I hate to tell you that I told you so but I told you so...

Just completed a routine go-through of http://www.swaminomics.org/. And guess what I found. An article about SEZs - available at http://www.swaminomics.org/articles/20071202.htm

The article says and I quote -

Policies for SEZs should be such that -

1. First, every SEZ promoter had to be an industrialist, not a builder, ensuring that this was an industrial project and not real estate in disguise.
2. Second, the promoter had to have an anchor project of his own in the SEZ. This ensured provision of high-class infrastructure, which a builder might neglect.
3. Third, the promoter had to buy land voluntarily from farmers and not expect state acquisition on his behalf. This avoided the heart-burning seen in Orissa and West Bengal.

And most importantly - "The Gulf of Kutch is the only coastal area in India with low rainfall. Farming is tough, so farmers are willing to sell their land"

I promise I wrote my article about Rajasthan before reading this. Wake up Rajasthan...

To read the "Rajasthan Article" - click here.

http://suvidblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/perfect-state-rajasthan.html

India's progress - A myth

A great article, given that it is posted on rediff it is quite unlike that website to post articles of such profoundity.

http://www.rediff.com/money/2007/dec/06utop.htm

Looks at all the negatives of the so-called demographic dividend. This article exposes the crisis we also call "demographic dividend". A few quotes from the article to elucidate the point -

Who will create the jobs to absorb the net increase of 71m young people of working age over the next five years? Most are poorly educated and only a fraction will find regular work. Who will feed them and supply them with water and fuel? India has 18 per cent of the world's population but only 4 per cent of its fresh water and just over 2 per cent of its land area. Many of the country's groundwater aquifers are already in critical condition. Available per capita water supply has declined since 1975 and water demand is set to exceed all usable sources of supply by 2050. The bulge of young people today, furthermore, will in time become a bulge of pensioners in a country where only 11 per cent of the working-age population have formal pension arrangements. India will thus face the same problems of ageing and high dependency ratios as Japan and Europe today, only on a larger scale.

India does not have much time to shape up....

The perfect state - Rajasthan...

Why is the going so slow on such a large number of infrastructure projects in the country. The much maligned babudom is a convenient scapegoat. It also deserves the title actually. But the issue is not as simple as that. A big issue in developing anything is availability of land.

India suffers from a variety of issues hampering land use for infrastructure growth - be it SEZ, airports, metros, power plants etc etc...I propose to list them out and elaborate on them in this blog.

1. India faces legacy issues. Its a country where development was preceeded by growth in people who are already living there and occupying the land. Any development therefore must be preceeded by a people relocation exercise. Further, states have poor or weak land records. This means that the tillers of the land have no legal right to the land and hence they are not entitled to any compensation for loss of their land. The result - Nandigram.
2. Available land in India is dual use. India pays the price for being a fertile land which is good for agriculture and necessary for urban centres at the same time.
3. India, to some extent and rightfully so, is paying the price for democracy. See China for a contrast.

A good corollary for all the three points is Dubai. India today can spend almost as much as Dubai can, but in Dubai, development is preceeding people. Dubai has negligible agriculture so the land can be fully committed to urban infrastructure. There are no legacy issues and no people to relocate. Finally, there is no democracy and so there are few conflicts of interest.

So what is the solution to all this. Most fortunately, there is a state in the country with huge land area unoccupied by people. It faces no legacy issues, no ownership rights transfers as its largely desert. The state is Rajasthan (and to some extent Gujarat). Imagine the scope for developing transport hubs, SEZs, power plants and other infrastructure in the heart of the desert linked by a express tube to Jaipur which in turn is linked to the Delhi airport. Its time to go for a desert safari.It can be done...

Delhi Airport - 2020

I have finally managed to crack it!! Given the plethora of coverage it was receiving, it had become simply impossible to determine the final picture on the status of the Delhi airport. But finally its all been checked.

Status 2008

Ok so here is the status - Mission 2008. New terminal 1 between current terminal 1A & 1B. This will cater to all domestic airlines. This is just an interim terminal. Also we will get a spruced up terminal 2 for international connections. Unfortunately not much else will change, other than one additional runway in Delhi.

Status 2010

Now here is the big one. A new terminal 3 (thats the video on the GMR website). This is an integrated terminal (both domestic & international) which will be linked by metro to CP (the dedicated connection on which work began recently). Further, the domestic interim terminal will be connected to the metro via the dwarka line which will be extended. The interim terminal will be converted to a low cost carrier terminal. Apparently the current terminal 2 will be razed to the ground (Yahoo!!!) for further expansion of the new Terminal 3.

Beyond 2020

Expanding the terminal 3 complex to form a huge U shaped complex. Looks really nice.

Other Projects

1. The CP-Badarpur metro line is facing unnecessary controversy. Rest of the work appears to be on track.
2. Bangalore and Hyderabad airports ready for launch by around March-2008 but are mired with connectivity problems between the new airports and the city.
3. Mumbai metro and airports facing land acquisition issues and on hold at the moment.

The only projects going great guns are in Delhi. And its hilarious to see that the one project which has led to all infrastructure projects in Delhi is facing trouble - The commonwealth games village is hopelessly behind schedule. I pray that the committee withdraws the games from Delhi just before 2010 so that we can finish all the other ones and ditch further embarassment during the games.

Shanghai - Public Transport

Came across a very interesting pic recently. It shows the length and breadth of the Shanghai metro network in 2020. Its one hell of a badass. The total length of the track is expected to be 960 Kms within the city. Compare (contrast) this with the length of the London tube at around 450 Kms today and the New York subway at around 400 Kms. Makes the Delhi system (expected to be around 350 Kms as per current plans) in 2020 look puny doesnt it. Given that both the cities have the same population today.....

India@Risk 2007

Came across a recent report online by the World Economic Forum which lists out some of the risks facing India as she tries to sustain a record breaking streak of 9% GDP growth year on year.

The risks listed out for the country (apart from the obvious one of infrastructure) are

• Economic Impact of demographics - Will we really be able to cash in on the so-called demographic dividend. This will require a huge investment into education (some articles envisage around 10%-12% of GDP). This invesment will have to be largely focused on primary education (say around 6% of GDP), followed by vocational education (say another 3% of GDP) and finally around higher education (Engg, Medicine, MBA, Other degrees - another 2%-3% of GDP). Unfortunately the current education minister is more interested in the least important of these three aspects of education. This also implies a quick change to India's current labour laws. India's antiquated labour laws, if re-written can even solve our terrorism issues and maoist worries (more on this in a related article).
• Loss of fresh water sources - I envisage this to be the single-largest issue in the coming 5-10 years. With global warming, the snow isnt falling in the high mountains. What makes it worse is that the available snow is melting faster too. With a population which continues to grow at 1.5% this remains an unaddressed issue.
• Economic crisis/Oil Price shocks - A perfect opportunity to quickly ramp up any investment in public transport infrastructure within urban agglomerations and roads infrastructure connecting the urban centres with the rural areas.
• The negative impacts of globalisation in the developed world - will protectionism be back? I dont think this is likely to impact India in the short-to-medium term. Protectionism will do more harm to the developed world than to India. Besides growing south-south trade should solve this issue to a large extent.
• Climate change - Huge impact, perhaps the single largest threat to India's potential. I dont see much possible here given the huge population pressure on the limited resources. I envisage huge strife here for the country.
• Infectious diseases - Fairly substantial risk from threats like AIDS given India's huge (700 million under 30 yrs) youth population. Again not sure what governance can do in this regard. There must be some awareness of the issue, but is it preventable? I feel, providing gainful employment to the youth, giving a meaning to their lives, is a possible solution of engaging with them in this as well.

All in all, a fairly credible list with 3 very key ones in it. Something I feel has been missed out in this list is the fact that the demographic dividend comes with a time limit. The 700 million strong under 30yrs population of India will be approaching 50 in 25 yrs time. What then? I also feel that the birth rates will decline dramatically as more and more of these youth commit themselves heavily into building something for themselves and getting ahead. No children will be a small price to pay for this achievement. The only caveat here is that this decline in birth rates is expected to be fairly uneven in India - likely to be higher in states with better performances on education and gender equality (read south) and insignificant in poor, male dominant, uneducated states (read north). This would lead to the northern states becoming India's own version of eastern Europe continuing to provide labour to the better developed south of the country.