after China. As depicted by a McKinsey and Company report, digitization in India is happening faster than various mature and emerging economies.
The report also revealed that with digital capabilities improving fast and connectivity becoming more ubiquitous, it isn’t a surprise if technology is quickly and radically transforming nearly every sector of the Indian economy. It is most probable if that does both- create substantial economic value as well as change the nature of work for countless number of Indians.
India is already charting among the top two positions globally if we talk about countries on various significant magnitudes of digital adoption that include social media users, smartphones devices, app downloads, wireless-phone subscribers and more. When it comes to the major digital economies in the world, the country is again the second-fastest digital adopter among 17 countries.
One of the main factors behind fast digitization in the country is its government’s efforts to build up Aadhaar. As reflected by the official data, there are 1.2 billion people enrolled by Aadhaar after it was introduced in 2009 that has made it a single largest digital ID program worldwide and has accelerated the use of other digital services.
For instance, there were nearly 870 million bank accounts that were linked to Aadhaar by February 2018 in comparison to 399 million in April 2017 and 56 million in January 2014. Similarly, all transactions of about 10.3 million indirect tax-paying businesses onto one digital platform is being brought by the Goods and Services Tax Network (GSTN) that was established in 2013, which as a result is helping the businesses to digitize their operations by creating a powerful incentive for them.
These are not just the government initiatives that are helping to bring internet-enabled services to the consumers making online usage more accessible for millions, but the private sector innovation is also found to be intensifying the drive. For example, the approach of bundling virtually free smartphones with mobile-service subscriptions by Reliance Jio has played a pivotal role as a catalytic agent for innovation and competitive pricing. While there is a drop in the data costs by more than 95 per cent since 2013, there was a fourfold increase in the download speeds between 2014 and 2017.
All these advancement in the digital drive is also probable to create up to 65 million new jobs in the country by 2025. However, there is the need for skill transformation and retraining of about 40 to 45 million other people for relevant digital skills, and that investments are required from the government in new infrastructure. Candidates will need to learn new relevant skills while businesses should seek new talent.
The result of this digitization drive is likely to double the GDP contribution of highly digitized sectors like IT and business process management by 2025. There will be increase in the growth for newly digitizing sectors that include logistics, insurance, retail, healthcare, data-driven lending and agriculture.
As mentioned by the report, the digital drive can be one of the most comprehensive drivers of future growth and prosperity of the country.
Source: Times Now