Workshop: Firms, Industry and SME Data in India

• Industrialisation, firms, employment and micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) are important areas of research in understanding the characteristics and success of a national economy

• Researchers using official statistics on these sectors often face problems in gaining access to appropriate data

• The matchmaking workshop brought together top policymakers and top academics from across the world to discuss issues related to Industrial data in India.

Industrialisation, firms, employment, and micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) are key areas of research in understanding the characteristics of a national economy, particularly so in India where the small- and medium- scale manufacturing sector is under pressure to produce more employment opportunities.

While the need for such research is well understood in policy circles, several issues relating to the availability and format of data make such research difficult. To address this gap in data availability, the IGC India-Central team organised a one-day workshop on 27 March 2015. The workshop brought together top policymakers from the Ministry of Statistics, Economic Statistics Division, and National Statistics Commission with top academics including Marc-Andreas Muendler and Kala Krishna to discuss issues related to industrial data in India. Around 50 people participated in the workshop, including representatives from the World Bank and Asian Development Bank.

The workshop helped the policymakers to understand the problems faced by researchers doing work in these sectors. The workshop also provided an opportunity for researchers to discuss with policymakers best practices related to industrial data in other developing and developed countries across the word.

Policymakers agreed to act on a number of requests from researchers to increase availability of official statistics.