Policy continuity with a definite thrust
Saturday, 15 September 2007
Qazi Azad
IN respect of development in several sectors, this country should arrive at a firm decision to rigidly follow a set of fixed ideas. Otherwise, the search for national advancement may be as vexing as the outcome of our one-time idea of spreading education in the vernacular.
The particular choice of that time has now given an opportunity to the British Council in Dhaka to earn a good amount of money by conducting here courses for the English Language Testing Service. Of course, the service is very useful in our present context. But our present punishment for our old folly is that we are continually losing money and that we have fallen behind in the global competition because of our lack of proficiency in the global commercial language, which is English.
The sectors, where certain pre-fixed ideas should be strenuously pursued ceaselessly without any compromise, are food production, land saving, industrial development and education. The ideas to be followed ought to be framed within a short period through informed analyses and debates. Unending analysis and debates, which are usually viewed as continuous search for ways for better perfection, also result in instability of policies, unless these are unidirectional. Such instability can only cause a nation repeatedly to miss its way and frustrate its goal of attaining progressively higher prosperity.
While deciding the guiding idea of the food production policy, we ought to logically ascertain how much food grain should be enough for our population and what should be its rate of annual growth to ensure availability of food for the new mouths, adding each year to the existing population. On an average, the intake of rice, which is basically a source of carbo-hydrate, by Bangladeshis is disproportionately higher than their consumption of animal protein, vegetables, fruits and milk. If twice the volume of rice, usually recommended for consumption by a diabetic patent in one meal, is enough per meal for a person in normal health, perhaps the present quantum of annual rice production in the country is more than enough to meet its yearly requirement.
Quality of life is greatly determined by a healthy diet, which does not depend on excessive consumption of only one food item. A proper assessment of the logical need for rice production will enable the authorities in identifying ways to augment production of the next most important food item, which is animal protein-fish and consumable meat. A ceiling drawn on rice production on a logical basis will permit maintaining certain land areas primarily for fish farming and cattle rearing and insulating them, for that purpose, from pollution by insecticides and abusive doses of chemical fertilisers. The vast wetland or haor areas of the country, where fishes can grow year round, may be brought under a system of such insulation with a firm official policy regulating agriculture in those areas.
Perhaps, a policy for simultaneous promotion of cattle and vegetable farming on a commercial scale in those areas, where grass would be free of toxin contents from insecticides and fertilisers, will succeed. Buffaloes, which are also a major source of milk, can be raised in a huge number in those areas, if not cow and goats. One of the major reasons why the number of cows and goats are steadily declining in comparison with the population growth in this country is the gradual shrinking of healthy grazing fields. Farmers have to labour harder than before for rearing both cows and goats. The toxin in the natural grass of the farmlands, owing to use of insecticides and fertilisers, not only affects the health but also the fertility of these domestic animals. The fact that birds like kingfishers, cranes and wild pigeons, which usually collect their food from agricultural lands, are now on the verge of extinction in this country supports this contention.
To ensure rice, fish, vegetable and milk production at steady and good levels, a strict well-laid-out policy for saving agricultural land should be adopted and religiously enforced. It would require simultaneous enforcement of a sound transportation policy, to be conjoined with fresh policies to regulate construction of new roads and rural houses and homesteads.
As the abnormally high population density of this country, its low level of economic growth and the consequential widespread poverty have made it explicit that further green revolution may not suffice to meaningfully dismantle poverty and significantly reduce unemployment, the thrust on industrial development has to be escalated and optimised with realistic policy supports, like reduced taxation to absorb the harsh impact of steady tariff reduction on industries and industrial expansion. If both the taxation policy and the tariff policy keep on mounting adverse pressure on the industries and entrepreneurs concurrently at this early stage of industrialisation in the name of competition, the eventual result may not be at all encouraging. It may not be any better than what would happen if a lame person is forced to compete in the long Olympic race.
In deciding what would be realistic polices on the two subjects, we ought to recognise that our route to poverty alleviation has to be via employment generation and not through expansion of the welfare net, for which we have too little wealth. Besides, we may decide what activities should remain pending to reduce the pressure for augmenting the state revenue. But what must not wait is putting an extra-ordinary emphasis on raising the quality of education.
Education without quality may be good for proving the correctness of the saying that "A little learning is a dangerous thing"; but it is no good for the advancement of a society. Unfortunately, since the time this nation has been committing the largest budget allocation to education sector-wise, public complaint about the deteriorating standard of education has become more pronounced and widespread. What is then the rate of return from the investment on this cheap education?
The time in hand of the present government is not long. Yet it can introduce policy changes in those critical areas and create a firm base of public opinion on those issues to support the qualitative policy changes in the future. Since a democratic government survives on the strength of public opinion, no elected government in the future would dare to amend such policy changes if these can be brought into being and caused to rest on the firm rock of solid public support.
IN respect of development in several sectors, this country should arrive at a firm decision to rigidly follow a set of fixed ideas. Otherwise, the search for national advancement may be as vexing as the outcome of our one-time idea of spreading education in the vernacular.
The particular choice of that time has now given an opportunity to the British Council in Dhaka to earn a good amount of money by conducting here courses for the English Language Testing Service. Of course, the service is very useful in our present context. But our present punishment for our old folly is that we are continually losing money and that we have fallen behind in the global competition because of our lack of proficiency in the global commercial language, which is English.
The sectors, where certain pre-fixed ideas should be strenuously pursued ceaselessly without any compromise, are food production, land saving, industrial development and education. The ideas to be followed ought to be framed within a short period through informed analyses and debates. Unending analysis and debates, which are usually viewed as continuous search for ways for better perfection, also result in instability of policies, unless these are unidirectional. Such instability can only cause a nation repeatedly to miss its way and frustrate its goal of attaining progressively higher prosperity.
While deciding the guiding idea of the food production policy, we ought to logically ascertain how much food grain should be enough for our population and what should be its rate of annual growth to ensure availability of food for the new mouths, adding each year to the existing population. On an average, the intake of rice, which is basically a source of carbo-hydrate, by Bangladeshis is disproportionately higher than their consumption of animal protein, vegetables, fruits and milk. If twice the volume of rice, usually recommended for consumption by a diabetic patent in one meal, is enough per meal for a person in normal health, perhaps the present quantum of annual rice production in the country is more than enough to meet its yearly requirement.
Quality of life is greatly determined by a healthy diet, which does not depend on excessive consumption of only one food item. A proper assessment of the logical need for rice production will enable the authorities in identifying ways to augment production of the next most important food item, which is animal protein-fish and consumable meat. A ceiling drawn on rice production on a logical basis will permit maintaining certain land areas primarily for fish farming and cattle rearing and insulating them, for that purpose, from pollution by insecticides and abusive doses of chemical fertilisers. The vast wetland or haor areas of the country, where fishes can grow year round, may be brought under a system of such insulation with a firm official policy regulating agriculture in those areas.
Perhaps, a policy for simultaneous promotion of cattle and vegetable farming on a commercial scale in those areas, where grass would be free of toxin contents from insecticides and fertilisers, will succeed. Buffaloes, which are also a major source of milk, can be raised in a huge number in those areas, if not cow and goats. One of the major reasons why the number of cows and goats are steadily declining in comparison with the population growth in this country is the gradual shrinking of healthy grazing fields. Farmers have to labour harder than before for rearing both cows and goats. The toxin in the natural grass of the farmlands, owing to use of insecticides and fertilisers, not only affects the health but also the fertility of these domestic animals. The fact that birds like kingfishers, cranes and wild pigeons, which usually collect their food from agricultural lands, are now on the verge of extinction in this country supports this contention.
To ensure rice, fish, vegetable and milk production at steady and good levels, a strict well-laid-out policy for saving agricultural land should be adopted and religiously enforced. It would require simultaneous enforcement of a sound transportation policy, to be conjoined with fresh policies to regulate construction of new roads and rural houses and homesteads.
As the abnormally high population density of this country, its low level of economic growth and the consequential widespread poverty have made it explicit that further green revolution may not suffice to meaningfully dismantle poverty and significantly reduce unemployment, the thrust on industrial development has to be escalated and optimised with realistic policy supports, like reduced taxation to absorb the harsh impact of steady tariff reduction on industries and industrial expansion. If both the taxation policy and the tariff policy keep on mounting adverse pressure on the industries and entrepreneurs concurrently at this early stage of industrialisation in the name of competition, the eventual result may not be at all encouraging. It may not be any better than what would happen if a lame person is forced to compete in the long Olympic race.
In deciding what would be realistic polices on the two subjects, we ought to recognise that our route to poverty alleviation has to be via employment generation and not through expansion of the welfare net, for which we have too little wealth. Besides, we may decide what activities should remain pending to reduce the pressure for augmenting the state revenue. But what must not wait is putting an extra-ordinary emphasis on raising the quality of education.
Education without quality may be good for proving the correctness of the saying that "A little learning is a dangerous thing"; but it is no good for the advancement of a society. Unfortunately, since the time this nation has been committing the largest budget allocation to education sector-wise, public complaint about the deteriorating standard of education has become more pronounced and widespread. What is then the rate of return from the investment on this cheap education?
The time in hand of the present government is not long. Yet it can introduce policy changes in those critical areas and create a firm base of public opinion on those issues to support the qualitative policy changes in the future. Since a democratic government survives on the strength of public opinion, no elected government in the future would dare to amend such policy changes if these can be brought into being and caused to rest on the firm rock of solid public support.