Vinod Anand

AFTER having looked at the trend of the economic indicators in the earlier Parts of this Paper, let us now review the trend of some of the social indicators, which are equally important to assess the effects of planning on the economy. We have considered the following social indicators for which the time-series data are available: Population in terms of birth rate, death rate and life expectancy; Education in terms of literacy rate; Health and Family Welfare in terms of number of registered medical practitioners, and hospital beds.

Population:
The population scenario in India is rather depressing in the sense that despite numerous programmes to contain population, India is today the second most populous country in the world. In fact over the years the situation has gone from bad to worse, as the population has been growing at a phenomenal rate with the result that it has gone beyond 1 billion marks. And the future appears to be very bleak. During the first three decades (i.e., up to the end of seventies) population increased at an annual average rate of 2.25%, 2.46%, 2.52% respectively. During the eighties, this rate fell down marginally to 2.14% but without making any dent on the total population. The country has been able to affect some, but not very significant, decline in the birth rate. Despite this decline, it is still high and is not sustainable at the existing level of development, though it is much lower than the average of the Third World countries. As compared to birth rate, death rate has declined more effectively. Whatever has been achieved so far is essentially due to family welfare programmes, including the initiatives like promotion of small family norm, reproductive and child health, child survival and safe motherhood through free and voluntary choice. Another initiative is concerned with the abolition of targets for individual contraceptives and at the same time focusing on overall population control and health related goals. An attempt is also made to involve community in the family welfare programmes. For example, the Community Award Scheme and Family Welfare Plan for Watershed Project, which were earlier initiated in 1996 on an experimental basis, are now fully operational. Beyond that the Pulse Polio Immunisation also continues. These programmes appear to be impressive, but what lacks is the political will, and that too in a set-up which is so wide and diverse. Apart from emphasizing direct methods, the policy package must contain a number of indirect ways to control population.

While we have looked at trends in Population, it is also important to look at life expectancy at birth, which is an important indicator of human development. It is seen that life expectancy at birth has gradually improved both for males and females, but the performance has not been very consistent as is evident from the annual average changes

Education:
The impact of planning on education has been assessed in terms of literacy rate. It is seen that the literacy rate has steadily gone up over the years. Eradication of illiteracy has always been a priority on the national agenda to meet the objective of the National Literacy Mission (NLM), the most important strategy for which is the Total Literacy Campaign (TLC), which aims at achieving total literacy by the year 2005. But, unfortunately this target has not been achieved. Apart from literacy rate, the other important agenda is the universalisation of elementary education, which has met with success in terms of the increase in the number of primary and upper schools, and a larger enrolment of children. Emphasis is also laid on girl child schooling and recruitment of rural women as teachers through special provisions like the Revamped Blackboard Scheme, Mahila Samakhya Programme (Education for Women’s Equality). Another important programme is The District Primary Education Programme (DEEP).

The subject of Education in India has long been on the State list. However, with the introduction of the New Education Policy (NEP) in 1987 the Central Government intervention has increased, and, with the initiation of liberalization in 1991, private sector has also been taking major initiatives. Though regarded as a major instrument for improving socio-economic conditions of the people, education is not well linked with poverty eradication objectives. A few major initiatives have, however, been taken from time to time to integrate poverty issues with education. Some of these initiatives are:

? massive expansion of educational facilities including setting-up of educational institutions in rural and remote areas with emphasis on regional language/mother tongue as the medium of instruction to eradicate rural-urban disparity in the access of education;
? hostels for poor students belonging especially to scheduled castes, scheduled tribes and backward classes, and residential schools for the poor-tribal;
? mid-day meals, merit-cum-means scholarships, and book-loan programme for the poor school children so that they do not have to earn their livelihood at the cost of education;
? vocationalisation of education at all levels to provide skills to the poorer sections for earning their livelihood;
? non-formal methodology of education ( including schemes like ‘Earn While you Learn’, ‘Action Research Project’ on universal primary education, and UNICEF assisted projects) permitting students to learn a course of their interest through a method most suited to them, at their place and over a period which is convenient to them;
? distant education and use of mass media;
? adult education;

Although we have vastly expanded the educational net work in the country, yet the quality of education has gone down. In fact, a parallel economy is emerging in the filed of education with a mushroom growth of low rate educational coaching institutes all over. This will have immiserizing effects on our economy in the coming decades.

Health and Family Welfare:
These are assessed in terms of the number of registered medical practitioners, and the availability of hospital beds per 10,000 of population, the data for which are available for limited years. It is seen that over the years the medical facilities have steadily improved both in terms of the availability of medical practitioners and hospital beds. As compared to 1950-51, the number of registered medical practitioners per 10,000 of population increased by around 12% in 1960-61, 64% in 1970-71, 129% in 1980-81, and by 182% in 1991- 92. In respect of hospital beds per 10,000 of population, the increase was around 62% in 1960-61, 100% in 1970-71, 159% in 1980-81, and 203% in 1991-92. With increasing population, the scenario has gone worse in recent times. Although the availability of these facilities shows an upward trend, yet these facilities, considered in absolute sense, are extremely meagre and even negligible in a country with a massive population. An important point to remember is that illness care is not much of the responsibility of the State in India. A large proportion of people pay directly for the curative services which are delivered to them either by private sector physicians of western medicine, or by a large number of practitioners of indigenous and other systems. The provision of preventive and promotive health care services (which also include, to some extent, suitable housing, sanitation, safe drinking water etc.) is, however, the responsibility of the State. Some of the well-meaning health programmes the Government has launched so far are briefly mentioned below:

? An extensive net work of Primary Health Centres and Sub-Centres opened under the Minimum Needs Programme;
? Community Health Worker Scheme ( later called Village Health Guide) of the Seventies;
? The policy measures to integrate practitioners of traditional medicine into primary health care as contained in the National Health Policy of 1982;
? The Programme of Urban Basic Services (UBS) of the urban slums introduced in the early eighties;
? Signing of Alma Ata Declaration on ‘Health for All’ by the year 2000 which led to the National Health Policy Statement of 1982;
? Launching of a number of disease-specific programmes to contribute to the health and productivity of the poor;
? Establishment of a National Illness Assistance Fund to achieve the objective of ‘ Health for Under Privileged’;
? Ten Major National Health Programmes aimed at prevention, control and eradication of communicable and non- communicable diseases.

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Contemporary global capitalism: Multi-pronged crises-2

The grand failure of many a financial institution in the US is one of three such crises that have affected the world today; the others related to oil prices and food shortages. These in sum have broken the back of neoliberal triumphalism, and have resulted in a spatial shift in global capitalism. No wonder, it is time to address alternatives to this greed driven, unregulated and excess-motivated system. Such an alternative must be based on the principles of ecological sustainability, social justice and democratic participation writes Professor Pritam Singh who teaches at the Oxford Brookes University Business School, Oxford.

Inflation and Oil Price Rise

In spite of the economic slowdown, the crisis is being further compounded by a rise in inflation, a result of the crisis in the agricultural and energy markets. Oil is a non-renewable resource, and its total global stock at a given level of technology is fixed. The political and military crisis in west Asia, which has two-thirds of the world’s known oil reserves, is further contributing to a situation of reduced supply of oil in the present and uncertain supply in the future. The search for non-oil energy resources is becoming a pressing imperative for the energy-intensive character of advanced capitalism. John McCain, the Republican candidate in this year’s presidential elections in America, has been harping on about the oil vulnerability of America in the light of the country’s continuing military crisis in west Asia. He has promised an energy policy, “that will eliminate our dependency on oil from the Middle East” and has openly acknowledged a link between America’s oil strategy and military strategy by stating that his promised energy policy will be aimed at preventing “us from having to send our young men and women into conflict again in the Middle East”. America’s dependence on oil has been increasing and the price of oil, though fluctuating, has shown an upward trend in the global market. At the time of the first worldwide oil crisis, in 1973, 33 per cent of America’s oil needs were met by imports; now, the country’s import dependence has nearly reached 60 per cent. According to some estimates, this will rise to 70 per cent by 2020 [Rachman 2008]. The price of oil has risen from $ 26 a barrel shortly before the Iraq invasion in 2003 to $ 100 a barrel now, after having touched a high of $ 148 in July 2008. And, according to the analysis and estimates by Goldman Sachs, one of the largest Wall Street investment banks trading oil, it can rise to $ 200 a barrel in the next two years.

Apart from the supply-demand dynamic playing a role in determining oil prices, the fluctuations in the dollar’s exchange rate also impact upon the price of oil. Since oil is traded in the international market in dollars, a decline in the exchange rate of the dollar leads to a rise in oil prices – in order to recoup the fall in the value of the dollar. The falling dollar also encourages financial investors to look upon oil and other commodities as assets. This gives impetus to speculation in oil – thus further pushing up oil prices.

The price of oil has come down from the peak it had reached in July. This is partly due to the fallout from the credit crunch. The decline in business and consumer confidence as a result of the financial turmoil related with the credit crunch has tended to lower the demand and hence the price of oil. However, the overall trend is towards a rise in oil price.

Search for Biofuels

Rising oil dependence, the uncertainty about the oil supply from west Asia, and the rising price of oil are the driving imperatives behind the new, intense competition for biofuel alternatives to oil, in America and elsewhere. The US – whose foreign and domestic policy in the past has been decisively influenced, if not controlled, by powerful oil corporations, and where the opposition of oil companies to research in non-oil resources has hampered the efforts to develop renewable energy sources – seems to be now in the forefront in search for biofuels. Even the big oil companies have changed their stance and are now investing in developing biofuels. The search for biofuels has direct implications for the volume of global production, supply and availability of food.

Large areas of land that were hitherto used for food production have been diverted to growth of biofuel crops such as corn in America and sugarcane in Brazil. The US is the world’s largest exporter of cereal and has more than one-third share in the world exports of wheat and other foodgrains. In America, corn is currently the major source of biofuels, and this shift has inevitably resulted in diversion from food production. Globally, bio-ethanol production has doubled between 1999 and 2003 and is projected to double again by 2010 [de Fraiture et al 2008: 69]. The global food shortage is significantly, though not wholly, the result of decline in food output as a result of the decline in land area used for food cultivation. This is the supply side dimension of the global food shortage.

The increased demand for food as a result of the prosperity of some sections of the population in BRIC economies represents a part of the demand dimension of the global food shortage. The changing pattern of demand for food is also a contributory factor to the emergence of food shortages. The past few decades of continuing prosperity in advanced capitalism and the emerging prosperity of a section of the population in the Asian and Latin American capitalist economies have led to an increase in demand for meat products. According to the Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates, most of this increase in the next seven years will occur in the developing economies, where consumption is expected to grow by 2.7 per cent per year compared to 0.6 per cent per year in rich countries. The increasing demand for meat leads to diversion of large tracts of land to raise animals. To argue for vegetarianism or at least for reduction in meat consumption now is not merely an ethical and ecological call; it is increasingly becoming an economic imperative.

The mismatch between the supply of and demand for food is only one factor in the rise in food prices. These prices are also being pushed up by the rise in oil price, which manifests itself in rising production and transportation costs of food. Another contributory factor is the role of speculative capital. This capital, through futures markets and forward trading in foodgrains, can manipulate a rise in price that is disproportionately more than what would be warranted by the current forces of demand and supply. By its very nature, such capital feeds itself on food shortages and the misery caused by such scarcities. Responding to speculators’ role in creating food shortages, Lenin in a famous speech to the Petrograd Soviet in 1918 had said, “We can’t expect to get anywhere unless we resort to terrorism: speculators must be shot on the spot”. The Socialist Party in Belgium has recently taken a less stringent position than Lenin’s when responding to an initiative by the KBC bank (Belgium) in launching a fund with returns linked to food commodity prices; the party has called for a ban on such funds [Jackson 2008].

Because food expenditure is not a major item of household expenditure for large sections of the population in advanced economies, the rise in food prices is not yet leading to a rise in demand for higher wages. However, in the developing world, food expenditure is a major component of household expenditure, so the rise in food prices is likely to push up the demand for higher wages – and it is already leading to a series of social and political conflicts, for example in Bangladesh, Egypt, Mexico, Tanzania, Senegal and Haiti [McGeough 2008: 7]. Even in the advanced capitalist economies, trade unions are reporting unease in their membership over the rise in food prices along with the rise in oil prices. There are recent signs of increasing militancy in trade union claims over wage settlements, especially in the UK and Germany. The advanced capitalist economies have had a long, lucky run over the last few decades, largely due to low commodity prices. The rise in commodity prices now is putting a serious question mark over the sustainability of growth in the advanced capitalist economies.

The Spatial Shift in Capitalism

The spatial shift in global capitalism, in the shape of emergence of new economic powers in Asia (China and India), Latin America (Brazil) and the ex-Soviet bloc (Russia and Ukraine), is manifesting itself not only in the rise in demand for more food and energy sources but also in the geopolitical ambitions of the nation states in these regions. Business groups based in these nation states, both in the public and the private sector, are dramatically expanding and consolidating their transnational ventures. In 1990, the emerging economies accounted for just 5 per cent of the flow and 8 per cent of the stock of global foreign direct investment (FDI). By 2006, FDI (including mergers and acquisitions) from developing countries accounted for 14 per cent of the world’s total, giving these countries a 13 per cent share of the stock of global FDI [Anon 2008a].

Although the phenomenon of Third World multinationals is not entirely new, the scale of operations of some recent Chinese and Indian business ventures abroad is especially salient. China’s sovereign wealth funds, i e, the funds owned by the Chinese government have been investing massively in the UK and the US. Though resistance was experienced in the latter, these funds were welcomed in London [Weinberg 2008]. The Indian capitalist group Tata’s takeover of British Land Rover and Jaguar group is symbolic of the changing balance in global capitalist economy.

Dependency in Reverse?

It is important, however, not to exaggerate the meaning of these developments. It would be wrong to portray these developments as a sign of the emergence of “reverse colonialism” or “reverse dependency”. Indian and Chinese multinationals that acquire western multinationals continue to have a negligible role in the economic, business and political decision-making of western capitalist countries. That is one reason there has been hardly any opposition to their acquisition ventures, except in Germany and France. It is also important to remember that, in spite of impressive aggregate growth rates in China and India, both of these countries continue to have massive numbers of very poor people due to the uneven nature of the development path these countries have pursued. This mass poverty limits the potential for growth of their internal markets and also defines the nature of their competitive power in the world economy. Chinese growth is highly dependent on export of manufactured goods produced with low levels of technology. Indeed, it is precisely because of the low labour costs that China has been able to compete successfully in the international market.

The high growth rate of GDP in India has been driven by developments in the services sector. But while this growth is impressive in its contribution to overall growth, like China it remains dependent upon relatively low labour costs in order to compete with US and European multinationals. Meanwhile, the labour productivity in China and India remains far below that in these two areas. At this point, the technological superiority of advanced capitalism over emerging capitalism is too entrenched to start making statements about the emergence of China and India as superpower rivals of America and Europe. What is important, however, in deciphering the changing balance of global capitalism is the emergence of a multiplicity of new economic alliances and rivalries. Of particular interest is the nascent imperialist competition between China and India in Africa. Chinese and Indian multinationals, backed by their respective governments and supported by international finance capital, are making massive forays into Africa. Recently, Bharati Airtel, India’s leading mobile operator made a multi-billion dollar bid for Johannesburg-listed MNT. Had that bid succeeded, it would have made Bharati Airtel one of the largest telecom companies in an emerging market. Although this bid did not succeed, what is interesting to note is that it was being financially supported by Goldman Sachs and Standard Chartered [Johnson 2008].6 Even more imperialistic in character is China’s recent decision to buy large swathes of land in Africa and South America to grow food for its home consumption [Anderlini 2008; FT Editorial 2008].

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Cuba: From isolation to reinsertion

Patricia Grogg

CUBA’S reintegration into Latin America means that the government of Raúl Castro will be celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Revolution in a wholly different regional context than the one that prevailed in the 1960s, when this Caribbean island nation was marginalised by practically all of Latin America.

In this sense, 2008 has been a very productive year for Cuban diplomacy, and the string of successes are expected to continue in 2009, with several Latin American heads of state visiting Havana, including Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa and Argentine President Cristina Fernández in January, followed by their Chilean counterpart Michelle Bachelet in February, and Mexican leader Felipe Calderón on a date to be decided.

Raúl Castro’s choice of Venezuela and Brazil as the destinations of his first official trips as Cuban president, following his appointment in February 2008, is an indication that he is steering his administration down the path of Latin American and Caribbean integration, while continuing with a foreign policy focused on relations with China and Russia, the successor to the Soviet Union.

In Brazil, Cuba was officially admitted as a full member of the Rio Group -- a political discussion and coordination forum involving 21 countries of the region--, which convened an extraordinary meeting during the first Latin American and Caribbean Summit on Integration and Development, held Dec. 16-17 in the northeastern Brazilian state of Bahia.

Cuba’s admission to the Rio Group and the fact that it was invited to participate in the first regional summit held without U.S. involvement, where it also secured a condemnation of Washington’s nearly five-decade trade embargo on Cuba, strengthens the Cuban government’s stance against a possible reinstatement into the Organisation of American State (OAS).

For some analysts, the next step towards achieving complete regional integration would require dismantling the OAS, which excludes Cuba. "The OAS must be replaced by a Latin American organisation that is free from any intervention from the Pan-American imperial power," Ximena de la Barra, a Chilean independent consultant and researcher, commented to IPS.

On Jan. 31, 1962, the OAS’s Eight Meeting of Consultation of Ministers of Foreign Affairs, held in Punta del Este, Uruguay, passed a resolution excluding Cuba from the Inter-American system due to the island nation’s Marxist-Leninist government and its alignment with the Communist bloc.

The decision was passed with the supporting votes of 14 countries, one negative vote (Cuba), and six abstentions (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador and Mexico). Following the suspension from the Washington-based OAS, all the governments of the region, with the sole exception of Mexico, broke off diplomatic relations with Cuba.

According to former Cuban diplomat Carlos Lechuga, Washington secured the votes in favour of excluding Cuba "through pressure and extortion," violating both the OAS and United Nations charters. "It was a victory obtained at a high cost, and it further discredited the OAS," Lechuga says in an article analysing the issue.

"For much of these past 50 years we’ve been cornered, but we’ve put up a strong defence," Raúl Castro said during his recent visit to Brazil, in reference to the period of international isolation that began in 1962, as the Cuban Revolution also became a reference point for any leftist movement that chose to take up arms.

Although Cuban authorities deny having played a role as "exporters of revolution" --because, they say, "revolutions are forged by the people" -- they have recognised that during the 1960s and 1970s they supported and encouraged armed revolutionary movements that emerged in several countries to fight against their national "oligarchies" and the United States’ "imperial policy" in the region.

"The only place where we didn’t support revolutionary efforts was in Mexico. In all the other countries, without exception, we supported such movements," admitted Fidel Castro in July1998 at a Havana meeting of economists, when the now ailing leader was still president.

In his opinion, the region had the necessary objective conditions to bring about a revolutionary process, but "the subjective conditions failed."

More recently, in his book "Peace in Colombia" the Cuban leader said that "as for supplying weapons to revolutionaries, we considered whether or not the government of the country in question had an aggressive position towards Cuba. It would depend on how far the struggle in that country had advanced."

According to researchers, the worst moment in Cuba’s relations with other governments of the region was during the 1962-1975 period. In 1975, the OAS amended a 1964 resolution that forced its member states to suspend diplomatic, trade and consular relations with Cuba.

"The amendment of that decision created conditions that paved the way for a gradual normalisation of ties with the island for the governments of the region, with the sole exception of El Salvador," Cuban researcher and academic Luis Suárez writes in a yet unpublished article provided to IPS.

Humanitarian concerns and the successive votes against Cuba in the United Nations Commission on Human Rights -- which Cuba viewed as participating in the United States’ policy of aggression -- caused diplomatic tension and clashes with several Latin American countries throughout the 1990s.

The biggest row occurred with Mexico, during the presidency of Vicente Fox (2000-2006). But Fox’s successor, Felipe Calderón, ironed out the differences, and diplomatic relations between the two countries are now strong, with both presidents planning official visits for 2009.

Today, Cuba maintains ties with all the countries of Latin America, with the exception of El Salvador and Costa Rica, with which it has only restored consular relations. In addition, at this year’s U.N. General Assembly, Cuba obtained the highest favourable vote in 17 years (185 countries in favour, and three against) in its call for the elimination of the U.S. embargo.

Since the 1990s, Cuba strengthened its cooperation with Latin America and the Caribbean, especially in the fields of health and education, through literacy programmes, specialised medical assistance, and free training for health professionals.

In 2005, the first 1,612 doctors graduated from the Latin American School of Medicine, which opened in 1999 with the enrolment of students from Central America and now has students from 27 countries. These new professionals took an oath to go back to their countries of origin and serve the medical profession with a non-commercial spirit.

Such programmes are especially popular among poor sectors in Latin America, and are highly valued by some governments, who see them as a key contribution to integration and development, in particular in the lowest-income nations.

Moreover, in the 1990s Fidel Castro began to speak out against taking up arms to achieve revolutionary goals. "Not even atomic weapons could dampen the hopes of the people; but it is clear to us now that at this moment in time, under the current circumstances, armed struggle is not the most promising way," he said in 1993.

"Take it from someone who, as you all well know, was involved in an armed struggle and backed armed revolutionary movements, and who does not regret it," Fidel Castro said that year in Havana in the closing statement at the meeting of the Sao Paulo Forum, where Latin American leftist movements came together to coordinate actions.

Fidel Castro stepped down from power in 2006 due to poor health, at the age of 82. In February 2007 he retired from the presidency, and the single-chamber parliament elected his younger brother Raúl to take over. However, he is still first secretary of the governing Communist Party. [Courtesy IPS]

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