that too at a time when they were looking to gradually recover from the slump caused by covid19 pandemic it was almost as if the economies were bogged down by a massive geopolitical crisis right when they were learning to wear off 2 years of pandemic blues within a span of few months central banks in major industrial nations were rushing to tighten their monetary policy stance increase key lending rates as a safeguard against rising inflation in india consumer prices soared to 8year high of 779 in april 2020 and remained above the reserve bank of indias rbis target range of 26 for 10 straight months the toideloitte survey shows that a majority of the respondents 3518 expect inflation to come down to the rbis median level of target range in over a year only 3149 expect it to happen in the next 6 months inflation may have peaked although it is too early to say so we expect it to remain high throughout the year due to high oil prices a strong dollar and intermittent supply chain disruptions exacerbated by geopolitical situations majumdar said she feels that it be a tightrope walk for the rbi as it will have to balance the growth and inflation objectives both at the same time majumdar urges the government to opt for sectorspecific targeted efforts to manage supply and therefore inflation a large part of inflation is due to food prices and the government must make efforts toward building infrastructure to optimize the food and agribusiness supply chain developing market linkages by identifying and connecting farmers with buyers and facilitating contract negotiations between the two could be critical again reducing logistics cost will be critical and schemes such as gati shakti and india logistics plan could go a long way in improving the last mile connectivity there has to be emphasis on effective implementation and execution of these schemes at the earliest she added exports boostindias exports fell over 12 to 345 billion in december 2022 while imports dipped 3 to 582 billion resulting in a widening of the trade deficitcommerce secretary sunil barthwal told reporters the declinethe fastest in two yearswas due to global headwinds as several countries are in the midst of a slowdown and also due to the high base in december 2021 when exports of 393 billion were the third highest on recordhowever majumbar believes that exports can see a boost through improved competitiveness and doing business environment she says that schemes like productionlinked incentives pli gati shakti are likely to help india improve its efficiency and bring down logistics costs a wellnegotiated free trade agreement can also help in improving export competitiveness alternatively india could deal with the situation of a rising current account deficit by restricting imports of nonessentials or looking for alternative cheaper import destinations she added boost to private capexeven amid inflationary pressures and the related rate hikes about 46 respondents said that they are likely to incur private capital investment to boost