DETAILED policies to transform the economy by getting more women into work, doubling exports and dramatically increasing Scotland's population will be at the heart of the SNP's independence blueprint.

The First Minister said the SNP would spell out its policy choices to tackle a range of economic problems in the White Paper next week.

He was speaking after the launch of another Scottish Government document explaining the additional economic powers that would become available to ministers under independence.

The 200-page report identified a series of problems facing the Scottish economy and insisted they could be tackled in different ways if the country left the UK.

Key priorities included ­increasing productivity and employment, boosting the population, growing exports and encouraging businesses through the tax system.

Building Security and Creating Opportunity: Economic Policy Choices in an Independent Scotland did not make specific policy commitments to address the issues raised.

However, Mr Salmond ­promised: "Next week we will be zeroing down to the SNP's choices, while making it clear we are only one political party."

He said the White Paper would include measures and "precise targets" to increase the population in coming decades by encouraging Scots not to leave the country and allowing more skilled migrants to settle and work in Scotland.

On Monday, the Institute for Fiscal Studies think tank warned an independent Scotland faced more severe tax rises or spending cuts than the rest of the UK over the next 50 years to bring the country's debts down to a manageable level.

The Scottish Government report, launched at Dundee University, acknowledged: "There will be challenges, not least in restoring the public finances to health and unravelling decades of under-investment in the economy."

It added: "Competing priorities will require to be managed".

But Mr Salmond insisted ­independence would free Scotland from "one size fits all' economic policies tailored mainly for London and the south-east of England.

He said: "If we pursue the sort of policy mix outlined potentially in today's document we can address these challenges, overcome them and take ourselves to a more prosperous outcome."

The Scottish Government ­document called for an industrial strategy designed to promote engineering and new growth sectors such as life sciences. It suggested that improved childcare and welfare provision could increase the number of women in work - helping families and giving the economy access to, as Mr Salmond put it, a "huge, untapped reserve of talent and ability."

It also said a cut in corporation tax - up to now the SNP's only firm tax pledge for an independent Scotland - and a possible reduction in air passenger duty would help key sectors.

Alistair Darling, head of the pro-UK Better Together campaign, said: "The Nationalists have chosen to ignore reality and to offer up a type of fantasy economics that beggars belief.

"Their paper seems to be telling people the best way to respond to the warning from experts that going it alone would mean tax rises for families and service cuts to communities is to make unfunded promises of business tax cuts.

"It just doesn't make any sense. It wouldn't solve the problem. If anything, it would make it worse."

Alistair Carmichael, the Scottish Secretary, said: "What we have is a wish-list but not a price-list for their undetailed plans."