The World Bank finally struck a middle ground between the critics’ and the government’s claims on poverty reduction during the first half of this decade.
With critics strongly disputing poverty reduction claims and the government sticking to its 10 per cent poverty reduction estimate, the World Bank eventually chose the average of the two opposing claims that is five per cent poverty reduction.
One remains keen to know how the World Bank arrived at its five per cent% estimate, who the target groups are that may have benefited from growth, how much did they benefit, and how big or small a benefit amounts to reduction in poverty in World Bank’s view?
How does the World Bank define poverty for Pakistan and how different it is from the definition used in the country in which they are headquartered? For, poverty definition cannot be country-specific as it is basic necessities that all humans must possess without which they are deprived and poor irrespective of where they live.
Sunshine and rain are defined similarly for all parts of the world. So, the economic sun should provide similar sunlight and warmth to all the deprived or they will remain under a cloud. In the US, the clouds clear up and then follows the claim of poverty reduction. Why is it that, in Pakistan, clouds continue to hang over the poor and the result is called poverty reduction?
If the World Bank agrees with Pakistan’s definition of the national poverty line of Rs 878 consumption expenditure p.m. per capita, the extent of poverty is grossly understated. That is, those five per cent who are now believed to be above the poverty line are actually still very poor if they do not have the basic basket of goods required for decent human life.
So, all that may have happened is a slight reduction in the adversities they experience. But, for as long as the adversities continue, poverty remains. The global interests however wish to define poverty loosely to demonstrate success of their so-called “reform” effort and the export of their neo-liberal ideology. However loosely they may define poverty, temperature remains until it becomes normal even if it has dropped five degrees from a high of 105 degrees.
The question is, what still is the level of deprivation even if adversities of some have eased according to the national poverty line designed to suit the interests of policymakers and external financiers alike?
The easy national poverty line reminds one of the pass percentage that was brought down from 40 per cent to 33 per cent in the last half century because not many could attain 40 per cent marks and the system did not look good with lots of failures.
Reduction to 33 per cent passed more incompetent and saved many faces by concealing the deprivation in knowledge. Similarly, our national poverty line saves many faces but conceals deprivation of many kinds which does not put an end to deprivation but gives a clean bill of health to the exporters and pro-growth importers of the neo-liberal world view. With world’s 35 per cent malnourished living in South Asia, according to UN’s FAO, the state of deprivation is alarming to say the least.
The situation is all the more alarming due to pet solutions that may not fit the issues on the ground. And, pet solutions are of those who propose without giving an opportunity to define the issue. If the issue is of malnourishment, the imported solution is to increase investment in agriculture and boost export earnings thinking that it will also create employment. Creating employment is fine but the issue here is to create employment in a way that absorbs all the unemployed.
The way proposed is capital and technology intense that is labour-saving. That is, it will create some jobs but not as many as are needed to absorb all the deprived. This aspect is ignored in a bid to quickly demonstrate increase in export earnings as that will bring feathers in the cap and fast.
The opportunity cost of the above capital- and technology-based increase in agri-exports is also ignored. While on paper, policy makers will be able to show some employment generation, what they will not reveal will be the enormous job creation potential through an alternative strategy that will have been lost due to the mindless import of capital-intense agricultural development strategy.
Country’s policy makers must realise that development is not mere development of land, roads, bridges, and ports. Development is development of people that does not happen “of course” unless people development is built into the grand design. No agricultural development will be development enough only if we will have dollar earnings to boast of.
Unless people develop, the result will not be development. And, people in the countryside will not develop unless we factor the “land-to-the-tiller” concept into our agricultural development strategy that requires resolute political will. Land to the tiller concept is rejected as many see it emanating only from the Chinese revolution.
This concept spurred development also in Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and the USA through the famous Homestead Act. While we know Abraham Lincoln for it, it is a pity we do not know our own Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) for it who would give title to the land to the one who would reclaim/develop it. There is no concept of absentee landlordism in Islam.
All development strategies should first make use of the factors we are endowed with in abundance. In agriculture, it is labour that should be used intensely so that they are engaged and they develop with agriculture. This concept remains alien to our policy-makers because they import from the ones in whose interest it is to export their surplus capital equipment and technology. Thus, we see an emphasis on physical capital in our agricultural policy outlook to the neglect of our huge potential in human capital.
Even if exports skyrocket, they will distribute only in favour of the owners of assets and means of production. To say, “of course exports will reduce poverty” is to ignore the linkages as exports will be gap-amplifying if physical and intellectual assets are as iniquitously distributed as they currently are in our country.
Progress cannot be gauged through percentage point reductions in poverty that are not visible. Visibility is definitely required as those who walk out of the Jinnah terminal or wander around from Islamabad to Rawalpindi for the first time should not smirk and mock at our hypocrisy and dualism that betray oppression of the people by the wealthy and intellectual elite alike.
Such tourists if handed a copy of World Bank’s statement on poverty reduction will remain as unconvinced as the inhabitants of this country are. After all, what does five per cent poverty reduction mean in a country with significantly rising population? This amounts to perhaps an absolute figure of about three million whose adversities may have lessened somewhat, if at all. Are we talking about less than two per cent of the population still in actual poverty but not viewed as such due to the lax standards we and our external interests use to give our policy makers and their imported thought a passing grade?
Somehow, the pro-growth neo-liberal outlook must appear to be working even if things are not working out as well for those who should matter in the country, that is, the enormous human resource that remains un-/under-utilized and bypassed in the process we call development. This is hardly “development” that earns fortunes for only a few and compels the rest to believe that they too are developing when they are just watching from the sidelines in a state of stagnancy and disbelief.
The World Bank finally struck a middle ground between the critics’ and the government’s claims on poverty reduction during the first half of this decade.
