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Open Forum
Karnata Assembly Poll:MONEYBAGS FOR POLITICAL POWER, by Insaf, 7 May 2008 |
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Round The States
New Delhi, 7 May 2008
Karnata Assembly
Poll
MONEYBAGS FOR
POLITICAL POWER
By Insaf
The forthcoming Assembly poll in Karnataka has thrown up a new
trend in Indian politics, which is at once ugly and dangerous. More and more moneybags
are actively showing interest in what is being called the “business of politics”.
It’s now no longer the industrialists and liquor barons, but real estate moguls
and mine owners eager to control the levers of political power. Worse,
political parties are welcoming them with open arms. A quick glance at some such
candidates is not only revealing but knocks out former Chief Minister H D
Kumaraswamy, worth about Rs 50 crore, as a match. The BJP’s kitty includes G
Prasad Reddy, a real estate magnate with assets worth Rs 313 crore, Hemachnadra
Sagar, Rs 71 crore, Karunakara Reddy and Somashekar Reddy, both Rs 30 crore
each. The Congress has Kupendra Reddy with assets worth Rs 180 crore, Anil H
Lad, Rs 170 crore, H R Gaviappa, a mine owner, Rs 89 crore. Obviously, money is
no constraint. Rs 10 crore in cash was seized in Bellary and sarees worth Rs 20 lakhs in
Davanagere.
Clearly, the Election Commission faces a tough task in
ensuring a free and fair poll. However, it has already embroiled itself over
its code of conduct. Surprisingly, it has asked the BJP to delete all
references to the Centre and the Congress in its three short films spotlighting
rising prices and the agony of the aam
aadmi. This has given the BJP a new plank in addition to the “great
betrayal” by Deve Gowda’s Janata Dal (Secular). The BJP is now understandably
campaigning against the EC playing the censor and violating its constitutional right
of freedom of speech and thereby denying a “legitimate political debate”. On
its part, the Congress is going all out to woo the voters with promises of waiver
of loans, reservation for women, stipend for unemployed youth, Rs 50,000 crore
investment for infrastructure development et all. The voters shall make their
choice with the first phase of polling beginning today. .
* * * *
Deshmukh Gets Reprieve
Meanwhile, the Karnataka poll has given a breather to Maharashtra’s Congress Chief Minister, Vilasrao Deshmukh.
His head is no longer on the chopping block, as was the case last month, when
Sonia Gandhi had sought an assessment of his Government. Instead, he has been
asked by the Congress High Command to campaign for the second phase of polls on
May 22 in Bijapur, Gulbarga and Bidar areas, which have a sizeable Marathi-speaking
population. At home, Deshmukh has to decide what to do with Maharashtra Navnirman
Sena (MNS) Chief Raj Thackeray, who is back with his tirade against north
Indians. Though the Congress-led coalition Government is keen to help build the
MNS as a counter to Bala Saheb’s Shiv Sena, how long can it look the other way?
In a massive rally on Saturday last at Shivaji Park, Mumbai, Raj reiterated
that he would not allow the outsiders to destroy Maharashtra’s culture. He even
dared the Government to arrest him.
* * * *
Centre Seeks Meghalaya’s
Help
Meghalaya has assumed great importance for the UPA
government—at least in one core area of nuclear power. The Centre is running
short of 50 per cent of nuclear fuel, which according to Union Minister of
State for Power Jairam Ramesh could severely affect power projects. The Department
of Atomic Energy (DAE) has estimated that it can extract about 3,75,000 tonnes
of high-grade uranium ore from Domasiat in West Khasi Hills district of
Meghalaya. However, it has stiff opposition from some NGOs and political
parties for the past decade and more. Jairam Ramesh termed on Friday last in
Shillong the shortage as a “life and death issue for India”, and appealed to
the anti-uranium mining lobby to allow the mining of the precious ore. Those
opposed believe that mining of uranium would endanger the locals’ health by exposing
them to radiation. The Prime Minister too has personally conveyed the Centre’s
wish to Meghalaya Chief Minister Donkupar Roy. Much now depends upon Meghalaya
and its people.
* * * *
Manipur Villagers
To Be Armed
Manipur has decided to follow in the footsteps of
Chhattisgarh and Jammu and Kashmir to fight militancy. With the State having
the largest casualties in the troubled North-East, the Okram Ibobi Singh
government has decided to arm inhabitants of two villages—Heirok in Thoubal
district and Lilong Chajing in Imphal West District to protect themselves from
militants. On Friday last, his Cabinet also agreed to train and recruit 500 villagers
as ‘special police officers’ as in militancy-ridden J&K. The SPOs will get
a salary of Rs 3,000 per month and will be armed with .303 rifles. The decision
comes in the wake of the Centre mounting
concern over the deteriorating law and order situation in the State and the villagers’
demand for arms from the Government following the killing of three persons by
militants in March. Manipur’s move is on the lines of the Chhattisgarh Government’s
decision to set up Salwa Judum, a vigilante force, to fight the Naxalites. Ironically,
the Supreme Court recently expressed itself strongly against the concept of
Salwa Judum and even denounced it as violation of human rights. .
* * * *
States Overdrawing
Power
With temperatures already soaring high this summer, the
demand for electricity from various States has increased. Worse, most States
have started resorting to heavy overdrawal from the power grid, ignoring
mandatory safety measures. The Union Power Ministry is concerned. Instead of
load shedding, the States are overdrawing power thus risking a complete power
collapse in the country. In April, the
States which were issued overdrawal warning include, Uttar Pradesh, 137
notices, Rajasthan, 104 such warning, Gujarat 78, Punjab 71 and Haryana 30. The
demand for electricity is learnt to have increased on an average by 12 per cent
and in some cases even by 20 per cent. And, is bound to go up further. The Ministry
has done well in issuing the following advisory to the State governments: give
priority to drinking water supply, public utility and other essential services
if and when supply is less than demand.
* * * *
CBI To Probe Rhino
Poaching
Last week, the Camel made news in more ways than one. This
time around it is the rhinoceros. None less than the Central Bureau of
Investigation (CBI) has been approached by
the Assam Government to look into the recent spate of poaching of rhinos in the
Kaziranga National Park and Orang and Pobitora parks. So far, six rhinos have
been killed this year, while 21 rhinos were poached last year. The tally adds
up to 78 since 2001. The decision to involve the CBI follows allegations of
involvement of international agencies in poaching incidents. The reason? The rhino horn is in big demand as its powder
is widely believed to be an aphrodisiac. It is five times more valuable than
gold and fetches around $ 45,000 per kg in the international market! Kaziranga
is said to have the largest number of rhinos in the world—2,000, about 80 per
cent of the global population! --INFA
(Copyright, India News and Feature
Alliance)
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Agni III Missile:PROPELS INDIA IN BIG LEAGUE, by Radhakrishna Rao, 19 May 2008 |
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Defence
Notes
New
Delhi, 19 May 2008
Agni III Missile
PROPELS INDIA
IN BIG LEAGUE
By Radhakrishna Rao
The smooth and flawless test firing of the
long range nuclear-capable Agni-III missile capable of hitting targets at a
distance of 3,500-km early this month from the Integrated Test range (ITR)on
Wheeler Island on the east coast has
come as a shot in the arm for India’s credible nuclear deterrence capability.
According to sources in the Defence Research and Development Organisation
(DRDO), which designed, developed and tested Agni-III, this firing has cleared
the decks for its production and induction.
However, Agni-III would need to be
subjected to one more flight before it is declared operational. Significantly,
the trade embargo imposed by the US in the wake of Pokhran II in
1998 had impeded the pace of development of these missiles. Washington
exerted pressure on New Delhi to drop the
project as it was a threat to the stability in South Asia
region.
Clearly, Agni-III’s successful test flight
has propelled India into the
select group of countries such as Russia,
US, France and China
which have missiles similar to Agni-III in their arsenal.
Described as a “fire and forget” missile
the Agni-III is capable of computing its own trajectory and is immune to all
the extraneous forces once it is launched. Perhaps the biggest advantage that India
could derive from Agni-III is that this missile has given the country for the
first time a clear cut capability to strike deep into the Chinese territory.
Defence observers say that Agni-III could easily reach cities like Shanghai and Beijing.
As it stands China’s
latest submarine launched ballistic missile JL-2 and its land- based variant
DF-31 have been causes of concern for India’s defence establishment.
Besides, many short range Indian missiles could easily hit urban centres of Pakistan
with ease. Notwithstanding, that Pakistan’s long range Shaheen-II missile could
easily hit many cities in the northern and western parts of India.
There is no gainsaying that Agni-III’s
capability has gone down well with India’s of no-first-use nuclear
policy which holds that ‘nuclear retaliation to a first strike will be massive
and designed to inflict unacceptable damage”. The 50-tonne heavy, 1.7 metre
tall 100% indigenous all-composite Agni-III is an all solid fuel driven
two-stage weapon system. Being rail mobile, it can be launched from any part of
India.
More than 70 Indian industrial units have contributed to its development
vis-à-vis technology, systems and subsystems, components and raw materials.
As it is, Agni-III has benefited from the technological elements
developed for the short range Agni-I already inducted into the Indian army and Agni-II which after completion of user
trials is ready for induction into the services .While Agni-I has a range of 700-kms, Agni-II has a range of 2000-km.
The Agni-III is expected to be ready for test flight early next decade.
Spurred on by the unqualified success of
Agni-III, the DRDO is now preparing the ground to launch a project aimed at
developing longer range Agni-V missile capable of hitting targets at a distance
of 5,000-km. “The development process has already begun and in the next two
years the design should be ready” quipped a senior official of the DRDO.
The Agni-V would derive most of its
sub-systems from Agni-II. But they would need sufficient scaling. Also on the
anvil is a plan to develop Agni-IV as an intermediate step between Agni-III and
Agni-V. Besides, the Agni-V would need to be thoroughly evaluated for severe
thermal environment and other factors while on flight.
Significantly, the long term goal of the
DRDO is to achieve Multiple Independently Retargettable Vehicle (MIRV)
capability .But achieving MIRV capability could pose a serious technological
challenge in terms of the size and weight of the warheads. The DRDO has also a
plan to develop a hypersonic missile, the technology developed for which could
have civilian spin offs in the form of a low cost satellite launch vehicle and
an ultra fast civilian aircraft.
Asserted another DRDO official, “We have
the capability to go in for even longer range missiles but it is for the
political leadership to take a decision.” As things stand now, developing the
ICBMs (Inter Continental Ballistic Missiles) capable of hitting targets beyond
the range of 10,000-kms is well within the country’s capability. India’s advances in launch vehicle
technology as highlighted by the success in pulling off multiple launches and
the ground covered in developing heavy lift-off vehicles could smoothen the
country’s plan to develop a range of ICBMs in the near future.
Yet another feather in the cap of DRDO is
the progress, though modest, achieved in giving a shape to India’s nuclear capable submarine
launched ballistic missile (SLBM). As envisaged, the Indian SLBM whose initial
range would be around 750-km, is expected to be ready by early next decade when
India’s
own nuclear submarine would hit the blue oceans.
Meanwhile, the DRDO is hopeful of testing
its EXO Interceptor which forms a part of its BMD (Ballistic Missile Defence)
system in July. This would be followed by another test involving both the EXO
and ENDO interceptors in tandem in Sept-October. As it is, the Indian BMD
system has gone through two successful test flights in Nov 2006 and Dec
2007. In sum, as India’s missile programme
progresses from strength to strength, an old adage needs to be recalled: If you are strong in your defence, your
adversary will think twice before any misadventure. ---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
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Inflation Still Untamed:RETHINK POLICY PEGGING RUPEE TO DOLLAR, by Dr. Vinod Mehta,21 May 2008 |
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ECONOMIC HIGHLIGHTS
New Delhi, 21 May 2008
Inflation Still Untamed
RETHINK POLICY PEGGING RUPEE TO DOLLAR
By Dr. Vinod Mehta
Former Dir
(Research) ICSSR
The rate of inflation after having dipped to below 4
per cent surpassed the 5 per cent level in March
and now for the week ending 3 May it moved to 7.83 per cent, touching a
44-month high. The measures taken so far to control
inflation have not yielded any results.
The Reserve Bank of India has raised the credit reserve
ratio twice while the Finance Minister has reduced the import duties as well as
imposed/increased the export duties on a few essential commodities. It is also persuading
the steel and cement manufacturers not to increase their prices. In spite of positive sounds that inflation
will be controlled nothing is happening.
And now the Prime Minister has stated that it will
come down by September this year. But fears are being expressed in certain
quarters that the rate of inflation may become double digit in a few
months. The reason is that earlier the
inflation was mainly due to a mismatch in the domestic demand and supply and
now an international dimension has been added to it. Namely, the rising oil
prices, shrinking supply of essential commodities internationally and the
weakening of the US dollar are showing their impact.
In fact, inflation has suddenly spurted in many countries of the world
and in some developing countries like Afghanistan,
Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia,
Philippines,
Tajikistan etc. Besides, the increase in the prices of essential commodities
have been very high. With food and fuel prices soaring, inflation topped 8 per
cent in the Philippines and
9 per cent in Indonesia.
Even Japan,
which suffered nearly a decade of deflation, last month reported that inflation
hit a decade-high. Oil rich countries of West Asia too like Egypt and Jordan are unable to explain the
unprecedented increase in the prices of essential commodities to their
citizens.
Apart from India
other BRIC (Brazil-Russia-India-China) countries are also facing the menace of
inflation. Compared to Russia, India
and China the rate of
inflation in Brazil
is less at 4.8 per cent but it is increasing.
However, the rate of inflation in Russia
is above 7 per cent and in China
about 8.5 per cent, way above India.
China's
recent bout of inflation has been triggered mainly by soaring food prices. The
overall food prices have increased by 22.1 per cent in April from a year
earlier, “while pork, the favorite meat for the vast majority of Chinese,
became 68.3 per cent more expensive over the same period.”
Inflation is, thus, a worldwide phenomenon today but
for India the increase in prices have come at a time when there has been some
slowdown in the growth of the domestic manufacturing sector and the fear of
worldwide recession especially in the US which may affect our exports and
indirectly affect the growth of the economy in general.
This is indeed, a very difficult situation for the Government
in power especially when the elections are due both in the States as well as at
the Centre. If the choice is between
growth and inflation, it makes sense to choose growth and ignore inflation,
which can be tackled through short term measures like imports in weeks or
months.
But if we lose the growth momentum it will take years
to get back that momentum. It has taken
almost 50 years to raise the growth rate by nearly three times from almost
three per cent (the so called Hindu rate of growth) to nine per cent today. But
with the inflation rising above 7 per cent there is a likelyhood that some growth will be sacrificed to tame
inflation since untamed inflation is a politically hot potato.
It is common knowledge that inflation strains family budgets
with more or less fixed incomes and erodes their real incomes. While higher
growth impacts the whole economy bringing in more revenues to the Government
and leads to creation of more productive assets and more jobs. An ideal situation is one where the growth
rate is higher and the rate of inflation is modest. In real life we seldom get such ideal
situations. The Government’s of the day
have no option but to manage the situations with the options available to them
at that particular point of time.
But as every one knows there is no magic wand to
control or bring down the rate of inflation overnight as the people would like
it to be. There is always a time lag. Steps
taken now will have the desired effect a month, two months or even three to
four months later. And in certain
situations it may take a few years as in the case of agro-based essential
commodities.
The main reason for the increase in the price level
is the mismatch between the demand and supply of essential commodities. This
mismatch has not occurred overnight but has been gradually developing for the
past few years. For instance, the
acreage under food crops has been shrinking, productivity of agricultural crops
is stagnant and there is still no freer movement of agricultural products
within the country.
In short, nothing has been done to increase the
supply of essential commodities. And the supplies cannot be increased overnight
to control inflation. The Government
will have to take certain decisions now so that the prices of essential
commodities remain relatively stable over a longer period of time.
This calls for large investments in the agricultural
sector and rural infrastructure. This
also calls for raising the agricultural productivity by providing farmers with
improved seeds and other inputs, timely credit, chain of cold storages, market
information and so on. A large number of
volumes have been written on this aspect in the past 50 years but the need is
to implement them. Can one ask if there
is any blue print for this?
Another reason for inflation in India is that the
rupee is pegged to the US dollar and the dollar’s weakening worsens it. To quote from a US financial paper : “The weakening
U.S. dollar is another source. Not only is it pushing up prices of American
imports, it is transmitting inflation to the dozens of economies that link
their currencies to the U.S. dollar, from Saudi
Arabia to Hong Kong to Mongolia. Because of their currency
pegs, these economies are forced to track Fed rate cuts even if they aren't
facing recession.
“Isn't that strange that in every country
pegged to our dollar, when the Fed floods the system with
liquidity, every country tied
to us gets more inflation, but we do not? Almost ironic isn't it, but I trust
the Government reports --- and if they say no inflation --- then no inflation
it is!
“In
China
we are now seeing nearly 9 per cent inflation. In India, white collar wage inflation
is sometimes in the 20%+ range. Most of South America has Central Banks raising
rates to try to fight inflation, as is Australia. It appears America, Canada,
and Antarctica are immune to the scourge - no
inflation zones!”
It is high time that we rethink our policy of pegging the rupee to the US
dollar. There have been suggestions that
we should link the rupee to a basket of currencies say, the Euro, Japanese Yen
and US dollar. But for that we will have
to make changes in the RBI rules. May be
the RBI can enlighten us on this? --- INFA
(Copyright India News & Feature Alliance)
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Uncompetitive Economy:WHO PAYS FOR EFFICIENCY & CORRUPTION?, by Dr. Vinod Mehta,15 May 2008 |
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Economic Highlights
New Delhi, 15 May 2008
Uncompetitive Economy
WHO PAYS FOR EFFICIENCY &
CORRUPTION?
By Dr. Vinod Mehta
(Former Director, Research, ICSSR)
As
the economists say, nothing comes free in this world. One has to pay for it. But when a consumer pays for something he or
she gets in return something tangible like bread or butter or intangible like
the services of a lawyer or a doctor.
This is the positive aspect.
There
is also a negative aspect to costs in the sense that a consumer gets nothing
tangible or intangible in return but increased cost. This negative aspect of cost is reflected in
higher prices, higher taxes etc., which in turn are nothing but costs of
inefficiency and corruption at various levels inside and outside the
government, within the organizations as also within the system itself.
So
far, no systematic study has been done to quantify the costs the individual or
for that matter the country as a whole pays for the inefficiency and corruption. However, one can bet that if any such study
were to be done based on an appropriate methodology, the costs of inefficiency
and corruption would run into thousands of crores of rupees every year.
Let
us take steel for instance. India is
rich in iron ore and many countries especially Japan buys large quantities of
iron ore from India to turn it into steel and then make products like car,
tractors etc. out of them. It pays the
freight charges for importing Indian iron ore as also pays relatively much
higher wages to its steel workers, but still Japan
is able to sell steel at a relatively competitive price than India. Why is it so?
In
fact, public sector steel units are over-manned-- where one worker can do the job there are
three or four employed. The Indian
labour laws are such that it becomes very difficult to lay off an inefficient
worker or to re-deploy him elsewhere.
Those who are familiar with the recruitment practices of workers and
employees for public sector undertakings (PSUs) would know that most of its
workers and employees are recruited not on the basis of their skills or
qualifications but on recommendations of politicians.
Similarly,
the top positions are also filled not on the basis of the qualification and the
expertise of the person concerned, but on some other considerations like the
political propinquity of the concerned person or bureaucratic lobby etc.
The
result is higher administered prices and higher taxes. In a competitive environment most of these PSUs
would have been closed down by now or taken over by healthier units. Since this
is not possible in the existing circumstances, therefore, to keep the steel
mills running or for that matter any PSU running, the government raises the
prices to cover up a part of its losses, increases taxes to cover another part
of the costs and raises the countervailing duty on imported steel to protect
the steel industry.
These
relatively higher prices of steel and higher taxes are in fact, the costs of
inefficiency, which the Indian consumer as well the Indian nation as a whole is
forced to pay. (The government at the moment is asking the steel manufacturers
to keep the prices down to help it tackle current level of inflation. It does
not affect the larger argument that the steel prices are still administered to
a very large extent).
In
a chain reaction, with the price of steel being high, the cost of construction
becomes high for the consumer, the cost of motor vehicle is high and we are
unable to sell our steel goods abroad. So as a nation we also lose on
exports.
This
is true of many of our industries. In the airlines business, we employ about
five to 10 persons on a job, which is normally handled by just one person
abroad. In the hotel industry too, we
employ more people than what are actually required. This is also true of government employment.
It
needs to be noted that this was the state of affairs in the erstwhile USSR and for
this reason its industry was totally inefficient and uncompetitive in the world
market. Even today, 18 years after the breakdown of the USSR and the introduction
of the market economy, the Russian industry is still uncompetitive. It is true
that over- manning provides employment to more people, but in the long run it
turns those surplus people into parasites. The over-manning of business and
industry only signifies a stagnant economy--an economy which is not
growing.
A
growing economy would generate more employment, which would be more
productive. This is what is lacking in
this country. While no new jobs are being created, more and more people are
being employed on same jobs. All our
attempts in the past, to raise the level of investment either through the
domestic or foreign investment route have not succeeded.
Likewise,
there is a cost to be paid for corruption, which is again reflected in higher
prices and higher taxation. Over the years, corruption has entered our body
politic to the extent that it has become somewhat a second nature with a
majority of our people. We seldom pause
to think that this personal gain can have bad effects on the economy.
Take
the case of electricity. It has become
normal practice to steal electricity in connivance with the electricity board
officials; an employee gets monetary benefit, while the electric distribution
unit does not recover the cost of its operations. In many cases the bills remain unpaid for
months together. Once the State Electricity Board runs into losses the
situation is retrieved only by either raising the electricity charges or other
taxes and this cycle carries on for years together. Electricity charges have been raised umpteen
times, but units never come out of losses!
In
fact, corruption is visible in almost every deal. If somebody wants his tender to be accepted
he has to pay a bribe. The loan cannot
be raised from a bank without greasing the palm of the concerned officer. You
cannot get your child admitted in a particular school or a course without
paying some kind of consideration, money euphemistically called ‘donation’ or ‘capitation
fee’. The inconvenient files can be made
to disappear from offices by paying a bribe.
The engineers will not pass the bills of the contractors unless they pay
them a bribe. It is so much so that the contractors now keep the necessary
margin for a bribe while submitting their tenders.
All
those who have paid bribes and all the organizations which have lost money due
to bribes automatically will resort to other means to recover their
monies. Those who have paid bribes would
recover them by taking bribes or by doing other illegal acts like concealing
their income etc. Organizations will jack up the prices of their products while
the government would raise the administered prices as well as taxes.
The
country must get out of this vicious circle of inefficiency and corruption at
the earliest. It is for the people to
understand this vicious circle and come out openly against this inefficiency
and corruption. As the citizens should ask political leaders what they have done
in these past five decades to root out corruption and improve the efficiency in
the country!--INFA
(Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)
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Increasing Food Demand:MALNUTRITION & & FAMINE SCARE, by Dhurjati Mukherjee, 16 May 2008 |
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Open Forum
New Delhi, 16 May 2008
Increasing Food Demand
MALNUTRITION & &
FAMINE SCARE
By Dhurjati Mukherjee
The global food situation has been reported to be quite
alarming and with record high grain prices there is a possibility of increasing
malnutrition, perhaps famine, in some parts of Africa and South
Asia. The Food & Agriculture Organization (FAO) has declared
that 850 million persons would go hungry in the world and things are expected
to get worse this year and also possibly in 2009. Yet an estimated 1.6 billion
adults, about a quarter of the world’s 6.7 billion people are overweight, some
of them obese.
According to the United Nations Population Division, the
world’s population is growing by about 78 million people per annum with
projections of an additional 2.5 billion by 2050. The increase in population
and the change in consumption coupled with growing use of corn and other foods
for bio-fuel are expected to trigger a food shortage. Unless food shortage is
tackled effectively and quickly, the world would face increased social unrest,
food riots, political instability and more failed States, observed Lester
Brown, president, Earth Policy Institute, Washington.
Already food riots have been reported in over a dozen
countries in Africa and Asia, specially in Egypt, Haiti, Cameroon, Bangladesh
and Indonesia following sharp rise in food prices caused by various factors
which included record oil costs, severe droughts, diversion of corn for ethanol
use and rapidly growing demand in the Third World countries, including China
and India. The World Bank president, Robert B. Zoellick, has warned that around
30 nations are at risk of social unrest from the crisis as the world faced the
biggest challenge from its 45-year history.
By 2012, world population is expected to touch seven billion,
most of the additions being in South Asia and Africa.
Asia will add 500 million, reaching 1.6
billion. Africa’s population, now 960 million,
will grow by one billion. A rough calculation by Brown and his Institute has
found that just to feed the additional each year would require 640 square miles
of good new farmland. That’s an area approximately the size of Los Angeles county or 18 million football
fields.
At a recent meeting of experts, called by the British Prime Minister
to discuss the food crisis, the chief of World Food Programme, Josette Sheeran,
said a “silent tsunami” threatened to
plunge 100 million people on every continent into hunger. “This is the new face
of hunger – the millions of people who are not in the urgent hunger category
but now are”, he observed.
Meanwhile, the White House released $ 200 million in wheat
stores for developing countries recently, and further steps are being planned
to help ease the burden of the rising food prices on the world’s impoverished
people. Options include building more overseas storage facilities and roads to
reduce food wastage and taking necessary measures to accord top priority in
evolving an action plan at the G-8 summit of industrialized nations in July.
As for India, it has been found that the
Rs 5,000-crore National Food Security Mission (NFSM), launched to ensure food
security for all by 2012, may be inadequate for meeting the foodgrains’ demand
in the country. While the total production has been estimated to touch 230
million tonnes by then, experts feel that it will fall short of the demand by
4.15 million tones. The demand estimates do not take into account the changing
consumption pattern in the country, specially in a section of the rural areas and
the urban areas.
The FAO has estimated that
one-fifth of the Indian population is undernourished because of poverty. While general
consumption has been on the rise, on the one hand, and a changing pattern
discernible, on the other, there would be increasing pressure on foodgrains.
One cannot deny that the effects of the National Rural Employment Guarantee
Programme (NREGP) and Bharat Nirman will steadily have an impact on the rural
areas and, as the poor and the economically weaker sections use over 70-80 per
cent of their income on food, the demand projections may need to be further revised.
The NFSM has been designed only
to produce more rice, wheat and pulses. “It does not focus on coarse grains but we’re
now thinking of looking at the demand for such grains as well”, Union
Agriculture Ministry sources informed. This is much needed at this point as
demand for coarse grains would increase greatly in the coming five years while,
in urban areas, the demand would be oriented towards meat, eggs and pulses.
The problem of food crisis is
exacerbated by the fact that in China,
India
and some other countries, the diet of the growing middle-class now includes
more meat, poultry and eggs. To grow farm animals and poultry require much more
agricultural feed stocks per unit of output compared to the crops being
consumed by humans. Amongst vegetarians and a section of the rural population,
the per capita consumption of pulses and edible oils is growing as well,
pushing up prices of all these commodities.
In addition, the production of
foodgrains has also been affected by climate change such as unseasonal heavy
rains, floods. Moreover, diversion of more land top growing crops for
production of bio-fuels for energy security has pushed up food prices and
depleted food stocks. In India,
water availability is a problem specially to boost up productivity, while
dryland farming has not yet become widespread. Irrigation and water facilities
are inadequate in most parts to produce three crops per year.
Moreover, in some countries of
the Third World, including India
there is an increasing trend to industrialize by using agricultural land to
boost up the pace of growth. If this continues, it is likely to have disastrous
consequence in the not-too-distant future and food security may get
jeopardized. Though the Union government has recently come out against this trend,
it does not look to be serious.
While there is still time for India, we need to focus attention
on the agricultural sector and ensure increased production of foodgrains,
pulses and other basic necessities. The average crop yield in the country --3.12
tonnes per hectare is far less than the Asian average--4.17 tonnes per hectare.
Punjab and Haryana have been facing soil health
problems in respect of salinity and nutrient imbalance and irrigation potential
appears to be steadily exhausted. However, there is need to fully tap the
potential in the eastern and north-eastern region, stretching from eastern Uttar
Pradesh to Assam
for improving productivity, specially of rice.
The land-to-lab approach has to become a reality and the
agricultural universities have to be actively involved in this task. Other
measures such as rain water harvesting,
use of genetically modified seeds, wherever necessary, protection against weeds
and pests, better storage facilities and improving weather forecasting
(specially of rains) to protect crops are very much necessary in the short
term.
India must give special attention to the
fact that while it gives preference to the export promotion, it should not
weaken its ‘food security’ condition and
usurp the livelihood of poor villagers. As Mangal Rai, Director General,
Indian Council for Agricultural Research (ICAR) rightly pointed out: “Since land
area is limited and agricultural land is the most precious, one must be very
careful. One will have to take into cognizance the long-term effects of food
security of the country. Food security is an integral part of national
security”. ---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
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