While investment avenues in the developed world are almost saturated, global capital is now exploring new markets. The developing world offers fertile grounds for international investors.

The developing world has enormous natural resources which largely remain unexploited due to lack of technology, capital and human resource. The law enforcement is weak and governments are inefficient and corrupt.

The laws including environmental, human and consumer rights are easy to flout. Civil society, consumer rights groups and political organisations are not strong enough to defend local interests. Higher profits can be generated due to cheap labour, energy and raw material.

Often foreign direct investment does not benefit the poor while global capital continues to flourish. Out of 100 largest economies in the world, 51 are global corporations not countries, reveals the Corporate Watch Report of 2000.

According to the 11th Annual World Wealth Report released on June 27, 2007 “globally the number of people possessing $1 million or more in investible assets rose 8.3 per cent in 2006 and reached to$ 9.5 million. And the wealth of the world’s rich increased 11.4 per cent to $37.2 trillion last year. Interestingly bulk of this amount found its way into real estate business which is oozing with unmatched profits. The global direct real estate transaction volumes reached $682 billion last year, up by 38 per cent from 2005.

Pakistan is also a point of attraction for global capital. Neighbouring countries are now exploring sea shores to invest their surplus capital. UAE-based real estate concerns are fast expanding their overseas investments. They have surplus capital earned through high scale commercial ventures and foreign investment. The past three decades have witnessed amazing real estate development in UAE especially in Dubai which has become a hub of commercial activities. Investors from all over the world are pouring money into Dubai’s business ventures.

This has given tremendous boost to real estate activity. There is no dearth of capital in UAE. A booming economy and high oil revenues helped create 9,100 new millionaires (in dollars) in the UAE only last year, taking their total to 68,100 in UAE. Likewise Saudi millionaires grew to 89,600 in the same year.

Emaar, Dubai World, Limitless and Dubai Islamic Bank have surfaced as major players in Pakistani real estate business. Urban areas have witnessed unprecedented boom in construction over the recent years. FDI in construction has increased from only $12.8 million in 2001-02 to $1,937 million in 2005-06. Almost all of this development is being done in disregard of environmental and human rights.

In this era of markets, poor-rich divide is increasing at dramatic pace and economists are covering up disparities presenting “average” and “per capita” growth. Mathematically, one should be comfortable if one’s foot is placed in hundred degree boiling water and the other one in ice. Hence world should be in comfort if 90 per cent population has 10 percent resources and 10 per cent occupy remaining 90 per cent, thus making the equation perfectly balanced. The fundamental question is, if the investments bring “development”, they also create imbalances not natural equilibriums. The real estate investment targets land, which is the primary source of food for both rural and urban poor, whereas in fast expanding cities the land is precious source of shelter for urban poor. Cities in Pakistan have been expanding at alarming rate and eating productive agricultural land.

Taking example of Karachi, which expanded from 233 sq km in 1947 to 3,000 sq km in 1959, is bursting with seam. All this expansion was done by covering the cultivated land with concrete. The trend is not too different in other big cities and smaller towns.

The poor draw their sustenance on natural endowment like land as they cannot compete with market capital. With every acre of land converted from grain to concrete, the poor is the only loser as land is the primary source of his food security. An acre of land can feed needy dozens of poor but it benefits only a handful of rich if converted into urban real estate.

Loss of agricultural land is pushing up rural unemployment. Since agricultural labour is not trained for urban trades, it cannot find its share in urban employment opportunities, created through real estate investments. While employment opportunities of real estate ventures are boasted by city managers, they do not mention more unemployment created due to land occupation.

The situation can be explained by two major investment ventures. In 1974, Pakistan Steel Mills was founded. About 18,660 acres of land were acquired from 500 land owners and 200 lease holders. About 15 villages were erased by the mills. These villages were rich in pastures, livestock and fisheries. Affectees were offered Re1 per square yard for owned land, Rs1,500 for a pacca house and Rs600-1000 for katcha house. But they were not compensated. The affectees approached the court, which decreed in their favour and new rates were announced but villagers were never paid.

Till 1974 some 25,000 regular and more than 4,000 temporary staff was employed in the mills. Displaced villagers were only 35 among them now reduced to 16 only. The Ministry of Production also issued a letter number PD/JSA/3076/79 on May 16,1979 promising employment for local villagers but it never happened. A number of industrial units are operating in the area, having more than 30,000 employees but hardly two dozen local villagers are among them.

Port Qasim Authority is another empire built on the bulldozed remains of coastal villages. The port was inaugurated in 1975. At that time 20,000 acres were acquired on coast and another 15,000 acres were acquired from Sindh government. The port demolished 35 villages from the map

The Board of Revenue and the Port Qasim Authority signed an agreement on May 11, 1981 promising that all affectees will receive compensation and will be resettled before displacing them. However, only one village received some compensation and the remaining 34 never received any benefit.

From 1974 to 1990, the Port Authority employed 2,200 persons; only 79 were from the affected villages. Port Qasim ignored almost every agreement and instructions from Sindh government on local employment.

The authority acquired villages for port activities but now the same land is being allotted to private concerns for commercial purposes. Hundreds of production units are operating on the same land but villagers never received any benefit of this development on their land. Now Port Qasim is bent upon selling two islands Dingi and Bundaar to deprive fishing communities from their remaining sources of livelihood.

The list of examples is virtually unending. Lyari Expressway is a recent addition to it, which displaced about 25,000 families. The Diamond Bar Island City and Sugarland City are the upcoming episodes. Fishing communities on the Karachi coast especially at Hawksbay are forecasting a human disaster in waiting.

Interestingly, all this is being under the banner of ‘development’ in the centuries old villages of fishing communities, which were not considered eligible for basic human development over six decades. These villages are part of the metropolitan city but they do not have facilities like drinking water and primary health.

A country with more than 4.5 million children out of school and 10 per cent dying at infancy deserves investments and strategies for human development and not for real estate development.