How can we close the tech skills gap for older workers?-Case study of India and Poland
Background :-
We need to make sure that older workers and those already in the work force have the skills to take advantage of technological change. The ongoing debate on how advancing technology impact the demand for labor sets up a dichotomy. The future will be a utopia or a dystopia; as work reduces, society will face either unprecedented abundance or deepening inequality. But these transitions will not occur suddenly, nor will they be binary. And they will happen in very different ways depending on which firms adopt technology, and how workers might be able to respond. It is not just about youth in education; countries need to develop lifelong learning to ensure existing workers do not fall into a skills gap.
Two recent studies looking at Poland and India illuminate this unpredictability. In Poland the changes in the task content of jobs have been substantial. But they have also created jobs. In India the capital-augmenting technological progress has reduced labor share in gross value added, but also increased incomes of highly skilled, non-production workers. However, in both Poland and India, low skilled, production workers, and older workers have been disadvantaged as employers and economies adopt technology. Efforts to skill workers may hence need to focus on today’s workers and not only workforce entrants.
Poland: An unusual trend
Since the transition to a market economy in the 1990s, the structure of Poland’s economy changed. Employment in services grew by 2.25 million people between 1996 and 2014, equivalent to an 11.7% increase in the share of total employment. Employment in agriculture declined.
Modern services—which require higher-level skills, employ professionals, and often benefit from the use of information and communication technology (ICT)—grew the most. Similar changes occurred in manufacturing. Consequently, the intensity (the number of particular tasks performed by an average worker) of non-routine cognitive analytical and personal tasks rose between 1996 and 2014. At the same time, the intensity of routine and non-routine manual tasks declined.
However, unlike trends seen in many advanced economies, the intensity of routine cognitive tasks also rose, as Poland increased the number of medium-skilled, non-manual jobs.
A striking difference has emerged between younger cohorts (born between 1970 and 1994), who experienced task content evolution typical for most developed countries, and older cohorts (born between 1950 and 1969), who did not. Every new cohort entering the Polish labour market since the middle 1990s reached a higher intensity of non-routine cognitive tasks than that achieved by the previous cohort at the same age.
After a dozen years of a decline in the intensity of manual tasks in Poland, in 2014 workers born between 1970 and 1989 exhibited a lower than average intensity of manual tasks than workers born between 1950 and 1969, who have barely experienced any change since the mid-1990s. The developments among the younger group accounted for the majority of the overall change in task contents recorded between 1996 and 2014.
Educational opportunities are likely responsible for these inter-generational differences. Younger cohorts benefited from increasing tertiary education enrolment since the 1970s. From the viewpoint of task content of jobs, labour demand has largely accommodated the growing inflow of better-educated entrants without deteriorating their job prospects. Younger generations may be increasingly likely to work in computerized jobs (in line with Levy and Murnane, 2013). At the same time, both the education structure and task content of jobs held by older workers have barely changed.
India’s Organized Manufacturing Sector
The liberalization of the Indian economy in the 1990s created new opportunities for its manufacturing sector. Faced with easier access to foreign technology and imported capital goods, firms in the organized manufacturing sector adopted advanced techniques of production. This led to increased automation and a rise in the capital intensity of production.
This has raised much concern about the ability of the manufacturing sector to create jobs for India’s rapidly rising, largely low skilled and unskilled workforce. However, what has attracted less attention in the literature is the impact of capital augmenting technological progress on the distribution of income and wage inequality. Using enterprise level data from the India’s Annual Survey of Industries, we see that with growing capital intensity of production, the role of labour vis-à-vis capital has declined.
The share of total emoluments paid to labour fell from 34.7% to 22.4% of gross value added (GVA) between 2000-2001 and 2011-12. At the same time, the share of wages to workers in GVA declined steeply from 26.9% to 18.5%. Commensurately, the share of profits in GVA rose from 19.9% to 46.1% of GVA over the same period. This declining share of GVA going to workers rather than capital, raises the issue of equity in the distribution of income.
Importantly, even within the working class, inequalities have increased. The share of skilled labour such as non-production supervisory and managerial staff in the wage pie rose from 26.1% to 35.8%. At the same time that of unskilled production workers fell from 57.6% to 48.8% of the total wage bill. The rising disparity in the wages of skilled and unskilled workers is also reflected in the fact that the ratio of the average wages paid to them increased from 3.6 to 5.7 over the last decade.
These results underline the existence of capital-skill complementarity: firms with higher capital intensity employed a higher share of skilled workers and the wage differential between skilled and unskilled workers was higher in these firms. The fact that technological change has not been accompanied by a large increase in the supply of skilled workers has exacerbated wage disparity.
The Government of India’s ambitious Skill India program, with a target to skill 400 million workers over the next five year attempts to address this gap. However, assembly line methods of skill development which produce large numbers of electricians, machine operators, plumbers and other such narrowly skilled and certified persons will not address India’s skills challenge.
Takeaways
Technological advancement will create new types of jobs. In Poland, many younger workers benefited from education that allowed them to participate in an increasingly sophisticated, digital economy. But older workers may be left behind by technological progress and the emergence of new types of jobs. In India, workers that had the skills to use and manage more technologically-advanced processes and firms benefited. Poorly skilled workers lacked the skills to catch up with new modes of production.
Public policy will need to consider how to improve the skills or older and less-skilled workers to adapt to technological change. This is especially the case for countries with undeveloped systems of life-long learning. This means going beyond the important task of preparing young people for the future of work, but also ensuring that today’s (and tomorrow’s) workers are able to learn and update their skills, as enterprises adopt technology and seek higher-skilled workers
Why Zika is not the new Ebola
A rise in birth defects in the Americas is increasingly linked to Zika virus, previously undetected in that part of the world. Regardless of the underlying cause for these congenital abnormalities, the key to success lies in strong global health leadership. While some lessons from the Ebola outbreak can be applied, this new threat presents a different challenge and needs a different response.
Origins of Zika
In December 2015, the journal Nature asked infectious disease experts to predict which pathogens would trigger the next global crisis. None suggested Zika virus, a mosquito-borne disease first identified 70 years ago in Africa. Yet, a month later, the World Health Organization (WHO) is ‘deeply concerned’ and predicts up to four million cases in the Americas over the next year, including in the United States.
Zika virus infection causes mild, flu-like symptoms in most cases. What prompted concern was not the infection, but Brazil’s live birth information system (a system not readily available in less-developed countries) detecting a 30-fold increase in the number of babies born with microcephaly, a congenital defect limiting brain development. If the spreading virus is associated with microcephaly, as evidence increasingly suggests, the global social-economic repercussions could be severe. A large increase in the number of children born with profound learning disabilities worldwide would have severe human as well as socio-economic repercussions globally, causing productivity loss and high associated healthcare costs.
Very much like the West African Ebola outbreak, the spread of Zika virus was an almost unpredictable event – a characteristic common to most emerging infectious diseases that end up causing global crises. Unlike Ebola, it occurred in a part of the world where surveillance capacity enabled prompt detection of an unusual event.
Source: Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
Delayed reaction
When Brazil detected Zika virus in May 2015 there was no strong evidence of a link with microcephaly, and there is still no definite causal relationship, although evidence now suggests that infection during pregnancy is associated with microcephaly. Zika is also suspected to cause severe neurological symptoms in a small minority of infected adults. Regardless of the underlying cause − infectious, chemical or environmental causes are all plausible at the onset of the event − such a large-scale, unusual health event should prompt the WHO to take rapid action − particularly in light of the criticism the agency faced for delaying the Ebola response. The WHO International Health Regulations (IHR) emergency committee will convene on 1 February to decide whether the spread of Zika virus constitutes a Public Health Emergency of International Concern and advise on next steps.
An earlier convening could have affirmed WHO’s position as the global leader during health emergencies − a much needed message after the Ebola outbreak − and galvanized research into microcephaly and its underlying causes. The WHO’s Regional Office for the Americas (PAHO) has already been involved in supporting the investigations in Brazil. The Brazilian Ministry of Health declared a public health emergency on 11 November 2015 and PAHO issued an ‘epidemiological alert’ on 1 December, but these did not attract widespread global attention.
However, Zika is not Ebola; it does not spread from person to person, has a low mortality, and does not kill healthcare workers. Zika therefore warrants a different response. It does not require healthcare worker mobilization, treatment centres, contact tracing or safe burial teams. Rather the immediate needs are about research to determine the cause of the microcephaly, diagnostic capacity building and sustained efforts to reduce the mosquito population.
Much of this is already underway: Brazilian authorities inspected over seven million households looking for mosquito breeding sites. Their public health agency has generated key evidence for an association between Zika virus and microcephaly and has developed a rapid diagnostic test. The spread of Zika virus, detected in over 20 countries so far, has led to extraordinary measures, such as Brazil, Colombia and El Salvador asking women to delay pregnancy for up to two years, as well as widespread travel warnings to affected countries for pregnant women. What is needed now is strong leadership to ensure coordinated, consistent and proportionate advice to the public and a real focus on the critical research to help us understand what is really happening in Brazil and elsewhere.
While infections with Zika virus are currently largely concentrated in South and Central America, a rapid spread and mounting evidence of association with microcephaly means it could become a global crisis. Aedes aegypti, the mosquito that carries the virus, can be found in Southern Europe, Africa and the southern United States. There is additional concern that aedes albopictus, the highly aggressive tiger mosquito, could become a vector for Zika virus, further expanding areas at risk. It is unclear how Zika virus spread to the Americas. But like West Nile Virus, another mosquito-borne disease unknown to the Western hemisphere until 1999 but now endemic in North America, Zika could be here to stay.
The new threat
As the Ebola crisis wanes, it is clearer than ever that the nature or location of the next health crisis cannot be accurately predicted. The potential consequences of the Zika virus outbreak highlight once more the need for decisive and prompt global leadership, with robust surveillance and a flexible response capacity ready to face unexpected rather than predicted threats; lessons from Ebola will help but they are not the whole answer − the international community has to stop planning for last year’s problems and solve the current crisis.
Digital Media and Society :- Implications in a Hyperconnected Era
Innovations in technology, particularly in digital media,increasingly are changing the way people use Media,Entertainment & Information (MEI) services. More than this, the very fabric of daily life is being altered. People are interacting and connecting with each other in different ways. Their sensibilities and psychologies are changing.Blurring boundaries between private and professional lives,and the hunger for immediate information are driving online connection time. Trust in individuals’ relationship with digital media has become an increasingly prominent issue. In some ways, new generations are leading the evolution in changing behaviour, but in others, older generations are “catching up” surprisingly quickly.
Definitions
For the purposes of the Digital Media and Society report, digital media is defined as products and services that come from the media, entertainment and information industry and its subsectors. It includes digital platforms (e.g. websites and applications), digitized content (e.g. text, audio, video and images) and services (e.g.information, entertainment and communication) that can be accessed and consumed through different digital devices. People’s online behaviours shape their digital identities. Individuals may show different behaviour patterns in different contexts (e.g. private versus professional), which may be described as different digital personae.
User behaviour, preferences and concerns
People are spending more and more time online. Consider these approximate figures for 2015:-
–– 3 billion internet users
–– 2 billion active social media users
–– More than 1.6 billion mobile social accounts
While laptops and desktops are still most commonly used, mobile devices are gaining fast on them, causing a significant change in people’s engagement with digital media. Growth in mobile encounters is particularly strong in emerging countries, where consumers are leapfrogging from “no digital use” straight to “mobile use”.
Increased online connection time appears to be driven mainly by work or information seeking, followed by social and entertainment needs, based on findings from the five countries surveyed for this report. Digital media consumption for private and professional motives is more and more integrated, with individuals using digital media to move seamlessly back and forth between work and personal activities.
Sharing content has become a very important element of using digital media, with users most likely to share content that entertains, informs or inspires. Digital media also has made it possible for billions of online media consumers to participate in content creation. One-third of respondents to the Implications of Digital Media Survey conducted in October 2015 for this report, say they post written content, pictures or videos on social media sites either daily or a few times each week.
The main characteristics of today’s consumption patterns can be summarized as follows:
Mobile: People now spend an average of two hours daily on the mobile web, one-third of their total online time, with Millennials and digital media users in emerging countries emerging countries leading the mobile revolution.3 The obvious advantages are that mobile usage is less dependent on place and time, and devices are more affordable than laptops/personal computers (PCs).
Social and interactive: Social networking is by far the most popular online activity, clocking in at an average of 1.8 hours or 30% of daily online time.4
Flexible and personalized: Users can have a more active role and more control over the digital media offerings they use and engage, compared with traditional media. User accounts and cookies allow for customization of content displayed based on user characteristics and usage patterns.
Fast, instant and convenient: Fast internet and new technologies (hardware and software) allow for easier access and use, and enriched content.
More content: As content creation and distribution become simpler, a greater amount of content and services are becoming available. Content is more diverse, but consumption is potentially focused more on breadth than depth, as capacity is limited. The importance of content filtering, curation and recommendation has grown.
Collective: The possibility to connect, share, recommend and communicate creates a collective experience that shapes not only behaviours and preferences, but also a collective consciousness of shared beliefs, ideas and moral attitudes.
Fragmented and multi-channel: The huge number of channels and creators makes content ever more fragmented. Users access multiple platforms from multiple devices. Adapting content to these multiple platforms becomes imperative.
The higher the usage of digital media, the higher the willingness to pay: Increased connection and use of digital media should tip the revenue scale in industry’s favour, but innovation in creating better user experiences is crucial, as it is clearly evident that traditional digital advertising is losing its appeal and efficacy.
But new consumption patterns, along with the presence of more players and creators in the market, bring challenges.Consumer trust is at risk because of fundamental concerns about:
–– Truthfulness of content, given its volume, the large number of creators and sources, and need for more clarity around filtering mechanisms.
–– Integrity of the company/consumer value exchange.
–– Security of personal data and digital identities from cybercrime, given the significance of this information to a consumer’s professional, financial and social well-being
User engagement
Engaging consumers through digital media requires much more than simply “pushing” marketing content or services at them. Consumers have become savvy at ignoring ubiquitous display advertisements and more and more are using ad-blocking software. Instead, engagement requires providing valuable content that meets user needs for information, convenience andentertainment, stimulates content sharing and “pulls” in consumers. For any brand or service, critical elements of this engagement strategy include:-
––Entering into a conversation with consumers through social media
––Engaging employees to advocate the company through their social media activities
––Exhibiting socially responsible behaviour, particularly regarding use and control of users’ personal data.
The impact of digital media on individuals,organizations and society
The greater use of digital media today is changing people’s everyday lives and the way they connect and collaborate in the broader societal context, at work and in civil society. Much of the impact of this heightened use is beneficial to both individuals and society. Digital media has empowered people so that they no longer are passive bystanders or recipients in the transformations wrought by the digital revolution, but are actively shaping digital media and its meaning for society.
The benefits to both individuals and society of increased digital media usage include the following:
––Assists social interaction and empowers individuals, connecting the like-minded across vast distances, as well as connecting those usually separated by social, economic, cultural, political, religious and ideological boundaries
––Offers the means to increase civic participation and facilitates the creation of communities with a common interest or cause
––Enhances flexibility for workers and employers, boosting productivity and enabling greater work-life integration
––Facilitates education and life-long learning to build and source skills
The main risks of higher digital media consumption include the following:
–– Can be used with harmful intentions to spread propaganda and mobilize followers
–– Influences human decision making as a result of content filtering mechanisms that can target specific information to certain people with potentially discriminatory effects. This can happen through information sharing or manipulation of information,for example, during an electoral process (“digital gerrymandering”)
–– Potential for near term inequality due to the disruptions in labour markets and different skill requirements brought about by digital technology
–– Changes in social skills and sense of empathy as children and adults spend more time online. Facilitates bullying, harassment and social defamation, reflecting threats and patterns seen in the offline world
–– May impact mental and physical health if screen time is excessive. The harm includes stress, greater vulnerability to addictive behaviour, and less time spent in physical activity. Can pose health and developmental risks for young children if usage is not monitored
Way Forward:-
The public sector can help to update, promote and enforce evidence-based standards and regulations in order to facilitate the benefits of digital media and innovative solutions to mitigate the negative effects. It can also facilitate the creation of social institutions and programmes that assist individuals and the private sector in making digital culture healthier at home, in education, at work and in public life.
The private sector, principally industry, should consider the implications for individuals when designing platforms and services or creating content. The private sector can deepen efforts to build trust with consumers, for example, by becoming more transparent about how personal data are used and showing a corporate ethos of accountability and social responsibility. An effective tool is sponsoring public and non-profit organizations that help to promote beneficial use of digital media. From an employer’s perspective, organizations should forge a strategy to integrate digital media and technology into workflows, and should be proactive in addressing the opportunities and pitfalls that increased connectivity brings to the business and employees.
Finally, individuals are encouraged to enhance their digital literacy and skills, and use digital media responsibly. Individuals thus can protect themselves and others, especially those who are vulnerable. Individual scan also get involved with civic organizations and NGOs on digital media issues that have an impact on their lives.
Pradhan Mantri Kaushal VikasYojana
Background:-PMKVY completes 10 lakh enrolments under Skill India, 70% have completed their skill trainings since its launch.Pradhan Mantri Kaushal VikasYojana (PMKVY), the flagship of Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship has completed 10 lakh enrolments under the scheme.
The scheme has been implemented by National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) through a network of 1012 training partners affiliated to the scheme.
Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY):
This is the flagship schemeof government of India for skill training of youth being implemented by the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship through the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC). The scheme will cover 24 lakh persons.
- Skill training would be done based on the National Skill Qualification Framework (NSQF) and industry led standards.
- Under the scheme, a monetary reward is given to trainees on assessment and certification by third party assessment bodies.
- Focus under the PMKVY would be on improved curricula, better pedagogy and better trained instructors. Training would include soft skills, personal grooming, behavioral change for cleanliness, good work ethics.
- Skill Development Management System (SDMS) would be put in place to verify and record details of all training centres a certain quality of training locations and courses.
- Biometric system and video recording of the training process would be put in place where feasible.
- A good grievance redressal system being put in place to address grievances relating to implementation of the scheme. An online citizen portal to disseminate information about the scheme.
Genetically Modified Crops- the good , the bad and the unknown
Background :- The government has assured that the commercial release of the genetically modified mustard will not be approved without due process. In this regard, the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC) has put on hold any decision on it for now.The GEAC,being the apex body to accord approval for large-scale use and commercial release of genetically modified organisms in India, discussed safety issues of GM mustard’s application, but refrained from taking a final decision.
GM mustard
- The GM variant, called DMH11 (Dhara Mustard Hybrid 11), is said to deliver 25-30% higher mustard-seed yields compared to the best “check” varieties currently being grown in the country.
Government’s Stand
- The government indicated that the introduction of GM crops would happen only if other avenues of increasing production were not available.
- The GEAC has prepared a time-bound “roadmap” for taking a final decision on DMH11 mustard that involves holding public consultations as well. If the roadmap is followed, the hybrid would be back to the GEAC for approval by the end of May.
GM Crop
A GM or transgenic crop is a plant that has a novel combination of genetic material obtained through the use of modern biotechnology.
- For example, a GM crop can contain a gene(s) that has been artificially inserted instead of the plant acquiring it through pollination.
- The resulting plant is said to be “genetically modified” although in reality all crops have been “genetically modified” from their original wild state by domestication, selection, and controlled breeding over long periods of time.
Potential benefits:-
- Higher yield
- Reduced input cost
- Increased farm profit and economic assurance for the farmers on good return
- Improvement in health and the environment.
Potential risks:-
- Danger looms on unintentionally introducing allergens or other antinutrition factors in foods.
- Gene escape from cultivated crops into wild relatives.
- The potential of pests to evolve resistance to the toxins produced by GM crops.
- The risk of these toxins affecting non-target organisms and harming the beneficial ones.
Analysis:- The core of the issue is rather simple- “it is unknown” . The benefits can be seen instantly but the harmful effects on health and crop ecosystem looms large.The darker zone of unintended harm is what makes the GM crop less attractive and in this regard the government’s decision to follow the due process is welcome and treating it as a measure of last resort is good.
Source- The Hindu,Pib,WeForum etc
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Petrol in India is cheaper than in countries like Hong Kong, Germany and the UK but costlier than in China, Brazil, Japan, the US, Russia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, a Bank of Baroda Economics Research report showed.
Rising fuel prices in India have led to considerable debate on which government, state or central, should be lowering their taxes to keep prices under control.
The rise in fuel prices is mainly due to the global price of crude oil (raw material for making petrol and diesel) going up. Further, a stronger dollar has added to the cost of crude oil.
Amongst comparable countries (per capita wise), prices in India are higher than those in Vietnam, Kenya, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Venezuela. Countries that are major oil producers have much lower prices.
In the report, the Philippines has a comparable petrol price but has a per capita income higher than India by over 50 per cent.
Countries which have a lower per capita income like Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Venezuela have much lower prices of petrol and hence are impacted less than India.
“Therefore there is still a strong case for the government to consider lowering the taxes on fuel to protect the interest of the people,” the report argued.
India is the world’s third-biggest oil consuming and importing nation. It imports 85 per cent of its oil needs and so prices retail fuel at import parity rates.
With the global surge in energy prices, the cost of producing petrol, diesel and other petroleum products also went up for oil companies in India.
They raised petrol and diesel prices by Rs 10 a litre in just over a fortnight beginning March 22 but hit a pause button soon after as the move faced criticism and the opposition parties asked the government to cut taxes instead.
India imports most of its oil from a group of countries called the ‘OPEC +’ (i.e, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Russia, etc), which produces 40% of the world’s crude oil.
As they have the power to dictate fuel supply and prices, their decision of limiting the global supply reduces supply in India, thus raising prices
The government charges about 167% tax (excise) on petrol and 129% on diesel as compared to US (20%), UK (62%), Italy and Germany (65%).
The abominable excise duty is 2/3rd of the cost, and the base price, dealer commission and freight form the rest.
Here is an approximate break-up (in Rs):
a)Base Price | 39 |
b)Freight | 0.34 |
c) Price Charged to Dealers = (a+b) | 39.34 |
d) Excise Duty | 40.17 |
e) Dealer Commission | 4.68 |
f) VAT | 25.35 |
g) Retail Selling Price | 109.54 |
Looked closely, much of the cost of petrol and diesel is due to higher tax rate by govt, specifically excise duty.
So the question is why government is not reducing the prices ?
India, being a developing country, it does require gigantic amount of funding for its infrastructure projects as well as welfare schemes.
However, we as a society is yet to be tax-compliant. Many people evade the direct tax and that’s the reason why govt’s hands are tied. Govt. needs the money to fund various programs and at the same time it is not generating enough revenue from direct taxes.
That’s the reason why, govt is bumping up its revenue through higher indirect taxes such as GST or excise duty as in the case of petrol and diesel.
Direct taxes are progressive as it taxes according to an individuals’ income however indirect tax such as excise duty or GST are regressive in the sense that the poorest of the poor and richest of the rich have to pay the same amount.
Does not matter, if you are an auto-driver or owner of a Mercedes, end of the day both pay the same price for petrol/diesel-that’s why it is regressive in nature.
But unlike direct tax where tax evasion is rampant, indirect tax can not be evaded due to their very nature and as long as huge no of Indians keep evading direct taxes, indirect tax such as excise duty will be difficult for the govt to reduce, because it may reduce the revenue and hamper may programs of the govt.
Globally, around 80% of wastewater flows back into the ecosystem without being treated or reused, according to the United Nations.
This can pose a significant environmental and health threat.
In the absence of cost-effective, sustainable, disruptive water management solutions, about 70% of sewage is discharged untreated into India’s water bodies.
A staggering 21% of diseases are caused by contaminated water in India, according to the World Bank, and one in five children die before their fifth birthday because of poor sanitation and hygiene conditions, according to Startup India.
As we confront these public health challenges emerging out of environmental concerns, expanding the scope of public health/environmental engineering science becomes pivotal.
For India to achieve its sustainable development goals of clean water and sanitation and to address the growing demands for water consumption and preservation of both surface water bodies and groundwater resources, it is essential to find and implement innovative ways of treating wastewater.
It is in this context why the specialised cadre of public health engineers, also known as sanitation engineers or environmental engineers, is best suited to provide the growing urban and rural water supply and to manage solid waste and wastewater.
Traditionally, engineering and public health have been understood as different fields.
Currently in India, civil engineering incorporates a course or two on environmental engineering for students to learn about wastewater management as a part of their pre-service and in-service training.
Most often, civil engineers do not have adequate skills to address public health problems. And public health professionals do not have adequate engineering skills.
India aims to supply 55 litres of water per person per day by 2024 under its Jal Jeevan Mission to install functional household tap connections.
The goal of reaching every rural household with functional tap water can be achieved in a sustainable and resilient manner only if the cadre of public health engineers is expanded and strengthened.
In India, public health engineering is executed by the Public Works Department or by health officials.
This differs from international trends. To manage a wastewater treatment plant in Europe, for example, a candidate must specialise in wastewater engineering.
Furthermore, public health engineering should be developed as an interdisciplinary field. Engineers can significantly contribute to public health in defining what is possible, identifying limitations, and shaping workable solutions with a problem-solving approach.
Similarly, public health professionals can contribute to engineering through well-researched understanding of health issues, measured risks and how course correction can be initiated.
Once both meet, a public health engineer can identify a health risk, work on developing concrete solutions such as new health and safety practices or specialised equipment, in order to correct the safety concern..
There is no doubt that the majority of diseases are water-related, transmitted through consumption of contaminated water, vectors breeding in stagnated water, or lack of adequate quantity of good quality water for proper personal hygiene.
Diseases cannot be contained unless we provide good quality and adequate quantity of water. Most of the world’s diseases can be prevented by considering this.
Training our young minds towards creating sustainable water management systems would be the first step.
Currently, institutions like the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M) are considering initiating public health engineering as a separate discipline.
To leverage this opportunity even further, India needs to scale up in the same direction.
Consider this hypothetical situation: Rajalakshmi, from a remote Karnataka village spots a business opportunity.
She knows that flowers, discarded in the thousands by temples can be handcrafted into incense sticks.
She wants to find a market for the product and hopefully, employ some people to help her. Soon enough though, she discovers that starting a business is a herculean task for a person like her.
There is a laborious process of rules and regulations to go through, bribes to pay on the way and no actual means to transport her product to its market.
After making her first batch of agarbathis and taking it to Bengaluru by bus, she decides the venture is not easy and gives up.
On the flipside of this is a young entrepreneur in Bengaluru. Let’s call him Deepak. He wants to start an internet-based business selling sustainably made agarbathis.
He has no trouble getting investors and to mobilise supply chains. His paperwork is over in a matter of days and his business is set up quickly and ready to grow.
Never mind that the business is built on aggregation of small sellers who will not see half the profit .
Is this scenario really all that hypothetical or emblematic of how we think about entrepreneurship in India?
Between our national obsession with unicorns on one side and glorifying the person running a pakora stall for survival as an example of viable entrepreneurship on the other, is the middle ground in entrepreneurship—a space that should have seen millions of thriving small and medium businesses, but remains so sparsely occupied that you could almost miss it.
If we are to achieve meaningful economic growth in our country, we need to incorporate, in our national conversation on entrepreneurship, ways of addressing the missing middle.
Spread out across India’s small towns and cities, this is a class of entrepreneurs that have been hit by a triple wave over the last five years, buffeted first by the inadvertent fallout of demonetization, being unprepared for GST, and then by the endless pain of the covid-19 pandemic.
As we finally appear to be reaching some level of normality, now is the opportune time to identify the kind of industries that make up this layer, the opportunities they should be afforded, and the best ways to scale up their functioning in the shortest time frame.
But, why pay so much attention to these industries when we should be celebrating, as we do, our booming startup space?
It is indeed true that India has the third largest number of unicorns in the world now, adding 42 in 2021 alone. Braving all the disruptions of the pandemic, it was a year in which Indian startups raised $24.1 billion in equity investments, according to a NASSCOM-Zinnov report last year.
However, this is a story of lopsided growth.
The cities of Bengaluru, Delhi/NCR, and Mumbai together claim three-fourths of these startup deals while emerging hubs like Ahmedabad, Coimbatore, and Jaipur account for the rest.
This leap in the startup space has created 6.6 lakh direct jobs and a few million indirect jobs. Is that good enough for a country that sends 12 million fresh graduates to its workforce every year?
It doesn’t even make a dent on arguably our biggest unemployment in recent history—in April 2020 when the country shutdown to battle covid-19.
Technology-intensive start-ups are constrained in their ability to create jobs—and hybrid work models and artificial intelligence (AI) have further accelerated unemployment.
What we need to focus on, therefore, is the labour-intensive micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME). Here, we begin to get to a definitional notion of what we called the mundane middle and the problems it currently faces.
India has an estimated 63 million enterprises. But, out of 100 companies, 95 are micro enterprises—employing less than five people, four are small to medium and barely one is large.
The questions to ask are: why are Indian MSMEs failing to grow from micro to small and medium and then be spurred on to make the leap into large companies?
At the Global Alliance for Mass Entrepreneurship (GAME), we have advocated for a National Mission for Mass Entrepreneurship, the need for which is more pronounced now than ever before.
Whenever India has worked to achieve a significant economic milestone in a limited span of time, it has worked best in mission mode. Think of the Green Revolution or Operation Flood.
From across various states, there are enough examples of approaches that work to catalyse mass entrepreneurship.
The introduction of entrepreneurship mindset curriculum (EMC) in schools through alliance mode of working by a number of agencies has shown significant improvement in academic and life outcomes.
Through creative teaching methods, students are encouraged to inculcate 21st century skills like creativity, problem solving, critical thinking and leadership which are not only foundational for entrepreneurship but essential to thrive in our complex world.
Udhyam Learning Foundation has been involved with the Government of Delhi since 2018 to help young people across over 1,000 schools to develop an entrepreneurial mindset.
One pilot programme introduced the concept of ‘seed money’ and saw 41 students turn their ideas into profit-making ventures. Other programmes teach qualities like grit and resourcefulness.
If you think these are isolated examples, consider some larger data trends.
The Observer Research Foundation and The World Economic Forum released the Young India and Work: A Survey of Youth Aspirations in 2018.
When asked which type of work arrangement they prefer, 49% of the youth surveyed said they prefer a job in the public sector.
However, 38% selected self-employment as an entrepreneur as their ideal type of job. The spirit of entrepreneurship is latent and waiting to be unleashed.
The same can be said for building networks of successful women entrepreneurs—so crucial when the participation of women in the Indian economy has declined to an abysmal 20%.
The majority of India’s 63 million firms are informal —fewer than 20% are registered for GST.
Research shows that companies that start out as formal enterprises become two-three times more productive than a similar informal business.
So why do firms prefer to be informal? In most cases, it’s because of the sheer cost and difficulty of complying with the different regulations.
We have academia and non-profits working as ecosystem enablers providing insights and evidence-based models for growth. We have large private corporations and philanthropic and funding agencies ready to invest.
It should be in the scope of a National Mass Entrepreneurship Mission to bring all of them together to work in mission mode so that the gap between thought leadership and action can finally be bridged.
Heat wave is a condition of air temperature which becomes fatal to human body when exposed. Often times, it is defined based on the temperature thresholds over a region in terms of actual temperature or its departure from normal.
Heat wave is considered if maximum temperature of a station reaches at least 400C or more for Plains and at least 300C or more for Hilly regions.
a) Based on Departure from Normal
Heat Wave: Departure from normal is 4.50C to 6.40C
Severe Heat Wave: Departure from normal is >6.40C
b) Based on Actual Maximum Temperature
Heat Wave: When actual maximum temperature ≥ 450C
Severe Heat Wave: When actual maximum temperature ≥470C
If above criteria met at least in 2 stations in a Meteorological sub-division for at least two consecutive days and it declared on the second day
It is occurring mainly during March to June and in some rare cases even in July. The peak month of the heat wave over India is May.
Heat wave generally occurs over plains of northwest India, Central, East & north Peninsular India during March to June.
It covers Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, parts of Maharashtra & Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telengana.
Sometimes it occurs over Tamilnadu & Kerala also.
Heat waves adversely affect human and animal lives.
However, maximum temperatures more than 45°C observed mainly over Rajasthan and Vidarbha region in month of May.
a. Transportation / Prevalence of hot dry air over a region (There should be a region of warm dry air and appropriate flow pattern for transporting hot air over the region).
b. Absence of moisture in the upper atmosphere (As the presence of moisture restricts the temperature rise).
c. The sky should be practically cloudless (To allow maximum insulation over the region).
d. Large amplitude anti-cyclonic flow over the area.
Heat waves generally develop over Northwest India and spread gradually eastwards & southwards but not westwards (since the prevailing winds during the season are westerly to northwesterly).
The health impacts of Heat Waves typically involve dehydration, heat cramps, heat exhaustion and/or heat stroke. The signs and symptoms are as follows:
1. Heat Cramps: Ederna (swelling) and Syncope (Fainting) generally accompanied by fever below 39*C i.e.102*F.
2. Heat Exhaustion: Fatigue, weakness, dizziness, headache, nausea, vomiting, muscle cramps and sweating.
3. Heat Stoke: Body temperatures of 40*C i.e. 104*F or more along with delirium, seizures or coma. This is a potential fatal condition.
Norman Borlaug and MS Swaminathan in a wheat field in north India in March 1964
Political independence does not have much meaning without economic independence.
One of the important indicators of economic independence is self-sufficiency in food grain production.
The overall food grain scenario in India has undergone a drastic transformation in the last 75 years.
India was a food-deficit country on the eve of Independence. It had to import foodgrains to feed its people.
The situation became more acute during the 1960s. The imported food had to be sent to households within the shortest possible time.
The situation was referred to as ‘ship to mouth’.
Presently, Food Corporation of India (FCI) godowns are overflowing with food grain stocks and the Union government is unable to ensure remunerative price to the farmers for their produce.
This transformation, however, was not smooth.
In the 1960s, it was disgraceful, but unavoidable for the Prime Minister of India to go to foreign countries with a begging bowl.
To avoid such situations, the government motivated agricultural scientists to make India self-sufficient in food grain production.
As a result, high-yield varieties (HYV) were developed. The combination of seeds, water and fertiliser gave a boost to food grain production in the country which is generally referred to as the Green Revolution.
The impact of the Green Revolution, however, was confined to a few areas like Punjab, Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh in the north and (unified) Andhra Pradesh in the south.
Most of the remaining areas were deficit in food grain production.
Therefore the Union government had to procure food grain from surplus states to distribute it among deficit ones.
At the time, farmers in the surplus states viewed procurement as a tax as they were prevented from selling their surplus foodgrains at high prices in the deficit states.
As production of food grains increased, there was decentralisation of procurement. State governments were permitted to procure grain to meet their requirement.
The distribution of food grains was left to the concerned state governments.
Kerala, for instance, was totally a deficit state and had to adopt a distribution policy which was almost universal in nature.
Some states adopted a vigorous public distribution system (PDS) policy.
It is not out of place to narrate an interesting incident regarding food grain distribution in Andhra Pradesh. The Government of Andhra Pradesh in the early 1980s implemented a highly subsidised rice scheme under which poor households were given five kilograms of rice per person per month, subject to a ceiling of 25 kilograms at Rs 2 per kg. The state government required two million tonnes of rice to implement the scheme. But it received only on one million tonne from the Union government.
The state government had to purchase another million tonne of rice from rice millers in the state at a negotiated price, which was higher than the procurement price offered by the Centre, but lower than the open market price.
A large number of studies have revealed that many poor households have been excluded from the PDS network, while many undeserving households have managed to get benefits from it.
Various policy measures have been implemented to streamline PDS. A revamped PDS was introduced in 1992 to make food grain easily accessible to people in tribal and hilly areas, by providing relatively higher subsidies.
Targeted PDS was launched in 1997 to focus on households below the poverty line (BPL).
Antyodaya Anna Yojana (AAY) was introduced to cover the poorest of the poor.
Annapoorna Scheme was introduced in 2001 to distribute 10 kg of food grains free of cost to destitutes above the age of 65 years.
In 2013, the National Food Security Act (NFSA) was passed by Parliament to expand and legalise the entitlement.
Conventionally, a card holder has to go to a particular fair price shop (FPS) and that particular shop has to be open when s/he visits it. Stock must be available in the shop. The card holder should also have sufficient time to stand in the queue to purchase his quota. The card holder has to put with rough treatment at the hands of a FPS dealer.
These problems do not exist once ration cards become smart cards. A card holder can go to any shop which is open and has available stocks. In short, the scheme has become card holder-friendly and curbed the monopoly power of the FPS dealer. Some states other than Chhattisgarh are also trying to introduce such a scheme on an experimental basis.
More recently, the Government of India has introduced a scheme called ‘One Nation One Ration Card’ which enables migrant labourers to purchase rations from the place where they reside. In August 2021, it was operational in 34 states and Union territories.
The intentions of the scheme are good but there are some hurdles in its implementation which need to be addressed. These problems arise on account of variation in:
It is not clear whether a migrant labourer gets items provided in his/her native state or those in the state s/he has migrated to and what prices will s/he be able to purchase them.
The Centre must learn lessons from the experiences of different countries in order to make PDS sustainable in the long-run.
For instance, Sri Lanka recently shifted to organic manure from chemical fertiliser without required planning. Consequently, it had to face an acute food shortage due to a shortage of organic manure.
Some analysts have cautioned against excessive dependence on chemical fertiliser.
Phosphorus is an important input in the production of chemical fertiliser and about 70-80 per cent of known resources of phosphorus are available only in Morocco.
There is possibility that Morocco may manipulate the price of phosphorus.
Providing excessive subsidies and unemployment relief may make people dependent, as in the case of Venezuela and Zimbabwe.
It is better to teach a person how to catch a fish rather than give free fish to him / her.
Hence, the government should give the right amount of subsidy to deserving people.
The government has to increase livestock as in the case of Uruguay to make the food basket broad-based and nutritious. It has to see to it that the organic content in the soil is adequate, in order to make cultivation environmentally-friendly and sustainable in the long-run.
In short, India has transformed from a food-deficit state to a food-surplus one 75 years after independence. However, the government must adopt environmental-friendly measures to sustain this achievement.
Agroforestry is an intentional integration of trees on farmland.
Globally, it is practised by 1.2 billion people on 10 per cent area of total agricultural lands (over 1 billion hectares).
It is widely popular as ‘a low hanging fruit’ due to its multifarious tangible and intangible benefits.
The net carbon sequestered in agroforestry is 11.35 tonnes of carbon per ha
A panacea for global issues such as climate change, land degradation, pollution and food security, agroforestry is highlighted as a key strategy to fulfil several targets:
In 2017, a New York Times bestseller Project Drawdown published by 200 scientists around the world with a goal of reversing climate change, came up with the most plausible 100 solutions to slash–down greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
Out of these 100 solutions, 11 strategies were highlighted under the umbrella of agroforestry such as:-
Nowadays, tree-based farming in India is considered a silver bullet to cure all issues.
It was promoted under the Green India mission of 2001, six out of eight missions under the National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC) and National Agroforestry and Bamboo Mission (NABM), 2017 to bring a third of the geographical area under tree cover and offsetting GHG emissions.
These long-term attempts by the Government of India have helped enhance the agroforestry area to 13.75 million hectares.
The net carbon sequestered in agroforestry is 11.35 tonnes of carbon per ha and carbon sequestration potential is 0.35 tonnes of carbon per ha per year at the country level, according to the Central Agroforestry Research Institute, Jhansi.
India will reduce an additional 2.5-3 billion tonnes of CO2 by increasing tree cover. This extra tree cover could be achieved through agroforestry systems because of their ability to withstand minimum inputs under extreme situations.
Here are some examples which portray the role of agroforestry in achieving at least nine out of the 17 SDGs through sustainable food production, ecosystem services and economic benefits:
SDG 1 — No Poverty: Almost 736 million people still live in extreme poverty. Diversification through integrating trees in agriculture unlocks the treasure to provide multifunctional benefits.
Studies carried out in 2003 in the arid regions of India reported a 10-15 per cent increase in crop yield with Prosopis cineraria (khejari). Adoption of agroforestry increases income & production by reducing the cost of input & production.
SDG 2 — Zero hunger: Tree-based systems provide food and monetary returns. Traditional agroforestry systems like Prosopis cineraria and Madhuca longifolia (Mahua) provide edible returns during drought years known as “lifeline to the poor people”.
Studies showed that 26-50 per cent of households involved in tree products collection and selling act as a coping strategy to deal with hunger.
SDG 3 — Good health and well-being: Human wellbeing and health are depicted through the extent of healthy ecosystems and services they provide.
Agroforestry contributes increased access to diverse nutritious food, supply of medicine, clean air and reduces heat stress.
Vegetative buffers can filter airstreams of particulates by removing dust, gas, microbial constituents and heavy metals.
SDG 5 — Gender equality: Throughout the world around 3 billion people depend on firewood for cooking.
In this, women are the main collectors and it brings drudgery and health issues.
A study from India stated that almost 374 hours per year are spent by women for collection of firewood. Growing trees nearby provides easy access to firewood and diverts time to productive purposes.
SDG 6 — Clean Water and Sanitation: Water is probably the most vital resource for our survival. The inherent capacity of trees offers hydrological regulation as evapotranspiration recharges atmospheric moisture for rainfall; enhanced soil infiltration recharges groundwater; obstructs sediment flow; rainwater filtration by accumulation of heavy metals.
An extensive study in 35 nations published in 2017 concluded that 30 per cent of tree cover in watersheds resulted in improved sanitisation and reduced diarrheal disease.
SDG 7 — Affordable & Clean Energy: Wood fuels are the only source of energy to billions of poverty-stricken people.
Though trees are substitutes of natural forests, modern technologies in the form of biofuels, ethanol, electricity generation and dendro-biomass sources are truly affordable and clean.
Ideal agroforestry models possess fast-growing, high coppicing, higher calorific value and short rotation (2-3 years) characteristics and provide biomass of 200-400 tonnes per ha.
SDG 12 — Responsible consumption and production: The production of agricultural and wood-based commodities on a sustainable basis without depleting natural resources and as low as external inputs (chemical fertilisers and pesticides) to reduce the ecological footprints.
SDG 13 — Climate action: Globally, agricultural production accounts for up to 24 per cent of GHG emissions from around 22.2 million square km of agricultural area, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization.
A 2016 study depicted that conversion of agricultural land to agroforestry sequesters about 27.2± 13.5 tonnes CO2 equivalent per ha per year after establishment of systems.
Trees on farmland mitigate 109.34 million tonnes CO2 equivalent annually from 15.31 million ha, according to a 2017 report. This may offset a third of the total GHG emissions from the agriculture sector of India.
SDG 15 — Life on Land: Agroforestry ‘mimics the forest ecosystem’ to contribute conservation of flora and faunas, creating corridors, buffers to existing reserves and multi-functional landscapes.
Delivery of ecosystem services of trees regulates life on land. A one-hectare area of homegardens in Kerala was found to have 992 trees from 66 species belonging to 31 families, a recent study showed.
The report of the World Agroforestry Centre highlighted those 22 countries that have registered agroforestry as a key strategy in achieving their unconditional national contributions.
Recently, the Government of India has allocated significant financial support for promotion of agroforestry at grassroot level to make the Indian economy as carbon neutral. This makes agroforestry a low-hanging fruit to achieve the global goals.