´Port investments can add 1.4% to GDP growth´

Investments in setting up ports and large industrial cities near them can help push economic growth by up to 1.4 percentage points, Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant has said.

¨GDP can grow by 1.3-1.4 per cent more if we can do several things like investing in ports and port connectivity and also by creating very large industrial cities linked to the ports,¨ Kant said on the sidelines of the maiden Maritime India Summit. He said a huge number of containers can be handled at such cities and there can be other backward linkages as well on manufacturing and logistics. Inaugurating the Maritime India Summit, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the government will invest Rs.1 trillion in the ports sector over the next decade to make the 7,500-km long coastline an ¨engine of growth.¨