Union minister Piyush Goyal said the Indian industry must be proud of their achievements, the country’s strong macroeconomic fundamentals, and about the reforms made in the past several years.

The minister believes that India will be the third-largest economy in four-to-five years. “We believe India not only is the fastest growing large economy, we will continue to be so for many decades to come,” Minister for Commerce and Industry Goyal said on Sunday, addressing the Asia Economic Dialogue in Pune.

“My own conviction about the way India is growing is that we will drive our economy probably closer to 35 – 40 trillion-dollar economy by 2047. The desire of every Indian is to be second to none,” he added.

The minister said that the Russia-Ukraine conflict has had a severe effect on the developed world more than the developing countries.

He added that food security and energy security and its consequential impact on inflation, interest rates and growth have had a devastating effect on both developed and developing countries.

Further, on imports from China, the commerce minister said that over the years, the government hurt India’s interests by making the people get used to low-cost substandard goods from China.

“The trade deficit with China which was under 2 billion dollars around 15 – 16 years ago, increased to around 48 billion dollars by 2014. We allowed products to come from China while they stopped our products from India to go to China for legitimate or illegitimate reasons,” the minister added.

He spoke of the need to sensitize our people to take more pride in Indian products.

“India believes in the rule of law, their right to liberty, freedom of expression. Very different economic philosophies coexist in Asia. It will take some time for us to create adequate systems and manufacturing systems, and also sensitize our people and businesses to wean ourselves away from the opium of low-cost low-quality goods coming in from China,” he said.

The Minister said that India is now a partner the world can trust.

“By converting the Covid-19 crisis into an opportunity, we were able to open the world’s eyes towards India. Our ability to innovate and come out with vaccines and distribute and vaccinate the population at low cost has been a world record. During the Covid-19 pandemic, we did not let down a single international commitment. We are a trading partner the world can trust. We have had the highest-ever exports in 2021-22,” Goyal added.