This paper analyses how pandemic shocks, geopolitics, and climate risks are fragmenting global trade and how India is adapting through targeted industrial policy, diversified partnerships, and a revived FTA agenda. The contribution is threefold: (i) it synthesises recent shifts in supply chains and protectionist policy; (ii) it assesses India’s policy mix—ECTA/CEPA, PLI, and critical-minerals partnerships—against capability and infrastructure constraints; and (iii) it offers an evaluative roadmap for resilient, opportunity-creating trade in a de-risking world. Findings indicate that while India has leveraged friend?shoring tailwinds to boost electronics exports and FDI, binding bottlenecks in logistics, sustainability compliance (e.g., CBAM), and MSME digitisation must be addressed to lock in durable gains.

Keywords: Global trade, supply chain resilience, India’s trade strategy, protectionism, Free Trade Agreements (FTAs)
JEL Classification Codes: F13, F14, F53.

In Eastern India, natural resources and a cheap labour force are abundant, and infrastructural facilities are moderate. Any importance on small-scale production units, which often use labour-intensive techniques in artistic domains, may thus create high market demand for products. Eventual growth of these units may also call for regional development, which the present study attempts to inspect for the State of West Bengal, India. Although this study goes with the cluster approach of regional development, it goes beyond the traditional analysis which only focuses on the production process; rather examines why decent work practices are fundamental and how the workplace, together with home front, community and society, is connected to workers’ objective and subjective well-being, rise in productivity, and regional development in the end. The study blends early Location Theories with empirics to explain regional development, and thereby uses primary data, conducting Focus Group Discussions and interviews of the targeted population, employing simple statistical tools and a Likert scale to form an index. To analyse the growth potential and persisting threats of the production units, a SWOT analysis was also undertaken. Since this study analyses the progression from manufacturing industry-oriented intrusion to a total regional development with government support and people’s participation through a political economy of development approach, the perception magnifies sustainable growth.

Keywords: Growth Pole, Location Theory, Informal Sector, Objective Well-being, Subjective Well-being, Sustainable Growth.
JEL classification: O17, O4, I3, J01, R11, R58.

The present study examines the disparity in health based on health indicators across the districts in West Bengal, India. The disparities are considered to infer about human capital across the districts. The study has employed Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and accordingly formulated health indices in three domains: Health Infrastructure (HII), Accessibility and Affordability (AAI), and Nutrition and Health (NHI). A composite health index, grounded on the aggregate of the three indices, was constructed. The composite index highlights the overall disparity across the districts, while the domain-specific index reveals disparity within the district. The findings reveal wide variations both in the composite index and the domain-specific indices. There seems to exist inequality in the health component of human capital across the districts. Thus, the study recommends that concrete steps must be taken to improve the health indicators in the districts lagging behind. This will facilitate addressing the regional variations and strengthening the health component, eventually contributing to an improved human capital across districts and consequently in the state of West Bengal, India.

Keywords: Disparity, West Bengal, Health Indicators, Health Index, Human Capital.
JEL Classification: C38, I14 & J24.

Fiscal policy plays a central role in the economic development of a country, and inclusive growth is the key for Nigeria to achieve a growth that is broad-based and sustainable. Even though there are several studies on inclusive growth, there is a dearth of literature on the study that relates fiscal policy to inclusive growth in Nigeria. Thus, this study examines the effect of fiscal policy on inclusive growth in Nigeria using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model within the endogenous growth theory framework from 1981 to 2023. The Central Bank of Nigeria provided the data, and the composite index of the difference between the GDP per capita growth rate and percentage changes in Gini coefficients was used to measure inclusive growth. Government expenditure was divided into recurrent and capital expenditure. Sectoral government spending was also considered in analysing the effect of government expenditure on inclusive growth.

The findings showed the important role of targeted public expenditure in promoting inclusive growth in Nigeria. In the long run, disaggregated expenditure shows that both current and capital expenditure contribute positively to inclusive growth. While current expenditure supports essential services and immediate welfare needs, capital expenditure promotes infrastructure development and long-term economic benefits. However, the negative impact of government revenue and public debt on inclusive growth highlights the need for efficient revenue mobilisation and sustainable borrowing practices. The disaggregation of sectoral spending indicates that health, agriculture, and educational expenses greatly increase inclusive growth and enhance the importance of prioritising these areas for their long-term socio-economic benefits. Conversely, the negative impact of service cost means the inefficient or incorrect distribution of this category, emphasising the need for strategic redistribution in a sector that directly supports growth and inclusiveness. Thus, the government should prioritise productive expenditure by allocating more resources to recurrent and capital expenditures that directly support inclusive growth in Nigeria.

Keywords: Fiscal policy, Inclusive growth, ARDL, Nigeria.

The paper analyses the relationship between foreign direct investment and export dynamics in India from 2000 to 2023. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is a crucial factor for emerging nations like India, serving as an innovative accelerator to enhance exports and promote economic growth. In order to analyse both long- and short-run adjustments for foreign direct investment and exports, we used time-series data and applied the Augmented Dickey-Fuller test for stationarity. Following this, we employed the Johansen cointegration test as well as the VECM. A substantial correlation exists between FDI inflow and export performance over the long run. FDI corrects short-term deviations from equilibrium to the tune of roughly 29%. The Granger causality test indicates unidirectional causation from exports to foreign direct investment (FDI), suggesting that India’s robust export performance draws FDI rather than vice versa. The research indicates that maintaining India’s FDI inflow is essential for an export-driven strategy. Future research may focus on sector-specific foreign direct investment export relationships and the influence of global economic changes on these dynamics to enhance understanding of how India may further refine its FDI policies to boost exports and promote long-term economic growth.

Keywords: Foreign Direct Investment, Export dynamics, VECM, Granger causality, Economic growth.
JEL Codes: C32, F14, F21, F23, F43.

The existence of an earnings differential or wage gap is one of the many indicators of inequality and a manifestation of discrimination against women. The observed wage gap may be due to factors like social and cultural factors, differential preferences and tastes, low attachment of women in the labour market, occupational segregation, and, importantly, discrimination. This paper empirically estimates the extent of discrimination in the Indian labour market using the 2011-12 Indian Human Development Survey. The labour force participation decision is estimated by the probit method, and separate wage equations are estimated for men and women by OLS. Applying the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition method, the observed gender wage gap is decomposed into a part that is justified or explained by the differentials in the labour market characteristics of men and women, and the other part that is the unjustified or unexplained differentials that are mainly attributable to discrimination, among other plausible reasons. The decomposition results show that there exists a 26% wage gap against females, attributable to sex discrimination in the Indian labour market. Despite globalisation and labour market reforms, there has been hardly any decline in the gender wage gap in Indian labour since 1981, when 28% wage discrimination against women was observed.

Keywords: Gender wage gap, discrimination, labour force participation decision, probit estimation, wage estimation, Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition, discrimination.