For inclusive growth, the poor need equity, not charity

LAHORE: Exclusive growth favoring rich has been the hallmark of last three governments and the trend continued both during high- and low-growth cycles demonstrating that Pakistani economy is, by default or may be by design, structured to benefit the moneyed class.

The present regime seems to be pursuing the same path with more vigor as the common man is being punished through high utility rates, high inflation, and increasing unemployment.

The economy is directionless none of the manufacturing sector except carmaking industry is flourishing. The motorbike production is on the decline and tractor production has come to a standstill. Both these products are mostly sold in the rural regions and serve to lower middleclass of the society. The VIP culture is still in vogue not only in official circles but privately as well as the rich feudal and businessmen also travel with a security convoy.

The government planners play with the sentiments of the poor by declaring that a huge sum has been allocated in the budget for pro poor growth. They rightly consider allocations on education and health as pro poor initiatives but where is the implementation?

The service delivery in both education and health is on the decline. Poor children enroll in government schools to roll out semiliterate individuals after years of education. The poor patients share beds in government hospitals even with patients suffering from communicable diseases. They leave the hospitals with a few new health problems. These two areas still remain neglected.

The richer segments of society educate their children in quality private schools, where pass out with flying colors. The children of ultra rich complete their education in renowned institutes of developed countries. The rich patients go to the best private clinics in the country, while the richer make a beeline for the hospitals of developed economies.

The government has not yet announced a unified national curriculum for all education institutions in the country.

The services in the government hospitals remain as shabby as ever, while the private sector clinics are yet to be regulated. Specialist physicians openly charge up to Rs3,000 as consultation fees that no minimum wage earner could afford in Pakistan. There is no move to regulate private medical practice or even document private practice to generate badly needed revenues.

Issues such as land acquisition and compensation are as much a part of the agenda as are better schools and free medicines.

The idea is to make people feel that they too are stakeholders in the growth. Common man has still been badly ignored in the first seven months the present regime.

The growth has in fact slowed down to a trickle adding to the miseries of poorer segments of the society.

A close look reveals the economic policies as well as operations of last four governments including the incumbents are basically the same as were pursued by the Musharaf regime, only the incompetence and corruption has progressively increased.

Jobs are diminishing because the local industry suffers as it has to pass through a number of bureaucratic hurdles. The longer the length of red tape the higher are the chances of benefits going exclusively to those that have the ability to pay to get the hurdles removed. This has effectively denied level-playing field to all.

A painfully long red-tape is not the only thing that is hurting the economic growth, absence of better infrastructure and skill-oriented education is also lethal for it and such serious issues are yet to get government attention.

Technology has advanced too far and robots are performing tasks to maximise efficiency.

We still rely on ‘jugad’, a "hack" that could also refer to a clever makeshift fix or a simple work-around to keep obsolete technology working. This is not working now.

The country simply needs judicial use of available resources to move ahead. Policies restricting competitions in other sectors of economy would have to be removed to unleash the actual growth potential of the economy. The inequality would be addressed only through transparent policies that provide equal opportunities to all in education, health, social protection, and jobs.