Poverty unemployment and perspective of development

The need for micro-level planning has been recognised since the inception of planned economic development in India and the emphasis on district planning has started from the mid-sixties. The introduction of anti-poverty programmes during the recent plans has enhanced the need for planning at the block and district levels. Selection of a district as the unit of analysis has many advantages. Firstly, a district possesses a wealth of statistical data which can be used to delineate the economic structure of the district. This will be helpful not only for planning purposes but also provides a bench-mark for future studies on the district. Secondly, district possesses the desirable size and level of heterogeneity which is required for planning purposes. Finally, it would be possible to examine the most important issues like poverty and unemployment at the district level. The available information permits us to examine various issues debated at the national level. In view of all these advantages of selecting a district for analysis, the present study prepares a macro-framework for the economy of a district. It also shows how the available information supple mented with a few field studies allows us to carry out an analytical study in the Input-Output framework. It examines various issues like the relation between poverty and unemploy ment, poverty and growth, and unemployment and growth which are debated at the national level.