IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ris/adbewp/0593.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Nowcasting Economic Growth in India: The Role of Rainfall

Author

Listed:
  • Iyer , Tara

    (International Monetary Fund)

  • Sen Gupta, Abhijit

    (Asian Development Bank)

Abstract

This study provides a toolkit to nowcast, or produce early estimates of, gross domestic product (GDP) growth in India. We use a dynamic factor model (DFM) to nowcast GDP growth in India on a quarterly basis from January 2000 to December 2018. The DFM methodology offers a powerful and tractable means of nowcasting economic growth while accounting for mixed-frequency data, which is data released on different dates, and missing time series. The specified DFM, which includes six quarterly indicators and 12 higher-frequency monthly variables, is able to effectively nowcast growth in India. The variables in the framework are drawn from the real, monetary, financial, and external sectors in India and selected to represent aggregate economic activity. There are several interesting results in the study. A key finding is that rainfall has high predictive content for GDP growth in India, a novel result from the viewpoint of the existing nowcasting literature.

Suggested Citation

  • Iyer , Tara & Sen Gupta, Abhijit, 2019. "Nowcasting Economic Growth in India: The Role of Rainfall," ADB Economics Working Paper Series 593, Asian Development Bank.
    • Handle: RePEc:ris:adbewp:0593
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.adb.org/publications/nowcasting-economic-growth-india-role-rainfall
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Forni, Mario & Hallin, Marc & Lippi, Marco & Reichlin, Lucrezia, 2003. "Do financial variables help forecasting inflation and real activity in the euro area?," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(6), pages 1243-1255, September.
    2. Giannone, Domenico & Reichlin, Lucrezia & Small, David, 2008. "Nowcasting: The real-time informational content of macroeconomic data," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 55(4), pages 665-676, May.
    3. Lahiri, Kajal & Monokroussos, George, 2013. "Nowcasting US GDP: The role of ISM business surveys," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 644-658.
    4. Matsuyama, Kiminori, 1992. "Agricultural productivity, comparative advantage, and economic growth," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 58(2), pages 317-334, December.
    5. Matheson, Troy D., 2010. "An analysis of the informational content of New Zealand data releases: The importance of business opinion surveys," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 304-314, January.
    6. Domenico Giannone & Lucrezia Reichlin & David H. Small, 2005. "Nowcasting GDP and inflation: the real-time informational content of macroeconomic data releases," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2005-42, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    7. Arvind Virmani, 2006. "India's Economic Growth History: Fluctuations, Trends, Break Points and Phases," Indian Economic Review, Department of Economics, Delhi School of Economics, vol. 41(1), pages 81-103, July.
    8. Massimiliano Marcellino & Christian Schumacher, 2010. "Factor MIDAS for Nowcasting and Forecasting with Ragged‐Edge Data: A Model Comparison for German GDP," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 72(4), pages 518-550, August.
    9. repec:hoo:wpaper:e-92-3 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Xavier Irz & Terry Roe, 2005. "Seeds of growth? Agricultural productivity and the transitional dynamics of the Ramsey model," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 32(2), pages 143-165, June.
    11. Nagaraj, R & Srinivasan, T N, 2017. "Measuring India’s GDP growth: Unpacking the Analytics & Data Issues behind a Controversy that Refuses to Go Away," India Policy Forum, National Council of Applied Economic Research, vol. 13(1), pages 73-128.
    12. Stock, James H & Watson, Mark W, 2002. "Macroeconomic Forecasting Using Diffusion Indexes," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, American Statistical Association, vol. 20(2), pages 147-162, April.
    13. Sen Gupta, Abhijit & Iyer, Tara, 2019. "Quarterly Forecasting Model for India’s Economic Growth: Bayesian Vector Autoregression Approach," ADB Economics Working Paper Series 573, Asian Development Bank.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kaufmann, Daniel & Scheufele, Rolf, 2017. "Business tendency surveys and macroeconomic fluctuations," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 878-893.
    2. Bańbura, Marta & Giannone, Domenico & Modugno, Michele & Reichlin, Lucrezia, 2013. "Now-Casting and the Real-Time Data Flow," Handbook of Economic Forecasting, in: G. Elliott & C. Granger & A. Timmermann (ed.), Handbook of Economic Forecasting, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 0, pages 195-237, Elsevier.
    3. Mogliani, Matteo & Darné, Olivier & Pluyaud, Bertrand, 2017. "The new MIBA model: Real-time nowcasting of French GDP using the Banque de France's monthly business survey," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 26-39.
    4. Bragoli, Daniela, 2017. "Now-casting the Japanese economy," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 33(2), pages 390-402.
    5. Michele Modugno & Lucrezia Reichlin & Domenico Giannone & Marta Banbura, 2012. "Nowcasting with Daily Data," 2012 Meeting Papers 555, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    6. Cascaldi-Garcia, Danilo & Ferreira, Thiago R.T. & Giannone, Domenico & Modugno, Michele, 2024. "Back to the present: Learning about the euro area through a now-casting model," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 40(2), pages 661-686.
    7. Matteo Luciani & Lorenzo Ricci, 2014. "Nowcasting Norway," International Journal of Central Banking, International Journal of Central Banking, vol. 10(4), pages 215-248, December.
    8. Banbura, Marta & Rünstler, Gerhard, 2011. "A look into the factor model black box: Publication lags and the role of hard and soft data in forecasting GDP," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 333-346, April.
    9. Caruso, Alberto, 2018. "Nowcasting with the help of foreign indicators: The case of Mexico," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 160-168.
    10. Chudik, Alexander & Grossman, Valerie & Pesaran, M. Hashem, 2016. "A multi-country approach to forecasting output growth using PMIs," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 192(2), pages 349-365.
    11. Rusnák, Marek, 2016. "Nowcasting Czech GDP in real time," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 26-39.
    12. Karim Barhoumi & Olivier Darné & Laurent Ferrara, 2014. "Dynamic factor models: A review of the literature," OECD Journal: Journal of Business Cycle Measurement and Analysis, OECD Publishing, Centre for International Research on Economic Tendency Surveys, vol. 2013(2), pages 73-107.
    13. Danilo Cascaldi-Garcia & Matteo Luciani & Michele Modugno, 2024. "Lessons from nowcasting GDP across the world," Chapters, in: Michael P. Clements & Ana Beatriz Galvão (ed.), Handbook of Research Methods and Applications in Macroeconomic Forecasting, chapter 8, pages 187-217, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    14. Raul Ibarra & Luis M. Gomez-Zamudio, 2017. "Are Daily Financial Data Useful for Forecasting GDP? Evidence from Mexico," Economía Journal, The Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association - LACEA, vol. 0(Spring 20), pages 173-203, April.
    15. Zhang, Qin & Ni, He & Xu, Hao, 2023. "Nowcasting Chinese GDP in a data-rich environment: Lessons from machine learning algorithms," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    16. Schumacher Christian, 2011. "Forecasting with Factor Models Estimated on Large Datasets: A Review of the Recent Literature and Evidence for German GDP," Journal of Economics and Statistics (Jahrbuecher fuer Nationaloekonomie und Statistik), De Gruyter, vol. 231(1), pages 28-49, February.
    17. Caruso, Alberto, 2019. "Macroeconomic news and market reaction: Surprise indexes meet nowcasting," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 1725-1734.
    18. Tóth, Peter, 2014. "Malý dynamický faktorový model na krátkodobé prognózovanie slovenského HDP [A Small Dynamic Factor Model for the Short-Term Forecasting of Slovak GDP]," MPRA Paper 63713, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Andreini, Paolo & Hasenzagl, Thomas & Reichlin, Lucrezia & Senftleben-König, Charlotte & Strohsal, Till, 2023. "Nowcasting German GDP: Foreign factors, financial markets, and model averaging," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 298-313.
    20. Massimiliano Marcellino & Christian Schumacher, 2010. "Factor MIDAS for Nowcasting and Forecasting with Ragged‐Edge Data: A Model Comparison for German GDP," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 72(4), pages 518-550, August.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    dynamic factor model; GDP growth; India; nowcasting; rainfall;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C32 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Multiple or Simultaneous Equation Models; Multiple Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes; State Space Models
    • C53 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Forecasting and Prediction Models; Simulation Methods
    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ris:adbewp:0593. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Orlee Velarde (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/eradbph.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.