Have we not had enough of the Western model of development? Can we change gears at this point in time or are the times bad. In public service whenever one wanted to do something out of the ordinary one was told that times are bad. Times in Pakistan are never good. Whenever any actions that did not suit the boss were suggested these were shot down as too risky. There were exceptions as always.
The present situation is so terrifying that the old guards that brought us to this need to be taken to the sea and given a ducking. Urbanisation as the way for growth is ridiculous and we do not seem to have learnt our lesson. There is shortage of everything in this country. Water, energy, or any demand-driven economic activity is short. Food production system was not geared to the new realities provided by urbanisation. Agricultural land that was already unable to feed the nation has been further reduced by this urbanisation. Former finance ministers that showed urbanisation as growth should be made to live in villages.
According to a recent Lancet photographs we have lost about 3 million hectares of land to urbanisation. That means that the supply of everything is going to be reduced. The graphs are very much different. Population increases are going upwards and resources coming downwards. How can Pakistan survive? Meat is out of reach of the common man, milk is getting ready for an exponential explosion in prices, vegetables unless grown in proximity of these urban towns like Islamabad, Lahore and Karachi, not to mention others, will face shortages.
Normally when shortages occur the supply side augmentation manages to supply the shortages in the short run. There is no such indication and then we have just seen that elites' fertiliser companies have been given gas when the common man is under stress and unable to have one kind of energy. You do not need chemical fertilisers for organic are just as good and two hundred times cheaper. Created on farmer's field this compost based organic fertiliser can be produced in ten days time and even earlier if the temperature is high.
All the waste material which otherwise is a source of illness can be used and used profitably. To add to the woes of the country we are in the election year. The engineers talk of maintenance of mechanical things but the time has come to maintain people. They are at their wits end and daily one comes across the abuse of the system by people who are suffering. There is near unanimity that the political system has let the people down; the poor and the infirm use rather strong words.
But we in the urban areas are blind to the requirements of the poor and the end result may be that the entire system explodes. Election year is otherwise tense. The dependence on degrees for eligibility puts strong faith on 14 years of education and graduation. That some may have the degree and yet not graduate in life. Some may be double graduate but may be an imbecile and some of them are in the highest office. The naivety of the political rigmarole is not known to many. When the late President Farooq Leghari moved to dismiss the government of Shaheed BB the major players were the feudal of Punjab. This was done very subtly.
The feudal' were rewarded by the Nawaz regime that had a very heavy mandate. Three nay four ministries were given to the person who carried the burden to the late President. To atone for the past intrigue the scion was sent to the current power structure and the plea taken was that the mind was developed. In fact the person(s) had created more problems for the system.
For during this time the political system did not realise that the intrigues were going on and that specific groupings had taken place. They have again showed loyalty to the source that they had intrigued against. One does not understand the compulsions of the group loyalties. Is it one of hail brother well met-you do me and I will try and do the same to you. But in all this the rhythm of the nation has been destroyed. In cricket if the bowler's rhythm is lost he will never be among the wickets. Similarly the rhythm of the nation is wrecked by these selfish persons and it can never do the work that it is supposed to do it. To go back to the natural environment may be the only way out. That means that one starts realising what the critical energies are and to substitute the local energies to the production system. The cost will be much less and the productivity will not lose out. This is easier said then done for the vultures that are in the system will eat the fair minded.
They have already done so and today's news is that natural gas is to be given to chemical fertilisers and the supporters of this move would have used the age old platitude that this is good for the farmers and food security would be enhanced. No amount of chemical fertiliser will do anything but create toxicity in the lands and if this was so red hot why did we not achieve food security. American agronomist Norman Borlaug and his team of resource use bullies created this at a time when they could do whatever in as blatant a manner that they could. Times have since changed. Their work was the work of technologists but passed off as science. There was and is no science. The "research stations" are meant to interfere in the normal functioning of the organisations and to increase their dependence on what can and will be passed on by these institutions.
One has to go in for natural principles of growth and not mechanical ones. Radical changes are required if growth is to be achieved. One aspect that has been shown by the planners and the finance ministers is that growth through easy options of urbanisation cannot take place. The natural resources are polluted and permanently damaged by the current situation in the country. Anyone who makes tall claims as to what he or their party has done must be talking through the hat. Radical changes in resource use have to be done. I had offered to the Punjab Government any services in relation to the polluted water that is thrown into the river Ravi via six polluted drainage channels but the bureaucracy was so regressive that nothing came out of it.
On the other had Sardar Asseff Ahmed Ali invited us to look into the Kasur leather tanning pollution? We were glad to help out. With increasing population the demand for more commodities won't go away. So what is the government to do about it? The last government had set-up a rhythm but that was destroyed and the new momentum will not come during the caretakers' time. The last government's most cued up individual was the President himself. He is not going to bell anything for sometime. By the time the new bureaucracy is organised and develops to take these matters in their own hands the horses would have bolted. The solution may well be to learn about natural systems productivity - to work with human nature instead of overriding it and driving ourselves like machines.
To meet future growth without burning out, we have to transform energy productivity. Human energy productivity is a new concept and has to be translated to meet the units of energy that a human spends and to see how that can be increased. Organic farming tells us how to do this. Why are we chasing chemical fertilisers when we have much cheaper options? Can any of us draw a parallel in one's life with one's work with nature to increase productivity?