Industry needs to up R&D spend, expect govt capex growth to sustain: Ficci

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Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. New Delhi: Businesses need to step up their research and development spending, and the industry expects the government to sustain the growth in budget allocation for capital expenditure as these two would help the Indian industry to become more competitive in global markets, Harsha Vardhan Agarwal, president of Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci), and vice-chairman and managing director of Emami Ltd, said. In an interview to Mint, Agarwal also downplayed the government’s concerns that private sector salaries were not keeping pace with their multi-year-high profitability, saying that the need to retain talent ensures salary increments in the private sector.

“It is not that the industry does not increase salaries, because if they did not, workers would move to competitors. Businesses always look for capable, talented people. Private sector will always try to retain people because manpower is the biggest asset that a company can have.

Whatever they need to do to retain, motivate them, they always do, they need to do," Agarwal said. Chief economic advisor V. Anantha Nageswaran had said last week that staff cost of private-listed companies has been coming down and companies have used profits to deleverage.