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Shaky
premises A
window to the unexplained Across
the Board Money
as a cure Global
roundabout Have
money, will waste Just
how many lives of people from other nations equal the life of one US soldier? Kathy
Schneitter Water
cuts
The
official policy of linking earthquake rehabilitation and reconstruction with
land rights and house titles is leaving many survivors out\ By Amjad
Bhatti
Quake
survivors everywhere in Azad Kashmir and North West Frontier Province (NWFP)
had tragic tales to tell about how their lives and livelihood were destroyed
by the terrible shaking of the earth under their feet on October 8, 2005. But
in many cases, the trauma and suffering continues many months into the
post-quake phase. Despite loud assurances and claims by official experts and
policy-makers, people have not been able so far to simply re-build what they
had before the earthquake, let alone all the talk of building it in a better
way. The most
alarming issue is the absence of clear policy directions and lack of
information for the survivors who every morning gather at news stalls in
urban centers to know what the headlines hold for them. And this is not just
the lone gap in rehabilitation and reconstruction exercises. Which places has
the government identified to relocate people whose earlier places of abode
are no longer safe to live? What are the procedures laid down to provide
people with money for reconstruction? What, if any, is the most suitable
design for them to re-build their houses and businesses. Has this design been
approved and how does it cater to their needs and demands? On all
the above-mentioned questions, nothing seems to be happening. This situation
is likely to breed a state of distrust towards the authorities among those
who are desperate to pick their lives from the rubble. Now
while most of the temporary camps are closed down, majority of the earthquake
survivors, with an urge to re-build, have returned to their native lands. But
before they can even start re-building, confusions disputes and conflicts on
land rights and house titles have emerged as one of the most tenacious
challenge to their urge and efforts. It is sad to note that about two months
after the survivors have returned to their ancestral lands, officials are
still unable to devise a proper policy for the allocation of land to people,
according to the severity and extent of their displacement. It
seems, the end March deadline to close the temporary camps arrived too early
for the authorities to ensure that the survivors' return remained eventless.
One estimate says around 20 per cent of all the two million people rendered
homeless by the earthquake have been permanently displaced from their area of
origin. Also, a sizeable number of displaced people is resisting to returning
to their areas of origin because there exists no mechanism to settle disputes
on inheritance, entitlement and land rights. Instead of going back and
getting involved in conflicts among themselves, they are preferring to stay
in the camps despite strict warnings by the authorities to move out. Understandably,
there is no place to return to for those who have lost their land and houses
or for those who were living in rented houses when the earthquake struck. It
is feared that these people would be excluded from the reconstruction
exercise which favours those who can prove that they owned land and houses
before the quake. Following
are some major categories of affected people whose plight needs prompt policy
consideration: (1)
Landless groups: These people have been very negatively affected by the
closing of camps because they have no place to return to. (2)
Discriminated groups: These people, both in urban and rural areas, face
discrimination of gender, age, disability, ethnicity, religion or social
origins. Widows, female heads of households, orphans, families with missing
heads of households all fall in this category partially because of the
inheritance system which favours male heirs. (3)
Left-outs: These people, both in urban and rural areas, could not receive
money for reconstruction of their houses because of the flawed criteria for
the provision of compensation money (allocations are made on the basis of who
owns a house or a piece of land and not on the basis of who lived or worked
their before the quake). They also include those who were denied initial
compensation because they had weak social linkages with their local elite. (4)
Urban dwellers: These are the people who own lands in urban areas where
remodeling of entire neighbourhoods and cities is being proposed. As a result
of this exercise, many of them may lose their property while the provision of
alternative land to them is certain to create conflicts which need to be
addressed before-hand through a well thought out conflict-prevention policy. (5)
Uncertain owners: These people do not have clear land rights and titles of
the houses they lived in, businesses they ran and lands they tilled before
the earthquake. They include urban slum dwellers and rural groups working as
tenants and sharecroppers. They appear to be the most vulnerable group for
the fact they are facing discrimination in the reconstruction process because
of their inability to come up with land titles in their names. (6)
Rural dwellers: These are the people who come from rural area where there
exists no regulated land title system. (7)
Peasants: These are the people from rural area where agricultural lands they
cultivate have disappeared as a result of sliding and collapsing mountains.
There is no compensation and land re-allocation policy for the land thus
lost. (8)
Evacuees: These people were forcibly evicted or relocated from their native
lands and have little chance of returning there. (9)
Kashmiri refugees: These people, coming from the Indian-administered part of
Kashmir, were allocated land by the Pakistani government before the
earthquake. Now that the earthquake has swept away most of their camps, there
is little in terms of policy for their rehabilitation elsewhere. "The
above list is very worrying especially as there are no existing mechanisms
where the people affected by the earthquake can go to claim their rights,
except the court system and revenue court system (quasi-judicial) that are
partly dysfunctional and already overloaded," observes a report posted
at the website of United Nations High Commission for Refugees. To make
the policy planning inclusive, each category of quake survivors needs
context-specific, area-specific and community-specific policy initiatives and
practical interventions for its rehabilitation. It is, therefore, suggested
that a quick mechanism is put in place first to iron out issues related to
land and inheritance rights and relocation and then to address resettlement
controversies before entering into the process of physical reconstruction. In this
regard we can conveniently learn from Bhuj (India) earthquake, where the
Gujarat government sought to ensure the protection of women's rights and
entitlements by registering houses in the names of both the husband and the
wife. The Gujarat government also ensured that the house titles were passed
on to widows rather than another male member of a family which had lost its
head. The
governments in Pakistan, Azad Kashmir and the Frontier need to constitute
committees of the affected people at the lowest level of local governance to
initiate the listing of issues that they face. This should be a first step
towards engaging vulnerable groups in decision-making about their
rehabilitation. This will also evolve a popularly acceptable base for
grievance redressing system, with a room for local feedback and monitoring. Hit-and-miss
methods of policy formulation in a centralised manner will lead to technical
inappropriateness, waste of resources and popular discontent among
emotionally worn-out population of the quake zone. The writer works for Duryog Nivaran -- a South Asian
network for disaster risk reduction.
The
mythology of Islamic banking is being propagated as a new science while the
real questions about riba remain largely un-addressed By Dr.
Aqdas Ali Kazmi Islamic
banking is commonly defined as banking that operates without the norm of
interest. It is comparatively a recent concept. It is only during the last 50
years or so that Shariah experts, scholars and economists in the Muslim world
have made a big effort to develop the theoretical foundations and the
operational framework for Islamic banking. As a consequence of these efforts,
vast literature has appeared on the subject of Islamic banking and the
associated themes such as Islamic economics, Islamic finance, and Islamic
monetary system and so on. A large
number of journals and periodicals on the subject augment the stream of
intellectual output of Muslim thinkers. Numerous universities around the
world recognise the subject of Islamic banking for master and doctoral level
research. The
workshops, seminars and conferences held on the subject of Islamic banking
and Islamic economics during the last five decades run into hundreds. These
seminars and workshops have been held throughout the Islamic world as well as
some of the world financial centers like London, New York etc. Not only
the Islamic Development Bank at Jeddah, but International Monetary Fund and
the World Bank are also promoting the cause of Islamic banking. The IMF at
one stage had opened a Shariah department tasked with devising Shariah-compliant
securities for domestic and external debts and transforming the existing
financial system in the Islamic world on lines specified by the Shariah
department. What has been the success of these ventures, however, is of
historical interest only. The
bibliographies on the subjects such as Islamic economics and Islamic banking
etc. run into many volumes and are spread over thousands of pages. In this
field the lead has been provided by the Islamic Research and Training
Institutes (IRTI) of Islamic Development Bank.
Apart from this, many writers have prepared their own bibliographies
of Islamic economics and related themes and these bibliographies are also in
numerous volumes. A
critical review of the literature on Islamic banking and an evaluation of the
so-called Islamic banks operating globally lead to a startling revelation:
Islamic banking both in theory and practice is nothing more than mythology.
This mythology has a genesis, a structure and socio-economic implications
which need to be analysed in full detail. By its
definition, structure, organisation, functions and methodology, a bank cannot
exist without interest. These two concepts are inseparable. Because of the
inseparability between a bank and the norm of interest, it can be concluded
that Islamic banking is a mythical and a contradictory concept. If the
objective is to abolish interest, the entire banking system will have to be
scrapped altogether. In other words, if the foundation of the banking
superstructure, namely the norm of interest has to be eliminated, the entire
superstructure would have to be dismantled. However,
to justify Islamic banking, the Shariah experts, economists, bankers and
intellectuals have continued over the last five decades or so to build a web
of myths which are increasing in number with time.
The
first or the primary myth which has gained common currency throughout the
Islamic world is based on gross misinterpretation of the Quranic verses on
riba, which have led to the conclusion that riba as prohibited in the Quran
and the bank interests are identical and as such interest must be abolished
from all tiers of the economy including banking. The Muslim scholars have
never seriously and dispassionately discussed the three basic and
inter-related questions. What is riba? What is interest? Are riba and
interest co-equal or synonymous? As a result of the failure of Islamic
scholars to critically address these fundamental questions, the myths on
Islamic banking continue to flourish. The
second myth around which the concepts of Islamic banking and Islamic economy
are developed, points out that interest is the basic cause of the ills from
which modern economies suffer such as unemployment, inflation, depression,
income inequalities, poverty, etc. Remove the norm of interest and the
economic system would be fully purified (Islamised) with no unemployment, no
inflation and no income and wealth inequalities. The
third myth is in the form of the popular claim that there are as many as 200
banking units or banking companies which operate around the globe without
interest and that these banks represent alternative models to interest-based
banking. Even the Western
secular banking companies are now opening branches of Islamic banks or
Islamic windows to cater to the needs of Muslim investors. The
fourth myth is that J.M. Keynes as one of the greatest economists of the 20th
century, in his numerous writings has propounded and approved the structure
of an economy which is free from interest; the Quranic injunctions and
interpretations forbidding interest are thus supported by the worldly
economists such as J.M Keynes. The
fifth myth is that the mode of profit-loss-sharing (PLS) is truly an Islamic
mechanism and as such it can best serve as the basis of Islamic banking. In
other words, PLS can replace the norm of interest in the banking industry and
can give optimal results. The
sixth myth stipulates that Islamic banking will become a reality once the
Islamic economic system is established in its totality.
In other
words, the successful launching of true Islamic banking is contingent upon
realising the objective of transforming the existing economic systems which
are secular in their outlook and spirit on Islamic lines. If a truly Islamic
economic system is established in a particular country or globally, operating
of Islamic banking and financial system will be feasible and practicable. The real
issue is that the mythology of Islamic banking is being propagated as a new
science throughout the Islamic world. The Muslim scholars in Pakistan,
Indonesia, Malaysia, Bangladesh, Sudan, Iran, Egypt and Saudi Arabia etc.
have taken the themes of Islamic banking, Islamic economics etc. to a new
level of research, interpretations and model-building. However, the process
of Islamisation of the banking and financial system has serious implications
for the future of economies of the Islamic countries. In case interest is
abolished through an ordinance or an administrative fiat, the Muslim world
would face an unparalleled predicament of economic disorder and disaster. The author is a former joint chief economist, Planning
Commission, and currently a consultant of the Planning and Development
Division, Islamabad. E-mail: aqdasalikazmi@yahoo.com
Tax
administration needs a thorough shake-up to rid itself of corruption and free
its working from unwarranted interference from the outside By Huzaima
Bukhari and Dr Ikramul Haq The
Central Board of Revenue (CBR), the apex revenue authority at the federal
level, symbolises an institution wrecked by inefficiency and corruption. Only
a couple of weeks ago a refund fraud of Rs 20 billion surfaced in the press
which once again confirmed the existence of an unholy alliance between
corrupt tax officials and unscrupulous businessmen, depriving Pakistan of
taxes worth billion of rupees. According
to a report published in The News on May 14, 2006, the Supreme Court rejected
the bail application of one, Raja Zaraat, "who has been wielding far
larger financial clout than originally estimated" in getting billions of
rupees as tax refund on forged documents (according to a press release by CBR).
The report disclosed that though the first compliant against the accused was
received by CBR in December 2005, yet no action was taken against him till My
4, 2006 when he was arrested in Islamabad. It is obvious that this colossal
tax fraud was not possible without the connivance of tax officials. It is the
duty of CBR to make public the entire incident and punish the defaulting
officers. It is an
undeniable fact that CBR has been brutally (mis)utilised by successive
governments in Pakistan. The high-ranking posting in CBR are made by the
rulers of the day to serve their interests (there exist unprecedented
exemptions/concessions for land developers and certain so-called charitable
foundations claiming to 'benefit' serving and retired civil-military
officials). CBR chairman's office was used to award contracts to Cotecna, a
Swiss company, in return for huge kickbacks (a case pending against former
prime minister Benazir Bhutto and her husband in a Swiss Court) offers a
clear example of 'close connections' between the rulers and the tax
administrators. It shows how CBR's high-ups deprived Pakistan of billions of
rupees to please their masters. In the process they make a fortune for
themselves as well. It is a matter of record that one CBR Chairman was
declared a proclaimed offender in a criminal case involving ARY Gold, a UAE-based
company. The latest Rs 20 billion refund scam confirms that nothing has
changed. Tax
administrators have been encouraging drug traffickers and criminals to bring
as much money as they want to Pakistan through normal banking channels and no
question about their 'source' would be asked. This facility, the government
claims, is vital for the 'revival of economy'. But this
lethal prescription for revival of economy has destroyed the entire social
fabric of the society. The result is mafia-like operations and collaborations
between tax administrators on the one hand and drug barons, criminals and tax
evaders on the other. The outcome is a total destruction of our
socio-economic system. Similarly,
the tax policies appeasing politicians-cum-industrialists, unscrupulous
traders and businessmen are obviously not without any personal interest of
the people who devise and implement them. The
situation has not changed even under the present regime -- harsh, illogical
and unfriendly tax policies continue for the poor while the rich and the
mighty keep getting exemptions and concessions. Honest taxpayers are
discriminated against when others get extraordinary tax concessions and
tax-holidays. Yet CBR Chairman talks of broadening the tax base and
improvement in tax-to-economic output ratio. If we
want to rectify the situation, there is an urgent need to revamp CBR as a
first step. It should be made an autonomous body, free of any outside
interference/pressures. All its officers, recruited through the rotten
competition examination system, should be either compulsorily retired or be
given Golden Hand Shake. They should be replaced by professionals, as the
State Bank of Pakistan and the Security and Exchange Commission of Pakistan
have already done. These professionals should be inducted on purely merit
basis and on market wages. Officials selected and appointed only under this
criterion can ensure the fair collection of taxes. Similarly,
delegation of full financial powers to CBR on the lines of the State Bank of
Pakistan is another need of the hour. These powers are absolutely necessary
if the board is to discharge its responsibility of running the tax apparatus
efficiently. The time
is now ripe for making CBR an autonomous and independent body free from its
secretarial working. The government, while scrupulously respecting the
board's autonomy and independence may enjoy powers to issue directions of a
general nature in writing wherever necessary. The autonomous CBR should work
directly under a parliamentary committee. Our
economic development depends upon forming efficient tax collection machinery,
manned by skilled professionals and headed by thoroughly scrupulous persons.
The process of CBR's depoliticisation should be undertaken while at the same
time ensuring that it also becomes a transparent, truly independent and
financially autonomous organisation. The
writers are tax consultants. They are members of visiting faculty of Lahore
University of Management Sciences (LUMS).
Policy-makers
need to think beyond increased budget allocations for health if the sector
has to really deliver By Dr
Sania Nishtar
The
second question relates to why we need to focus on the utilisation of
budgetary allocations. This is simply because problems with fund's release,
their under-utilisation and the resultant budgetary lapses are well known.
And it is here that striking a balance between minimising and controlling
costs and using resources efficiently and equitably -- in other words,
getting the best value for the money on the one hand and increasing the pool
of available resources on the other -- becomes important. Specific
interventions like promoting transparent financial administration,
controlling budgeting and costs, enhancing the capacity to overcome onerous
financial management procedures and decentralising decision-making also
assume an added importance. There is also a dire need for greater procedural
clarity in financial dealings among the three tiers of the government -- the
federal, the provincial and the local. The
third question relates to why there is a need for alternative modes of
financing health when the budget for the sector is already being increased
every year? It is important to understand why this is so. Pakistan
principally uses three modes of financing health -- taxation, out of pocket
payments and donor contributions. Ground realties warrant that we revisit
this paradigm for a number of reasons. Taxation as a mode of financing health
demands an extensive tax collection capacity and is possible largely in
formal economies whereas in Pakistan the informal sector of the economy is
predominant. It is likely that as the volume of economic activity increases
and if the current growth is sustained, the economy will move into the formal
sector and the tax base and taxation capacity of the country will broaden.
But along with efforts to reallocate existing tax resources for health, other
options will have to be considered. The
second major mode of financing health is out of pocket payments. The total
per-capita health expenditure in Pakistan is reported to be between Rs 750 to
Rs 800. While no official figures exist on the break-up of this expenditure,
experts believe that 25 per cent of this is contributed by the public sector
and 75 per cent through private out-of-pocket fee-based funding mechanism.
The monthly household out-of-pocket expenditure on health has been reported
at Rs 358 in Pakistan. This is equal to 5.2 per cent of the total monthly
household expenditure and translates into an annual per-capita health
expenditure of Rs 570. This is clearly a significant burden for '23.9 per
cent' of the Pakistani population which according to the very recent
government official estimates lives below the poverty line. Clearly this
highlights the need for mainstreaming social health insurance as a mode of
financing health. In this context, the recent Social Protection Strategy
needs to be revisited to broaden its scope on health. In its current format,
the only area where it alludes to health is in the section on employees'
social insurance. The
third source of financing health has been donor contributions. Foreign aid as
a percentage of total health sector allocation has officially ranged from
4-16 per cent over the last several years. Over the long term there should be
a shift away from reliance on donor contributions given that they bring in
their wake many challenges. For a start, donor contributions prioritise
resource-allocations in specific programme-based areas rather than
systems-strengthening interventions which are the need of the day. Undue
reliance on donor resources can also be detrimental to programme
sustainability given that donor support is generally dependent on political
and general conditions prevalent geopolitically. Given
these considerations, alternative sources of financing health are now a
strategic imperative. There are already many existing sources within Pakistan
which need to be further built upon. For instance we know that the employees'
social insurance which currently secures 3.06 per cent of the workforce can
be broadened. Philanthropy through Zakaat and Baitul Mal, which has
contributed less than 3 per cent to public contributions in health, can be
mainstreamed by structuring a conducive tax configuration. Corporate support
can also be mobilised within the framework of corporate social
responsibility, albeit with safeguards. Above
all, it must be recognised that health financing patterns are shaped by the
macro-economic environment not only because they can enable the allocation of
more resources but also because they can reconfigure how financing patterns
are determined. The recent example of countries where economic booms have
created opportunities for global employment practices thereby creating an
environment where employers subscribed to health benefits is a case in point.
It is hoped that as Pakistan economically prospers, new options like this
will become available. The policy challenge then will be to ensure that these
options match well with considerations for equity. More so because in the end
health -- at least priority health services -- should be delivered by the
state as a public good. The
writer is the founder president of Heartfile. E mail: sania@heartfile.org
How
various factors are coming together to frustrate the Doha Round of global
trade talks By Mustafa
Talpur
The Doha
Development Round promised to correct the inequalities in multi-lateral
trading system, specially focuses on eliminating or substantially reducing
farm subsidies in the rich countries, which are allowing farmers in those
countries to remain artificially competitive but which also depress global
commodity prices, consequently causing agrarian stress in the developing
countries. The Doha agenda also reiterated global commitments to share global
wealth more equitably, improve human development and facilitate the achieving
of millennium development goals. All nice words, but they could never muster
the political support of the powerful rich countries for their
materialisation. Expectation
from the Hong Kong ministerial conference were high. Millions of poor farmers
were expecting that the conference will change trade-for-development rhetoric
into reality and will rewrite unfair trade rules which erode their
competitiveness. The deal arrived at Hong Kong fell much below these
expectations. It was in fact disappointing, specially when seen in the
context of five years lost -- without making any progress on any of the Doha
Development Agenda -- between Doha conference in 2001 and Hong Kong meeting
in 2005. An undemocratic and a highly exclusive process was adopted to strike
the Hong Kong deal. No wonder, blame game dominated the whole one week
proceedings at Hong Kong. The real
concerns of the developing countries were totally ignored. The issue of farm
subsidies, which are highly distorting for the agriculture trade and are
driving millions of farmers out of business, was not dealt with seriously.
There was no significant progress even to recognise the disastrous effects of
farm support by rich countries. According to 2005 Human Development Report,
the amount of trade distorting domestic support increased instead of
decreasing -- from $ 243 billion in 1986-88 to $ 279 billion in 2002-3. The
simple have been made complex in subsidy boxes and their impacts on trade.
The rich countries play a tricky game by shuffling boxes, moving payments
from one box to the other. In aggregate terms, not a single penny has been
reduced. The
single triumph is the end date for elimination of export subsidies in 2013,
which would have ended anyway according to the European Union's plan to phase
them out. Still, the Union used them in Hong Kong as a bargaining chip to
demand something in return from the developing countries. The EU currently
provides 55 billion euros in farm support, from this amount only 4 billion
euros is paid as export subsidies. End to export subsidies, therefore, will
not make any difference in trade distorting subsidies. The
price paid to elicit this offer from the European Union was in two other
agreements -- that is, trade in industrial goods and services. All the
countries have accepted the controversial Swiss formula to reduce industrial
tariffs, according to which higher tariffs will face steeper cuts. All
developing countries have relatively higher industrial tariffs to protect
their domestic industries. Critics say this agreement will de-industrialise
developing countries because their newly established industrial units cannot
compete with the highly established Western industries. This will bring most
of the developing countries back to the colonial era where they were just
exporting raw material. Similarly,
all the countries also agreed to expand liberalisation of trade in services,
including several basic services like education, water and healthcare as well
as strategic services like financial sector, energy and distribution. The
developing countries agreed to intensively liberalise these sectors without
assessing the social, environment and economic costs of this agreement.
Global services trade is dominated by the United States and the European
Union. The developing countries don't have any comparative advantage to be
able to export services in a few sectors where some countries like India have
something to offer. Apparently,
there is a deadlock in negotiations on agriculture in which the developed
world has to give up, something they are not ready for. Strong lobbying by
farmers' groups in Europe and the United States is pressuring governments to
keep the subsidies while, at the same time, business groups and services
providers in those countries are lobbying to get market access for their over
produced goods and services in the densely populated developing countries.
The signs so far are not encouraging that any deal will be reached to help
poor farmers and consumers in the developing countries. Key trading
countries, instead, are moving towards finding other ways to achieve their
trade agendas, for instance through bilateral and pluri-lateral free trade
agreements. Political
signs for arriving at a trade deal are also not good. US President Bush has
moved his chief trade negotiator, Rob Portman, to become his new budget
director. The move is being widely viewed as a shift in the American
administration's priorities to focus on internal affairs rather than on the
conclusion of the Doha Round. The European Commission has stiffened its
negotiating position by announcing that it will make no further reforms to
its Common Agriculture Policy without substantive tariff reductions for
industrial goods and market access for services in return. India's chief
trade negotiator Kamal Nath has told the media that "no deal is better
than a bad deal" and African trade ministers have warned that they will
not accept any agreement that leaves out the issues of particular concern to
Africa. The
countries with little to sell in international market are deeply concerned
about the potentially negative consequences of opening their markets to
increase import. Their concerns have been backed by series of devastating
economic reports by the World Bank, the United Nations and several think
tanks including the Carnegie Endowment on the potential outcomes of the Doha
Round. Each
report shows steadily shrinking returns for the developing countries. The
World Bank has drastically reduced its estimates of potential gains from the
Doha Round over the last few years. Initial projections of $ 500 billion in
2003 have been reduced to a mere $ 96 billion in 2005, with only $ 16 billion
going to a few developing countries like china and Brazil and the remaining $
80 billion going to the developed world. Added to this the UN prediction that
the developing world is set to lose $ 63 billion in revenues from reduced
tariffs on industrial goods and you have a ready recipe for the failure of
the current round of global trade talks. In terms
of Pakistan's gains and losses, the country's trade deficit is rampantly
growing thus eating up all the remittances and foreign exchange earnings. If
trade deficit keeps growing at the same rate as it does now, Pakistan may
face a serious balance of payment problem and may have resort to the
International Monetary Fund for succour, bringing back the spectre of IMF's
conditional loans. This may push Pakistan back into the vicious cycle of
costly borrowing. The
promised gains for Pakistan from free trade are so far not visible. Poverty
is on the rise and the agricultural crisis in the rural hinterland is too
much there to be overlooked. Foreign direct investment is not coming in
setting up new industries, infrastructure development, creation of economic
opportunities and generation of employment and is mostly being realised
through the selling of national assets in the name of privatisation. The
question that comes to mind is: Will WTO ever deliver for development or will
it remain a tool for the expansion of capitalism? The legitimacy and
existence of WTO depends mainly on the success of the Doha Round but the pace
of negotiations and the intentions of the main actors involved in them
indicate that a pro-poor deal is unlikely to be achieved. This leads to
another question: Has the time arrived for the developing countries to take
the bold decision of opting out of the multi-lateral trading system? The writer is a senior programme officer with Actionaid Pakistan.
funding Not every
dollar borrowed from the Asian Development Bank automatically translates into
something beneficial. In some cases, the outcome is certainly not benign By Dr
Noman Ahmed
This big
money and grand intentions notwithstanding, there is substantial criticism
being levelled against the ADB approach towards development. Many a programme
and project involving large ADB funds have been undertaken in the past but
unfortunately very few of them have been able to contribute in any meaningful
manner to the sector or the area which they were meant for. According to a
recent research study conducted by two research organisations, Environmental
Defence and ADB Watch, more often than not results do not match with the
plans of the projects/programmes funded by the Bank. Most of the conclusions
of the two researches are also verified by the ADB's own records. If one
goes by the volume of loans provided by the ADB, Pakistan's record has been
quite impressive. The country has been one of the biggest borrowers from the
Bank, second only to Indonesia. Due to its current geo-political status as
the Non-Nato Ally of the United States in Washington's war against terror,
the donors are all too happy to extend large volumes of credit to Islamabad.
For instance, the ADB earmarked $ 2.4 billion for Pakistan for release
between 2003 and 2005. It must
be kept in mind that Pakistan is not yet totally out of debt, as is casually
portrayed by the regime. In 2002, Pakistan had $ 32 billion in public
external debt. Of this, $ 8 billion were owed to the World Bank while $ 6.5
billion to the ADB. If one
goes by the findings of internal auditors of the ADB, who claim to find 40
per cent of the projects funded by the Bank in Pakistan as being completely
unsuccessful, then at least $ 2.6 billion of the Bank loans given to the
country have gone down the drain. These billions of dollars getting wasted
have only come from just one lender. What is the real impact of other donors
funded projects, including those funded by the World Bank is still any body's
guess. According
to the data released by the operations and evaluation department of the ADB,
Pakistan has received 217 loans for projects in different sectors but only
some of these projects are rated as successful. For instance, in the case of
'Second On-Farm Management Project', the Bank auditors reported success
despite observing a few flaws. This project was focused on increasing overall
productivity, employment opportunities and income level of various areas in
southern Punjab like Rajanpur, Muzzaffargarh and Dera Ghazi Khan. It
successfully dealt with the issues of water logging and salinity which had
caused a great deal of harm to local communities. Out of an allocated $ 28.5
million, the project utilised $ 27.6 million. Some
other success stories include South Rohri Fresh Ground Water Irrigation
Project and Balochistan Fisheries Development Project. Unsuccessful projects
included Faisalabad Water Supply and Sewerage Project and Karachi Urban
Development Project (KUDP). In the views of the auditors, project planning
did not involve potential beneficiaries of these projects. Several design
flaws were also apparent, like lack of proper sewerage treatment options in
KUDP and incongruent volume calculations in the case of project in
Faisalabad. Sustainability remained a constrained parameter especially in the
laying of locality scale infrastructure. The ADB
has invested in many development sectors including agriculture, education,
health, urban development, water supply and sanitation and finance. While
projects in education and healthcare may be considered as partly successful,
water and sanitation as well as urban development are reported to have been
unsuccessful. Project design short comings, absence of stakeholder
participation, cost over-runs, time losses and negative environmental impacts
were some reasons behind the failure of these projects. Lack of scientific
performance indicators has also caused ambiguities. It may
also be noted that these findings are the Bank's own, reached at through its
own procedures. There are many independent researches done by various
organisations from different perspectives. It will be worth while to analyse
feedback from each of these studies to obtain a balanced conclusion of the
success and failure of the ADB's operations in Pakistan. Financial
support by donor agencies, both through their own programmes or through
requests and proposals submitted to them by the government, needs to be
assessed very carefully. There are several ground realities in the
development sector which cannot be denied. One is the magnitude and number of
development projects that require to be undertaken on a priority basis. They
do not at all find mention in the plans for locally/nationally allocated
development funds. The second is the non-availability of adequate funds but
it is not the whole issue. In many cases, institutional capacity and
technical and managerial resources are also not locally available for the
execution of a project. In such a situation, only money cannot bring about
the desired results. Dollars can surely create a good fishing net for a
skilled fisherman -- but they cannot create a fisherman. The third is the
fact that donor agencies are organisations that function independent of the
recipient countries. Their ultimate target is to have an impressive record or
annual reports, according to their own criteria. It is not necessary that
their objectives and approaches always match with the countries in need of
development finances. The fourth reality is that donor agencies are
controlled by the lone super power -- that is, the United States -- and other
industrialised countries that lend capital to these agencies for
disbursement. It is obvious that these countries will like to keep the right
to dominate the decision-making of these agencies with themselves under most
situations, if not all. And fifth is that administrations and governments
that negotiate with these agencies have their own ulterior motives. In most
situations, the concerned officials are aware of impending failure of a
project or programme funded by a donor, yet they still go ahead for reasons
of their own. Personal gains, scoring of a few political points and
clandestine linkages with donor agencies are often factors that prompt
officials to make up their minds about a certain project and its financing. In terms
of professional ethics such as transparency and fairness of approach, there
are many reservations that are cited about the working of the ADB. The Bank
does not pay any heed to local accountability mechanisms. A sizable number of
its important policy and project documents are classified and inaccessible to
even the borrowing countries. While the ADB emphasises the significance of
good governance, it does not follow this dictum in its own working. For
instance, the agreements contracted by various regimes in Pakistan with the
ADB have seldom been brought into the Parliament for approval. Similarly, the
Bank pressurises the governments to modify laws, rules, procedures and
conventions whenever and wherever they pose any limitation to the ADB's
approaches. A
rational approach towards the multitude of developmental problems can evolve
through considering few pre-requisites. The foremost issue to be tackled is
about institutional strengthening through local means. This implies that
different tiers of administration must become technically competent and sound
in management practices in doing their routine duties. Basic tasks such as
need analysis, organising and analysing baseline information, planning and
project design are few areas where human resources need to be mobilised.
Secondly, the potential affectees of every project must be involved in the
project at every stage of work. Theoretically, with a three-tier government
system in place, this is achievable. It must be understood that stakeholder
involvement is a political process. It must be allowed to take root. And
thirdly, lessons learnt from the past must be considered before making moves
for the future. It should be the most unfortunate situation where a failed
project or programme is repeated without any modification in its design and
application. Newswatch By Kaleem
Omar The
White House on Tuesday promised full public disclosure of the results of a
military probe into the alleged massacre of Iraqi civilians by American
forces in al-Haditha on November 19 last year after renewed accusations that
the US Marine Corps tried to cover up what could be one of the worst criminal
atrocities committed by US occupation forces in Iraq. Twenty-four
innocent Iraqi civilians, including women and children, died in the killing
spree by a Marine unit in al-Haditha, a town 200 km northwest of Baghdad. The
unprovoked attack came when Marines went on the rampage following the death
of a Marine driver who was blown up when his Humvee military vehicle was hit
by a roadside bomb. After
Time magazine broke the story in March this year, John Murtha, a Democratic
member of the US House of Representatives and a critic of the Iraq war,
charged that the killings would rival the Abu Ghraib scandal. Two
separate inquiries are underway into the incident and subsequent allegations
of a cover-up. The London Times reported that "leaked photographs taken
by another Marine unit and a video by a trainee Iraqi journalist suggest that
many of the victims were shot execution-style on the head and chest in their
houses." Forensic
evidence from corpses showed that the victims had bullet wounds,
contradicting the initial statements by Marines that the Iraqi civilians were
killed by a roadside bomb that also claimed the life of an American soldier. White
House spokesman Tony Snow told reporters on Tuesday that President Bush had
only heard of the incident at al-Haditha after Time magazine published a
report about it in March, and that the president was waiting for the military
to complete its investigation. However,
Snow was unable to explain why it took four months for Bush to learn about
the incident. The time lag doesn't say very much for Bush's performance as
the commander-in-chief of US armed forces. Is he really that far out of the
loop? Bush
said on Wednesday there would be punishment if the investigation turns up
evidence of wrongdoing by the US Marines. "I am troubled by the initial
news stories," Bush said. The
London Times reported: "Twelve Marines are now under investigation, some
of whom could face murder charges... Three Marine officers have since been
relieved of their command." Congressman
Murtha, himself a former Marine, charged that US military authorities had
paid compensation to the families of the victims, indicating they had assumed
responsibility for the deaths. "They paid people $ 1,500 to $ 2,500.
This doesn't happen unless it comes with the highest authority," Murtha
told CNN. Critics
of the war are calling the incident 'another My Lai' -- a reference to the My
Lai massacre in Vietnam on March 16, 1968, when US Army soldiers from Charlie
Company, 11th Brigade, 'Americal' Division, murdered hundreds of unarmed
civilians in the village of My Lai in Quang Ngai Province, on the orders of
one of the company's platoon leaders, 24-year-old Lieutenant William Calley. The
massacre followed the death of one American soldier who had been killed two
days earlier in an unconnected incident at another location when Calley's
platoon had run into a roadside booby trap. The Vietnamese paid for the death
of that one American soldier with the deaths of more than 500 villagers who
were slaughtered by Calley's platoon at My Lai. The US
Army colonel deputed to investigate the My Lai massacre said in his report
that those killed "comprised almost exclusively of old men, women and
children." The
Criminal Investigation Division of the US Army estimated 374 deaths, not
including the residents of Binh Taym, a nearby hamlet where additional
killings took place. But the
official Vietnamese memorial in the small village of My Lai, which had about
700 inhabitants before the massacre took place, lists 504 killed, including
182 women, of whom 17 were pregnant, and 173 children, of whom 56 were of
infant age. Sixty of the men were over 60 years old. Charlie
Company came to Vietnam in December 1967. By March 1968, many of the soldiers
in the company had given in to an easy pattern of violence. Soldiers
systematically beat up unarmed civilians. Some civilians were murdered. Whole
villages were burned. Wells were poisoned. Rapes were common. On March
14, 1968, two days before the My Lai massacre, a small squad from Charlie
Company ran into a booby trap, which killed a sergeant and wounded several
other soldiers. The following evening, when a funeral service was held for
the killed sergeant, Charlie Company soldiers had revenge on their mind. A
day later, on March 16, 1968, their revenge took the form of the My Lai
massacre -- one of the most horrific episodes in military history. Many of
the victims were killed in a ditch where they were trying to hide from the
rampaging American soldiers. Calley himself shot scores of villagers with his
automatic rifle, emptying magazine after magazine of bullets into them at
point-blank range. The US
Army tried to cover up the massacre. But after details of the massacre found
their way into the US mainstream press, including a detailed expose in the
New York Times by the American journalist Seymour Hersh (the same journalist
who, in April 2004, broke the story about the Abu Ghraib scandal), the Army
high command ordered Calley arrested and shipped back to the United States to
face a court martial. As the
American writer Mark Gado (a long time member of the New Rochelle Police
Department in New York) recounts in his book 'Into the Dark: The My Lai
Massacre', Calley's court martial began at Fort Benning, Georgia, on November
17, 1970. The prosecutor, Captain Aubrey M Daniel III, was a 26-year-old
attorney who had little trial experience. Calley was represented by George
Latimer, a former military judge. According
to the US Army's indictment, Calley was charged with the "murder of 109
Oriental human beings" -- the use of the term 'Oriental' here suggesting
that the victims were members of some sub-human species. As Gado
recounts, several members of Calley's unit had agreed to testify against him,
but many did not. The jury consisted of six US Army officers: one captain,
four majors and a colonel. During
the trial, Calley lived on the post at Fort Benning in his own apartment
where he frequently entertained friends and supporters. He took the time to
answer a great deal of fan mail from around the United States. At Gado
recounts, Calley was very aware of the tremendous publicity the My Lai case
had received across the world. Calley signed a contract with the US's Esquire
magazine to publish his version of events at My Lai and began working on a
book about the massacre. On
January 11, 1971, former Private First Class Paul Meadlo, Calley's partner at
the killing ditch in My Lai, testified. Meadlo, then 23, described how he and
Lt Calley shot defenceless old men, women and children in a frenzied
slaughter. "Calley backed off and started shooting automatic into the
people," he said. "I was beside Calley. He told me to shoot." As Gado
recounts, Meadlo described the second group of killings a few minutes later.
At the second ditch, a group of 80 to 100 women were crouching in terror.
"Then he started shoving them off and shooting them in a ravine. He
ordered me to help kill the people too. I started shoving them off and
shooting them," Meadlo added. Meadlo
admitted to many killings at My Lai, but legally, he was off the hook: the US
government granted him immunity for his testimony. Though
many soldiers from Charlie Company took part in the massacre, the US Army
high command had apparently decided, for damage-control reasons, that Calley
was to be the sole fall guy and therefore had to be convicted at all costs,
even if it meant granting immunity to Meadlo and other witnesses. As Gado
recounts, another former member of Charlie Company, Dennis Conti, took the
stand to describe his version of events at My Lai. In response to questions
by prosecutor Captain Daniel, Conti recounted the killings at the first
ditch: "So
they -- Calley and Meadlo -- got on line and fired directly into the
people... The people screamed and yelled and fell. I guess they tried to get
up too... There were a lot of heads had been shot off, pieces of heads,
fleshy parts of the body, side and arms, pretty well messed up," he
said. When
Calley took the stand, he defended the killings as part of his
"job." He said, "I did not sit down and think in terms of men,
women and children... I carried out the orders I was given and I do not feel
wrong in doing so... It was our job to go through destroying everyone and
everything in there." As Gado recounts, for three days Calley continued
offering the Nuremberg defence of 'only following orders.' That was
the same line of defence adopted by 13 members of Hitler's Nazi regime at
their post-World War II trial in Nuremberg for war crimes and crimes against
humanity. But the Allied Powers' trial court rejected their plea, ruling that
it was their duty to refuse to obey manifestly illegal orders. For
similar reasons, the Fort Benning court martial tribunal rejected Calley's
'only following orders' defence. Charlie
Company's commanding officer, Captain Ernest Medina, then 33 years old, took
the stand and emphatically denied ever ordering anyone to kill women and
children. "No, you do not kill women and children," he said. As Gado
recounts, on March 29, 1971, after the longest court martial in American
history and thirteen days of deliberations by the jury, Lt William Calley was
found guilty of the murder of at least twenty-two Vietnamese civilians."
The very
next day, Calley stood in the same courtroom and read his statement to the
jury prior to sentencing. He said that he was not at fault because he was
only doing what he was trained to do. "That was my enemy out
there," he said. What he
did not mention, of course, was the fact that not one round of enemy fire was
ever received by US troops at My Lai that day and no Viet Cong were ever seen
or captured. As Gado recounts, there was no contact with the 'enemy'
whatsoever. Calley's platoon suffered not a single casualty and there was no
battle. Calley
was sentenced to life imprisonment. On April 1, 1971, however, just two days
after the verdict, US President Richard M Nixon ordered Calley to be placed
under house arrest while his appeal worked its way through the courts.
"The whole tragic episode was used by the media and the anti-war forces
to chip away at our efforts to build public support for our Vietnam
objectives," Nixon wrote, in a statement that today sounds very much
like Bush's statements about the Iraq war. In 1973,
Calley's sentence was reduced to ten years by US Secretary of the Army Howard
Callaway. After much legal wrangling, Calley was paroled on September 9,
1974. As Gado notes, he had served three-and-a-half years under house arrest,
or approximately one month for every ten Vietnamese killed at My Lai. The
total time Calley spent in prison was only two days -- that is, the period
between the date when he was sentenced to life imprisonment and the date when
Nixon ordered that he be placed under house arrest. Today, Calley, now 72,
lives in Columbus, Georgia, where he works in a family-owned jewelry shop. That,
then, was the horrific reprisal ratio at My Lai in March 1968: 504 unarmed
Vietnamese civilians, including old men, women, children and infants,
massacred by a US Army platoon as an act of revenge for the death of one
American soldier -- a death, moreover, for which the My Lai villagers were in
no way responsible. At the
town of al-Haditha in Iraq last November, the reprisal ratio was somewhat
less. This time, it was 24 innocent Iraqi civilians massacred by US Marines
to revenge the death of one American soldier. Is this
yet another illustration of the Bush administration's contention that it
invaded and occupied Iraq to 'liberate' the Iraqi people?
firstperson One of the
biggest hurdles in the entire devolution process is (the absence of) fiscal
decentralisation. By Raza
Rahman Khan Kathy
Schneitter is country director Pakistan of the Swiss Agency For Development
and Cooperation (SDC). The organisation has been working in Pakistan for the
last 40 years and has recently celebrated four decades of its development
activities in Pakistan. Kathy
had been a teacher for 20 years before she joined SDC in early 1970s. She has
worked in Africa and Nepal besides serving a stint at SDC's headquarters. Kathy is
sharing the office of country director with her husband and describes this
sharing as a unique experience. Recently The News on Sunday talked to her on
the development process in Pakistan. Excerpts follow: The News
on Sunday: What are the areas that your organisation is working in? Kathy
Schneitter: We are working in three domains. The first domain is governance
where we have two action lines, the first one being the rights of women and
children and the second is devolution of power. We are supporting the
devolution process. The second domain is income generation. Here again we
have two action lines, first is to improve rural livelihood and the second is
provide micro-finance. The third domain is reconstruction and rehabilitation
of the earthquake-hit areas. We are building schools and health centres. Our
focus is also on reviving earthquake victims' livelihood. TNS:
What has been the impact of SDC programmes, especially in the domain of
governance? KS:
Governance is the latest domain that SDC has added to its activities in
Pakistan since mid 1990s. We have been especially active since 1999 when
President General Pervez Musharraf took over the government. It is always
difficult to say what has been the impact of our activities in a short period
of time like this. But I think now when you go to the rural areas, mainly
after the latest round of local government elections, you see that people --
especially women groups -- have somehow become more aware of their political
rights. Now women in union councils are taking up their responsibilities much
more seriously than in the past even if they still have long miles to go.
They are actively participating in discussion at the union council level. Now
people at this lowest level somehow realise they need to do something to
change their plight and that of their communities. The
union councillors are at least by now aware not only about their rights but
also of what their duties are. But still there is a long way to go before you
have people at all tiers of the government -- that is, the union council, the
tehsil and the district -- who know what they have to do. One of the biggest
hurdles in the entire devolution process is (the absence of) fiscal
decentralisation. This will be a lingering and recurring problem as long as
fiscal assets lie with the federal government. Financial devolution is
something which is to be done on priority basis. TNS:
What are the hurdles in realising financial devolution? KS:
People at the helm of affairs in Pakistan have to change their mindset
because the centralised system can no longer deliver. Pakistan has been used
to (this central) structure since the colonial time. So now the country needs
to change to something new. Earlier, people would go to a high official to
have themselves heard. In a democratic system, if people learn to talk to
each other to get something done, they will realise that they already have
some powers with them at the grassroots level to have their way. The
rationale is because if we do not get what we agreed to (by voting for a
particular person), why should we elect that person next time? I think power
of the ordinary people increases as the (democratic) system develops. The
success of the devolution process can take a very long time to materialise.
One should not have expected the devolution to make a huge impact from the
word go in 2001. For the success of the system, everybody must be convinced
that it is a good system because it brings decision-making down to the
people. I will not say it always works ideally, but the idea behind
devolution is to achieve good governance. TNS:
What role can this devolved system play in the evolution of a democratic
culture in Pakistan? KS: When
you talk of a democratic culture, you can't just talk of a democratic culture
at the level of the government, the administration, the politician. It has to
evolve from the level of the people. But the difficulty is that there are a
lot of illiterate people in Pakistan. Somehow, there should be a mechanism to
address to these people. The democratisation must take place from scratch and
should continue to the highest echelons of power. Only then will a political
culture take root and only then will it work for the benefit of everyone. TNS: Do
you find that people in Pakistan in general and in North West Frontier
Province (NWFP) in particular are development friendly? KS: We
have long partnerships in different districts of the country, especially NWFP.
We have never faced any difficulty to work with people. But when it comes to
gender and the rights of women, it is a little bit difficult when you work in
a backward area. But I must say I have never come across any non-negotiable
situation. When you are engaged in the process of development, awareness
raising must be concomitant. Obviously one has to be very sensitive about
local culture. TNS: Are
you hopeful of that the development process will finally succeed in Pakistan?
SDC: I
have been asked this question time and again. I respond by saying that if I
am not convinced of what I have been been doing for the last 25 years, I
would not have done it at all. I am very optimistic. But at the same time I
realise that it will take time. If you look at Switzerland, 150 years ago it
was not very different from what NWFP is now. Development has a lot to do
with education and particularly the education of women. This is one of the
most important development issues in Pakistan. TNS: Do
you mean that development process will not work without educating the women? KS:
Absolutely. If you want quality improvement, you must educate women. Then
there would be fewer children, for instance. As long as women in Pakistan
remain uneducated, there will be no change. But I am very positive and
hopeful that things will change in this regard. When you look at the rural
and urban areas of Pakistan, there is a huge difference (between the two).
Very often (the difference) has to do with the possibility of choices poor do
not have (in some areas). For me, education is the key to narrowing this gap.
TNS:
What makes men disallow women's development? KS: If
you want to change this situation, the male has to give up some of his power.
This is already evident in politics and in the working of many organisations
but I think something similar has to happen at the level of the family where
this change is still not evident. If the male surrenders some of his powers,
a natural corollary of this will be that he will also be shifting some of his
responsibility onto women's shoulders. TNS: Do
you think women in Pakistan are responsive to the development process? KS: They
are very responsive. If you talk to women in remote NWFP districts like Buner
and Dir, they are very eager to develop, to learn, to discuss. Many women's
groups have found that women want to have fewer children but the men don't
agree.
The
erosion caused by a change in river Jhelum's course has swept away a number
of villages in Punjab and is threatening many more By
Muhammad Badar Alam
The
danger is not imminent; it's already there. About half of Kamra's total
farmland has become a part of the Jhelum. "It's only a couple of acres
away from our houses," says Saed Rasool, a local teacher. The building
of the government-run school he taught at was swept away a couple of years
ago forcing a relocation. Saed
Rasool tells The News on Sunday by his cellphone how two neighbouring
villages of Siddha and Lashkari have been virtually wiped out of existence
due to the erosion caused by a change in the river's course. "This has
been happening since 2000 to the ruin of a number of villages on the west
bank of the river" as it flows into the river Chenab a few kilometres
downstream at Tarimu Barrage. The area
he is talking about is dotted by small villages where most people are farmers
and no one owns more than five acres of land. So the consequences of people's
homes and hearths getting swept away are grave and they are not economic
alone. "Those who lose their houses and farms are forced to move to
other villages where they work either as sharecroppers or as tenants. This
makes them rely on others for not their livelihood alone but also for the
protection of their honour and place in the community they migrate to,"
says Saed Rasool. People
sticking to their ancestral homes and lands have got together to make
themselves heard. Spurred by a local civil society organisation, Doaba
Foundation, the residents of 14 villages in the endangered area have formed a
forum to consult with each other and let their elected representatives and
government officials knows about their plight. Saed Rasool says this has
helped them take their case to the people who have the power to do something
about it. Last
May, he says, their calls were finally answered when the then district
coordination officer came to visit the area to get a hands of knowledge of
the problem. "(The officer) came up with a report which favoured our
demands," says Saed Rasool. "He even ordered the immediate
re-construction of the school in Kamra," says Shamsuddin Chishti, Doaba
Foundation's district coordinator. Before
the order could materialise, the Punjab government barred district
administrations across the province from spending money on new projects till
the formation of new local governments. This did not deter people in Kamra,
though. "We
persuaded District Nazim Hameed Sultan to visit the area in February 2006. He
was so moved by the extent of the damage there that he instantly ordered a
relief and compensation plan," says Chishti by telephone from his office
in Jhang. The plan envisages a waiver of all government dues, deferment of
bank loan repayment and provision of alternative land for housing and
agriculture. "Detailed proposals have been sent to the Board of Revenue, Punjab for the plan's implementation," claims Hameed Sultan. He is not aware that the official policy about at least one crucial part of his proposals has changed since long. Officials at the Board of Revenue's headquarter in Lahore can reveal that farmers displaced by river erosion can no longer get alternative land for farming. "In late 1980s, the policy was revoked because it was |
The
transition from relief to recovery and reconstruction in earthquake-ravaged
areas of Pakistan seems to have been marred by policy neglect, administrative
inefficiency and the absence of an effective grievance redressing mechanism. 
Budget
2006 is just around the corner with an indication that there will, both, be
aggregate as well as programme-specific enhanced allocations for health. This
raises the question of whether this increase can translate into improved
health outcomes over the short term. Here it must be understood that the
improvement in health indictors does not necessarily correspond with the
level of resource inputs because of the way funds are utilised in Pakistan
and the need for a reconfiguration of the health system. Three questions
emerge in this context: how should we interpret and analyse the current
allocations -- per se; do we need to focus on how budgets can be utilised
better and do we need alternate modes of health financing, and if so, why? 
Firstly,
let's interpret some of the figures: the government of Pakistan has been
spending 0.6 per cent to 1.19 per cent of the country's total economic output
and 5.1 per cent to 11.6 per cent of the official development expenditure on
health over the last 10 years. These figures reflect spending respectively by
the federal ministry of health and the provincial departments of health. They
do not take into account other public sector health services and those
provided by the private sector -- if these are also taken into account, the
total expenditure can roughly be placed at 3.5 per cent of the Gross Domestic
Product. Utilisation issues notwithstanding, total public sector health
expenditure is shown to double between 1991/92 and 1997/98 with a 100 per
cent increase over the last five years. But budgetary increases should be
viewed in the context of inflation and population growth and the real
per-capita expenditure. Enhanced allocations must also favourably impact the
ratio between development and non-development budgets. A comparison of
2003/04 and 2004/05 federal and provincial development and non-development
budgets shows a major dominance of non-development budget in the provinces.
This gap appears to have widened over the last 10 years whereas at the
federal level trends have been comparatively favorable towards development
budget. Budgetary allocations for health must also factor a favourable ratio
between prevention and tertiary care allocations. In this context, a
comparison of primary healthcare budgets with clinical health programme
budgets in successive Five Year Plans shows that clinical services have
consistently consumed more than 45 per cent of the total health budget. Along
the same lines, striking a balance between financing health in the rural and
urban areas should be an area of concerted focus not only because 70 per cent
of Pakistan's population lives in rural areas but also given that recent
surveys in 2005 have reported significant rural-urban disparities in key
health indictors. For example, mortality rate among children under five in
the rural areas of Sindh has been reported at 117 compared to 68 in the urban
areas. 
The
sixth ministerial conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) was highly
disappointing for trade negotiators, developing countries, millions of poor
farmers and thousands of civil society groups extensively monitoring the Doha
Development Agenda. The agenda forms the basis for the current round of the
international trade negotiations called the Doha round, which was initiated
after an earlier ministerial meeting in Seattle failed to address the growing
concerns of the developing countries on the supposedly positive effects of
trade liberalisation on human development. Poverty, impoverishment, food
import and unemployment are rising in almost all developing countries as they
become more integrated to global trading system. The more they open their
trade with other countries, the farther they fall on human development index.
Recently
published reports related to the development assistance planned by the Asian
Development Bank (ADB) reveal that the bank intends to enhance its lending
portfolio in Pakistan. It's Country Strategy and Programme Update (CPSU) for
2006-2008 has proposed to provide $ 1.458 billion for 12 projects in 2006
alone. The ADB has also shown keen interest in backing services which support
the devolution of power programme. 
The
Jhelum is a silent river these days and the quieter it is, the deeper it
runs. In Kamra village of Jhang district the river is running so deep that it
may be flowing right under people's courtyards and cropland. For local
residents, the day is not far off when their small settlement of about 100
houses will finally give in to the river current.