The key takeaway from the Human Development Report of the United Nations Development Programme, in its 20th year is there is no substitute for the huge growth story India has committed itself to. The corollary is green agenda does not benefit the poor.
Just one figure says it all. The annual progress rate in improving the condition of living has accelerated to its fastest pace for India, in the decade of 2000-2010. This is the same period when India achieved its fastest rate of annual GDP growth. Along with India, the other nine countries whom the new HDI index classifies as the top movers are China, South Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam. The top of the class is Oman, which, as the report says, ?invested energy earnings over the decades in education and public health?.
But to understand stories of larger countries like India better the annual HDI report should learn from the World Bank-IFC Doing Business report, also released on Thursday.
India, otherwise, cannot be read as a one cover story. The IFC report has recognised the challenge and disaggregated the India story into city specific tales. There is a world of difference in the pace at which business moves in Hyderabad, Jaipur or Ahmedabad, comparable with some of the best practices in the world, from Lucknow, Kolkata or Guwahati.
The India HDI story should be equally varied. Else it gives no larger understanding when looked at on one national scale. Indeed, the success of the recent initiatives state captains are taking for some of the most exciting regions, recognise and build upon these differences. The Bihar model of Nitish Kumar will not fit Narendra Modi?s Gujarat. Probably as a sign of coming of age, the 21st report of HDI next year should release a sub-national ranking too.
Otherwise there are few lessons that could be learnt from the omnibus report by policy makers. The size of India?s population relative to the rest of the world in any case makes it certain that the globe will be a far better place for most of the inhabitants, once India makes the crossover to the league of ?high human development?.
And the message that comes out from the HDI is that the only way to achieve that target is to push the growth envelope stronger. For possibly the first time, the HDI report makes it clear that India is doing all the right things besides, like NREGA, income transfers and education programmes to make the benefit of the growth reach the poorest. It is a question of pace. And it is here that the sub-regional reports would have helped.
Sure there are 169 countries the HDI report maps. It is obviously not possible for the report to make such local tales for each nation. But since India is such an important case study, a disaggregated case study is justified.
For instance the report points out that eight Indian states are home to 421 million ?multidimensionally? poor people, more than the total population of 410 million people in the poorest 26 African states. Yet India and China are expected to ?continue to converge with developed countries (indices)?.
Otherwise one can generally presume the next few HDIs will therefore have little more to say, on the India story, except to use the measuring tape.
Returning to the overarching growth story, just sample this paragraph (page 40). ?Since 1970, 155 countries?home to 95% of the world?s population?have experienced increases in real per capita income. The annual average today is $10,760, almost 1.5 times the level 20 years ago and twice its level 40 years ago. And the range, amount and quality of goods and services available to people today is unprecedented.? It is difficult to imagine such a para in the report that is essentially a rebellion against the GDP rod to measure how countries have done, inter se to transfer growth to the largest percentage of their population.
No wonder the report is not sure what stand to take on the issue of climate change. Policies in poor countries that benefit people now, will often be at the cost of future generations. How to make the green agenda work for the poor is a difficult challenge. So it says the current level of global consumption and investment are unsustainable.
But key questions on climate change will mean difficult answers about transfer of technology and use of market mechanism to prevent overuse of resources. These are subjects for which there are no answers. The report has therefore postponed these to its 2011 report which will focus on vulnerability and sustainability. It will, it promises, talk frankly what should be sustained (read growth patterns) and what are the conflicts of the rich northern regions with a strong environment stick and the needs of the less developed south. The links, conflicts and the complementarities?it says.
subhomoy.bhattacharjee@ expressindia.com
