It is a glorious tribute to the vision of Pt Deendayal Upadhyaya who gave a wholesome concept of growth
JP Dubey
The “Transforming our world: the 2030 agenda for sustainable development” adopted at the 2015 UN Summit has all the tenets that Pt Deendayal Upadhyaya had propounded in his Antyodaya programme.
At the core of this agenda are 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with 169 related targets with 232 individual indicators subsequently added to monitor the progress of these targets. The goals provide a framework covering 16 thematic areas, as well as global partnership and means of implementation for each thematic goal. The 16 themes are Poverty, Hunger, Health, Education, Gender equality, Water and Sanitation, Energy, Jobs and Growth, Industry and Infrastructure, Inequalities, Cities and Communities, Responsible Consumption and Production, Climate, Ocean, Land, and Peace. Formulation of SDGs was culmination of two main tracks viz. the Millennium Development Goals MGDs (2000-15) and the sustainability track which started in the Rio summit in 1992 with emphasis on social and environmental aspects and culminated in Rio+20 in 2012. One of the most significant outcomes of Rio+20 was to launch a process involving multi-stakeholders to create sustainable development goals (SDGs) combining the two tracks.
The three main dimensions of SDGs are, economic, social and environmental. The new agenda, however, goes beyond these three dimensions to 5 “Ps”: – People: to end poverty and hunger, in all their forms and dimensions; – Planet: to protect the planet from degradation – Prosperity: ensure that all human beings can enjoy prosperous and fulfilling lives – Peace: Foster peaceful, just and inclusive societies which are free from fear and violence – Partnership: Mobilise the means required to implement this Agenda through a revitalized Global partnership.
Goals
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Unlike MGDs which were developed by UN team, SDGs have been developed by consultative process involving multiple stakeholders such as UN Institutions: Business & Industry: Civil Society; Regions: Science & Academia and Political Leadership over many years . The targets given under the various SDGs are global only in the aspirational sense. Each country may mainstream them with its own plan, policies and programs after taking into account its priorities and circumstances. In turn the national government may expect the state and local governments to develop their own respective targets.
Dignity of Human Beings
National ownership of the targets is, however, necessary to ensure commitment. Perhaps most important aspect of the SGDs is mentioned thus in the Preamble of the Agenda “As we embark on this great collective journey, we pledge that no one will be left behind. Recognising that the dignity of the human person is fundamental, we wish to see the Goals and targets met for all nations and peoples and for all segments of society. And we will endeavour to reach the furthest behind first.” That reminds us about “Sarve Bhavantu Sukhina” and “Antyodaya”!
This is where we find so many similarities between Agenda 2030 and Purusartha- the Hindu View of Development which is based on Dharma. For us pursuing our needs (Kama) through economic development (Artha) is subjected to moral values and righteousness (Dharma). We believe in rebirth and we revere mother earth, hence sustainability is inbuilt in our thinking on development. Our dharma enjoins us to draw sustenance from earth without harming it, not only in this birth but in future births as well.
Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya whose birth centenary we are celebrating now, had propounded this theory in his four lectures on Integral Humanism that he had delivered on April 22-25, 1965, in Mumbai.
Agenda for Niti Aayog
We have entrusted the work of mainstreaming the Agenda with suitable modifications to Niti Aayog which has taken all necessary steps to involve state governments, local bodies, academia, business and civil society. It has also presented the Voluntary National Reviews (VNRs) at the High-Level Political Forum (HLPF) 2017. In fact, in the schemes and programmes that are already being implemented in our country, we seem to be working to achieve the SDGs in letter and spirit, much ahead of the schedule.
We, however, need to integrate our programs and policies
horizontally and vertically. SDGs are highly interrelated with the achievement of one target being dependent on so many others and vice versa.
We have a plethora of overlapping programmes. There is a need therefore, to integrate them. Ideally we may strengthen and use aadhar database to consolidate various benefits that any household may be drawing under various programs. Like for instance a farmers household may be getting benefit of various subsidies under agricultural schemes, MGNREGA, NFSA, ICDS, Housing etc. Proper household wise accounting will give us the real picture and enable us to evaluate the impact of each such scheme. We may even think of using the same data base to replace the population census. Also we may build health record of every person which may be updated by health workers equipped with handheld devices. Such record can be very useful in extending healthcare to all. We may also know how many school going children are actually attending school and how many working age adults are actually working and for how many days in
a year.
Main Problem
Our main problems are: Nutritional deficiency, low quality of education, lack of access to proper healthcare and housing, gender inequality and unemployment. These problems are interrelated and get reflected in overall poverty. One sollution that come to mind is to build modern towns based on model master plans with separate residential, commercial, institutional, animal husbandry and industrial sectors adjusted to the local conditions, each for around 20
thousand households each. This will not only provide jobs to the surplus rural workers close to their homes, enable them to build decent houses for their families, improve water,
sanitation, schooling, healthcare, marketing etc. it will facilitate urbanization without creating more slums.
Women Reservation Bill has been hanging fire for a long time because of strong opposition from some interests which have been considerably weakened now. It is therefore, the most opportune time to pass and implement the same at the earliest. In democracies like ours political power and
participation can make all the difference in gender equality. The other area of empowerment is in the services sector like healthcare, education, policing, catering etc. This will help us in achieving gender equality.
We may build a health force with equal number of male and female health workers equipped with mobile devices to collect and feed heath data in the national health record database and to arrange video conference between patients and doctors sitting at call centres. All expectant mothers and small children must be provided recommended nutrition so as to take care of the maternal and infant mortality. Vaccinations must be thorough.
In education, the time has come to take care of the quality for which it is important to build uniform course material at least in science and maths and to make detailed video lessons available in local dialects. The same may be telecast at the national school on TV and made available to schools for classroom viewing assisted by trained teachers. We also need to encourage vocational as well as
medical and healthcare education.
Development and Sustainability
It is often argued that there is inherent conflict between development and sustainability. By 2050 population of the world may increase to 9 billion and given exponential technological advancement consumption basket will have so much more variety in it by then. Providing a reasonable quantity to all will require so much more resources and create so much more waste causing global warming by 3 degree celsius. But it is possible to save earth and yet provide decent living to all. Red meat for instance has 35 times bigger footprint as compared to cereals and pulses. Controlling its consumption is one way of controlling carbon footprints. Secondly, advancing technology such as in solar power gives great hope for pollution free energy. There are quite a few such to steps to achieve sustainability.
Technological revolution, population explosion and economic growth have combined to bring about phenomenal changes in the quality of human life on earth. We have been expanding our consumption basket by adding to it a huge and ever expanding variety of goods and services. In doing so however we are destroying forests and biodiversity, over exploiting natural resources, generating unmanageable quantity of waste, generating green house gases which are causing global warming and climate change.
Secondly, it has created problem of access. Vast majority remains deprived of the goodies in the consumption basket due to lack of purchasing power—the mechanism of distribution. Technology is capital intensive and labour saving. Scientific advancement in healthcare had brought down the death rates drastically. For various reasons many communities have resisted or not been able to bring about a reduction in birth rates, resulting in population explosion putting earth under unbearable strain due to overexploitation and wasting.
Some other areas have remained untouched by technological
advancement for a very long time. We have perpetuated inequalities in various forms. Thus women being physically weaker have been treated as inferior to men, higher castes superior to the lower castes of manual workers and foreign rulers have exploited the ruled natives.
Finances
Attaining Sustainable Development Goals by 2030, requires huge investment for which all countries should marshall will and resources. As per UNCTAD estimates annual investment needed globally to achieve SDGs USD 5-7 trillion overall and $ 3.9 trillion -$ 2.5 trillion for the developing countries.For India the estimates are $ 0.96 trillion twice the combined expenditure of centre and states or one fourth of our GDP. It also requires that they join hands in a partnership, as the goals are far too ambitious for any individual country and the agenda concerns us all. It is an agenda to bring heaven on earth – a heaven in which no body is left out, and all live in peace and harmony with nature to enjoy the comforts that progress in science and technology has brought.
Developed countries are committed to official development assistance to the extent of 0.7 per cent of their gross national income. At highest ever, it totaled to $131.6 billion, in 2015 i.e., 031 per cent of combined GNI of DAC of OECD. Assistance to LDCs is being targeted to 0.2 of GNI. The developed countries have also committed to $100 billion annually for assisting developing countries in climate mitigation. So much depends upon these developed countries fulfilling their commitments.
A major?step needed is to increase domestic resources by increasing revenue both tax and non tax. True there is much more to this agenda than just the growth rate. But it is very
important for us that our growth rate runs high – above at least 7 per cent over the next 13 years. Then there are the exports, foreign direct investment, foreign institutional investment, as grants and loans from international financial institutions and inward remittances from non residents which need to be taken care of.
(The writer is an expert on economy,
governance and energy issues)
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