Activity in the services sector shrank in September as new orders sank, a new survey shows. To add to the worries, overall economic activity is seen to ·be nearly stagnating, while employment levels fell for the second successive month.
The seasonally adjusted Service: Sector Business Activity Index fell to 49 .8 from 53 .8 in August, HSBC Purchasing Managers Index, which is based on a survey of350'private sector executives, showed. Any reading ofless than 50 indicates contraction, while · economic activity is seen to be growing if the ·index is over 50. This is the first time since April 2009 that the services secfor, that accounts for more than half the Indian. economy, -has slipped into negative terrain.
The decline in services sector activity could be attributed to lower demand for offshoring and IT and IT-enabled services from the US and Europe, where several economies are grappling with debt problems. There is also an impact on financial services as banking activity has slowed down on account of higher interest rates and investors are wary of-parking their funds in stock markets.
At the moment, manufacturing activity is continuing to grow, though at a much slower pace. As a result, The HSBC India Composite Index which covers manufacturing and services sectors stood at 50.2 in September, compared to 54.5 in August. The overall trend is·in line with expectations that the Indian economy will grow at less than 8% during the current financial year, with agriculture providing the ?,nly silver lining. Last year the economy expanded 8.5% prompting the government to predict 9% growth this year. But over the last few months, as the globareconomic situation deteriorated and higher interest rates slowed down the tempo, the government too is lowering its forecasts although not to the extent tpat others have done.
But services which are shrinking. The survey shows employment fell for the second successive month, incre·asing worries for policymakers, who want rapid economic growth to take care of the growing-population that is joining the workforce.
Which of the following conveys the mean!ng of the phra?se, " ... we are not quite there yet." as used in the passage.

Options

A. We are fall from satisfactory levels of employment rate.
B. There may be one or two more rounds of further rate hike.
C. The tightening cycle has come to an end.
D. The rapid economic growth is far away.

Answer

B