Pro-Poor Budget

There is nothing more unequal than treating unequal people equally. Pro-poor budget have a clear bias towards the poor, in the sense that it work seeks to benefit the marginalized, rather than better-off sectors of the society. As such, there is often a commonly endorsed reference to pro-poor budgeting.

Raising pro-poor budget requires a strategy that is deliberately biased in favor of the poor so that the poor benefit proportionally more than the affluent.

Pro-poor budget wades into the needs of the poor. It looks for making a difference in the lives of the poor. It wedges in ex cathedra on the poor empowering them to have a hand in full tilt and to do them a wealth of good from the process of development. Pro-poor budget facilitates the poor to have enlarged opportunities for changing into healthy, educated, productive and shouldering responsibility. A pro-poor budget has a thought through partiality in favour of the poor so that he avails each to each more from government expenditure than the affluent.

The first and foremost move in getting through a pro-poor budget is the earmarking who the poor are. Understanding and measurement of poverty has evolved over time. It is now by and large recognized that poverty is not just a money related deprivation. It is an amalgamation of diverse losses of rights borrowing from the deficient welfare. Through thick and thin, budget must acknowledge to such structure of poverty. Through and through this exercise is indeed labyrinthine. That’s like pulling teeth. In crafting a pro-poor budget requires latest data about the degrees, magnitude and kinds of deprivations that make up poverty.

Owing to both practical and strategic reasons, it is important to establish a conceptual linkage between gender and poverty for promoting gender-sensitive budgets. It would be a mistake to simply equate the two categories. Gender imbalances and inequalities should run across every social, economic and political classification. The exclusion and deprivation experienced by the poor is not the same, and tends to be even more acute for women than for men. Gender allows us to stop envisioning the poor as a homogeneous category of people, whose needs can be addressed with the same recipe.

Pro-poor growth should direct resources disproportionately to the sectors in which the poor work (e.g. agriculture), areas in which they live (underdeveloped regions), factors of production which they posses (such as unskilled labor), outputs, which they consume (such as food), translated into strategy of pro-poor growth - employment generation combined with price stability of goods and services which are essential items. Policies need to be designed to reflect concerns of poverty.

In order to address poverty effectively the budget will need to have more direct rather than indirect means of taxation. This would help reduce prevailing high-income inequalities and help spread the benefits of economic growth.

Pro-poor budget means that the poor benefit disproportionately from economic growth. This is to say the proportional income growth (rate) of the poor must exceed the average income growth rate. The per-capita income growth rate of the poor must exceed growth rate.

This spurs three crystal clear policy messages. First, policies to promote growth should help the poor although they could do so more if they made growth pro-poor rather than neutral as it currently is. Second, reducing initial inequality, particularly asset inequality, should receive highest priority, due to its triple effect on poverty. Third, reducing gender inequality should equally be of highest concern to policy makers that want to achieve pro-poor growth.

It is clear that pro-poor growth that directly reduces poverty must be in sectors where the poor are and use the factors of production they possess. The vast majority of the poor is in rural areas, a majority depends directly or indirectly on agriculture for their livelihood, and the factor of production the poor possess and use most is labor, sometimes land, and even more rarely human capital. Thus pro-poor growth must be focused on rural areas, improve incomes and productivity in agriculture, and must make intensive use of labor. These things are nearly tautological, but often forgotten and are clearly not reflected in public policies or in the allocation of public funds by national governments or donors.

Heavy investment in the human capital of the poor will yield two benefits on poverty reduction. It will increase economic growth and it will make growth more pro-poor. The record of East Asia is a good illustration where high human capital accumulation promoted growth and poverty reduction.

Beyond a concern for increasing average incomes and reducing poverty, there is a greater appreciation for a need to enhance the security for the population if one is to ensure sustainable pro-poor growth. The security of the poor is threatened by physical threats. Thus, the poor are forced to avoid risks that may carry high rewards, can get trapped in cycles of poverty and insecurity, and are regularly pummeled by shocks that militate against sustainable reductions in poverty.

A pro-poor orientation to both the analytical framework and the policy-making processes desperately needs to put into practice. This entails significant governance innovations to guarantee, among others, peoples’ participation in the decision-making processes of the government, as a norm. The direct engagement between the citizens and the government through a process of engaged governance has the potential to achieve the objectives of good governance including bringing people to the government and government to the people.

The budget-makers need to remember that real enemy is poverty and deprivation, that their key weapon is their skill and professionalism and that their modus operandi is their humility. They are the custodians of a value system that defines the objective as demonstrating every single day that they are a caring democracy.

Attaining a pro-poor budget is a big challenge. It requires a bottom-up approach; that ensures that poverty eradication is a central issue and not a donor driven requirement. (www.asifjmir.com)

Nanotechnology: Preparing to live 100, 200 and even 300 years

Human aging is being controlled and researchers have proven that human cells can be created and in this century people will begin to live 100, 200 or even 300 years. Mice are already living 50% longer with the help of genetic inventions. Thanks to the human genome project, scientists are closer to identifying ways to decelerate human aging. Contrarily, with incompetent, insufficient, and laughable healthcare system in place, Pakistan seems to continue grappling with policy lapses. Due to factors related to high fertility rates, high illiteracy, high mortality, and above all uncreative methods of policy planning, Pakistan stands as a stranger to such a milieu. Its policymakers don’t even sense the world passing through a profound transformation. They lack their understanding for making decisions to understand forthcoming breakthroughs and strategically plan for new environs.

The rapid pace of technology and medicine are quickly posing the prospect of banishing aging and disease, and yes even most causes of death. Some of the most extreme but very possible aspects of technologies such as molecular manufacturing and nanomedicine promise continual cellular maintenance that will alleviate aging altogether and make it impossible for disease or toxins to injure one's body or take one's life. Present anti-aging treatments do not slow aging and do not extend life span more than quitting smoking, exercising, eating vegetables, or heeding ordinary medical advice does. While all over the world we have seen improvements in health and life spans, Pakistan has large gaps and much effort needs to be spent in narrowing that gap.

Although vainly wrestling with high female mortality at younger ages and during the reproductive years, Pakistan claims a life span of 65. This predominantly seems farce when almost one-half of women receive no antenatal care during their pregnancy and 72 percent receive no postnatal care at all.

The advancements in longevity can be generally attributed to improvements in sanitation, the discovery of antibiotics, and medical care. Despite tall claims, Pakistan’s record on these areas is hopeless. Now, as scientists make headway against chronic diseases like cancer and heart disease to extend anti-aging even further, such diseases in Pakistan are greater than ever and basic healthcare service is inaccessible to a vast majority.

There are theories on aging. The programmed theories hold that aging follows a biological timetable, perhaps a continuation of the one that regulates childhood growth and development. The damage or error theories emphasize environmental assaults to our systems that gradually cause things to go wrong.

Lengthening life expectancies in the industrialized nations are bringing about substantial changes including large increases in the number of elderly and in their proportion in the population. Such changes have occurred, for example, in the type of economic activity, housing, social services, and population make-up of the communities. With growth in the health care system and changes in the service mix provided, the elderly continue to consume more health care per capita and need different services.

Health care institutions, including hospitals, which are widely expected to experience increasing demand as the elderly population grows; organizations will provide home-based medical care and other types of assistance, allowing the individual to remain in their own residence; and a variety of assisted living facilities, ranging from adult day care to residential care to nursing homes.

Of greater concern, the already awful health care industry of Pakistan finds itself ill prepared to handle significant increases in the number of the very elderly. Today, there are almost 9.7 million senior citizens. When it has no policy in place for this population today, it has no concern for tomorrow. Neither public nor private sectors are equipped financially to deal with the problems caused by aging population. When a society starts aging, its economic vitality becomes inferior to that of young societies and sluggish economic growth reduces its opportunities to become well heeled. Thus, in Pakistan an aging population will become a heavy public burden, forcing its people to bring down the cost by establishing large institutions so that, by virtue of economies of scale, they could manage to provide the elderly with the most basic care and medical needs.

The health sector of Pakistan offers an inadequate remedy for the serious problems of an outdated and basically unsound system and hence needs an offensive. People must be offered a vision of a revitalized health care system that provides incentives for increased quality and technological innovation, while at the same time, reducing costs. Pakistanis need a system that gives them control over healthcare decisions, while encouraging them to set aside the resources they need to purchase this care.

The policy makers of Pakistan should keep themselves abreast of technological advances and management strategies by constantly scanning the literature and media, interviewing authorities, and drawing on other sources to identify emerging trends. These trends then need to be analyzed to select those that are most significant.

It needs to begin to prepare now for what will be a very different future. The key questions it needs to think about include: What is it that we should be asking? What is it that its policymakers need but do not get in their human development courses? People should be asking about connections -- connections between existing mindsets and human development. These connections simply are not made in most textbooks available for use in human development courses. In fact, effective change requires more than knowledge of human development. Effective change also requires the ability to devise strategies that take advantage of that knowledge … strategies for connecting research and practice. (www.asifjmir.com).

Poverty, Development and Democracy

In my last column I discussed about the anti-poor development in Pakistan. I have the reason to believe that my dissertation shall be falling short if I failed to explicate the parameters for pro-poor policy framework, hence this subject matter.

It is widely recognized that development is about much more than growth of GDP. Equally, everyone appreciates that democracy is more than simply a matter of universal suffrage and the holding of regular multiparty elections, essential though these are. So we need to understand exactly what is meant by development and democracy today, in the twenty-first century.

There is a need to recognize the links between democracy and good governance on the one hand, and poverty, development and conflict on the other.

A strong, effective, accountable state is the first pillar of democracy and development. International institutions alone cannot and should not take responsibility for eradicating poverty, authoritarianism and conflict. Pakistan’s government should take the initiative by ensuring that its own core institutions of democracy are fully accountable, and by adopting pro-poor development strategies and promoting democratic reforms and human rights at all levels.

The foundations of a democratic state are worth recalling: a freely and fairly elected parliament that is broadly representative of the people; an executive (government) that is answerable to parliament; an independent judiciary; a police force that responds to the law for its operations and the government for its administration; and armed forces that are answerable to government and parliament.

The financial affairs of any democratic government should be monitored by parliament through a public accounts committee, and by an auditor-general answerable to parliament.

Civil society is the third pillar of pro-poor development and democratization. Building the capacity of citizens’ organizations and a free and well-informed media are critical for promoting citizen participation, holding government to account and empowering poor communities. Poor people and poor communities, for example, are in the best position to understand and articulate their own needs, and their voices should be heard directly within government. But they are not and here political rights and opportunities can be bolstered through community action.

The media plays an important role both in giving voice to citizens and in holding government and the private sector to account on their behalf.

Where international economic organizations such as the IMF, the World Bank and the WTO set down conditionalities or constraints on policy, it must be in the pursuit of pro-poor development, and must work in ways that do not erode democratic institutions and human rights at the national and sub-national levels.

There is a need for responsibility, partnership and concrete actions – from the government, private sector, civil society and international community. Without responsibility on all these levels, development and democracy will remain rhetoric rather than become reality.

The principal aim of development no longer focuses on maximizing marketable production of goods. The emphasis now is on expanding opportunities and strengthening human capacities to lead long, healthy, creative and fulfilling lives. Development is about enabling people to have the ‘capabilities’ to do and be the things that they have reason to value. Poverty is the deprivation of basic capabilities and development as the process of ensuring that the most basic capabilities are achieved by all.

Basic capabilities include: being adequately nourished, avoiding preventable morbidity and premature mortality, being effectively sheltered, having a basic education, being able to ensure security of the person, having equitable access to justice, being able to appear in public without shame, being able to earn a livelihood and being able to take part in the life of a community.

Pakistan has a weak administrative capacity. Public officials are poorly trained or lack experience in public expenditure management. State institutions, such as ministries and judiciaries lack sufficient resources or are plagued by entrenched systems of corruption. Inadequate numbers of women at decision-making levels in the civil service and judiciary means that women’s interests are not represented in policy formulation and implementation.

Ill-health is also a cause of poverty. A single experience of sickness in a family can divert energy and resources, leaving the household in deep poverty. Diseases such as malaria, and tuberculosis are not only personal tragedies; a high prevalence of such diseases is associated with significant reductions in economic growth.

Many anti-poverty plans are no more than vaguely formulated strategies. Pakistan needs a genuine action plans - with explicit targets, adequate budgets and effective organizations. Pakistan does not have explicit poverty plans but incorporates poverty into national planning. And many of these then appear to forget the topic.

The government has difficulty in reporting how much funding goes to poverty reduction - unable to distinguish between activities that are related to poverty and those that are not. It confuses social spending with poverty-related spending. But much government spending could be considered pro-poor if it disproportionately benefits the poor. Under these conditions it is probably best to set up a special poverty reduction fund - to give a better financial accounting and to allow government departments and ministries to apply to the fund for financing for their poverty-focused programs.

The scope of development policy has become broader, making ‘pro-poor development’ a vital additional analytical category that orients attention towards those people most in need. Recognizing that ‘development’ is still used loosely in the policy world to refer to development strategies for Pakistan, rather than particularly for poor people, it is important to distinguish and promote ‘pro-poor development’. Development policies aimed at the general population may have a more limited positive impact on particularly disadvantaged groups. Pro-poor development concerns those policies that are specifically
designed to enhance the quality of the lives of the poor.

Pakistan must start out inventing pro-poor developmental policies. This can be a hat in the ring for Yousaf Raza Gillani government. Quite the other way, the climbing poverty will snuff out all his claims for transforming economy for emancipation of the poor lot. (www.asifjmir.com)

Poverty: Life near the Bone

Future trends show that the world poverty is decreasing and we are nearing the era when the poor of today will live the standard of the average rich of today. Contrary to this trend, in Pakistan poverty levels are going further up. Although many Pakistanis have greatly improved their standard of living since 1947, yet over 30 percent of them—around 50 million people—still live below the poverty line. The gap between the rich and poor has widened with some gaining financial comfort while others are finding it impossible to permanently escape from destitution.

Poverty is hunger. Poverty is lack of shelter. Poverty is being sick and not being able to see a doctor. Poverty is not being able to go to school and not knowing how to read. Poverty is fearing the future, living one day at a time. Poverty is losing a child to illness brought about by unclean water. Poverty is powerlessness, lack of representation, and freedom.

Poverty has many faces, changing from place to place and across time, and has been described in many ways. Most often, poverty is a situation people want to escape. So poverty is a call to action—for the poor and the wealthy alike—a call to change the world so that many more may have enough to eat, adequate shelter, access to education and health, protection from violence, and a voice in what happens in their lives.

For many, lack of access to income-generating activities, coupled with lack of basic services in education and health, is the determining factors behind acute poverty. In Pakistan, lack of access to credit, training in income-generating activities, basic social services, and infrastructure are critical factors behind the persistence of substantial poverty, especially in underserved rural and urban areas. Poverty levels also differ depending on where people live. The metropolitan poverty rate differs greatly between suburbs and the central city.

At the Millennium Summit in 2002, major development organizations looked at development goals, which had been agreed at international conferences and world summits during the 1990s, and distilled them into eight goals with eradication of extreme poverty and hunger at top. The Goals were formed in response to what was seen as uneven development progress, where globalization benefits millions, but poverty and suffering still exist.

This is scarcely surprising considering that those who live below the poverty line and that any supplementary income from working children becomes unavoidable for their families to make ends meet. We have to understand as why children go to work. If parents don't send their children to work I am sure factories will not be able to consume them. No mother likes her child to go for work. It is financial crisis, which forces. Our understanding should be little more practical as no parents want their children work at the age when children are to study and play.

The stress on a gradual approach towards eliminating child labor is the correct one. At the same time, poverty alleviation efforts must be stepped up, so that the loss of an earning member of the family is not felt, so actually and over an indefinite period of time.

Poverty is no longer just a matter of calories or of pricing a consumption bundle. It has to do with the poor defining and achieving their well being themselves and living a life in a participative society where the State is an enabling rather than a hindering institution. It is not that income or consumption level is unimportant. It remains at the core of any definition of poverty. But we must view it as an input as much as an outcome. It is an input which contributes towards well being. But just as important are public goods – health care, clean water, literacy, and healthy environment.

Pakistan's rural sector accounts for more than 70 percent of employment, and roughly two thirds of rural employment is in agriculture. Less than a third of rural households get loans, only 10 percent of which are from institutional sources. Pakistan's credit institutions are not helping the country accelerate agricultural growth and reduce poverty.
To improve performance in the rural economy and efficiency in financial institutions, rural credit markets must be liberalized.

Produce and price controls must be replaced by prudent regulation and supervision, combined with policies to stabilize the economy. Commercial banks must operate in a competitive environment. They must be allowed to set interest rates for rural lending that cover their transaction costs. Credit must be made available to support productivity growth for agricultural smallholders and small producers of the rural non farm sector, where Pakistan's growth potential lies. Credit must be made available to women and to the rural poor for consumption smoothing and for sustainable income generating activities.

Policy should be directed at developing a market based financial system for rural finance, but because of market failures to support disadvantaged groups, a special priority program may be needed to get credit to women, smallholders, and the rural non-farm sector.

Subsidizing interest rates is not the way to help marginal borrowers. Instead, they can be helped through fixed cost subsidies and self-selected targeting. NGOs should be encouraged to help, keeping in mind such success stories as the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh and Badan Kredit Kecaratan (BKK) in Indonesia.

Pakistan needs to make the policy choices to help it translate economic gains into real poverty alleviation for its citizens. It needs social protection, human development, and a well-coordinated rural strategy. Issues of governance are at the heart of many of the difficulties encountered in mitigating poverty and broadening access to social services for the poor. (www.asifjmir.com)

The need for Political Reengineering

Pakistan is a country that runs politics without politicians. And this has remained a major, if not the sole, obstacle against political stability in the country. The conviction of the people suffers from a serious scarcity of politicians with the capacity of perceiving, exploring and exploiting political-democratic opportunities for their necessitous citizens. This scarcity has left Pakistan with the option of practicing politics without politicians. And the result has remained the same: despair, pessimism, cynicism, and neglected pile of problems such as unemployment, poverty and a broken society.

Politics in Pakistan is a ghastly pursuit—what helps one group is thought inevitably to harm another; what benefits one must hurt the other. It is a politics of despondency. In the name of advancing the interests of one's own group, it rejects attempts to educate, pressure, or change the society as a whole, thus accepting the status quo and revealing its essentially conservative nature. It is a politics of defeat and demoralization, of pessimism and narcissism. By seizing as much as possible for one's self and group, it exposes its complete disregard for the whole from which it has separated—the rest of the society. It thus rejects the search for a just and comprehensive solution to social problems. It is fundamentally conservative, working against progressive change and supporting the status quo.

In politics of Pakistan the intent is acquisition of power, and a culture prevails where people as well as the nation have become insensitive to human values and feel no hesitation in trampling over the rights of others. The ambition for power has thus turned out to be the tumbling block for establishing peace, equality and a true sense of fellowship. Such exhortation to goodness and moral superiority will remain in a pious ideal if our political leadership failed to translate it in social and political policies.

As ill luck would have it, the name of the game in Pakistan has become winning the elections and not incessant development and prosperity for all. Consequentially, problems such as unemployment, inflation and rule of law are bumping up and no political entity in Pakistan seems concerned. The only implicit, overt and covert concern is for power.

The manifestos of all political parties are no more than points of etiquette. They lack the power to foster commitment, motivation and clarity of vision and purpose. They do not surround certain principles and processes, which are properly observed in their development and deployment. They fail to connote the manifesto of political parties forming the basis for strategic direction and daily action. They are not developed in ways that they become powerful tools. Our political parties do not adopt the new philosophy, institute leadership, and eliminate slogans and exhortations. They fall short of doing away with personal goals and putting everyone to work to accomplish transformation. This requires leadership and commitment to a common mission, which all political parties lack.

Perhaps Z. A. Bhutto was the first (and the last) to offer a program that ignited the spirits of people. Today’s political organizations, including the party he left behind, lack agenda, harmony with values, inspiration, motivation and the ability to capture the heart and soul of the people. Consequently, whatever deficient programs these parties offer are identical, monotonous and ambiguous. They only differ in phraseology and verbosity.

Manifestos of most major political organizations are substance deficient. Even during Feb 18 elections, I could not determine the main thrusts of political agendas of the contestant political groups (one candidate supported by a coalition of PPP, PML-N, while the other represented PML-Q). The entire campaign pivoted around attacks and counter-attacks. I could not even grasp the vision of PML-Q. Different leaders had different interpretations. Regrettably, no political party in Pakistan has a stated vision.

For all our political groups are without the vision people are locked in their past and present and incapable of imagining a future that will be better, they’ve lost hope. Politics has thus become mere “business,” horse-trading, squabbling about power with little sense of the ends to which power is the means. Gaining and holding on to power has become the purpose. For vision is what generates purpose for a society, without vision public life in Pakistan has become a battle of interests, unconstrained by a larger horizon of meaning. By and large, the losers are the powerless and the vulnerable—the luckless people.

By having a manifesto with people’s soul in it, a political party can have continuity. This is one of the major benefits of managing and leading by a manifesto developed by a participative process. It provides a long-term continuity and help leadership to maintain a long-term competitive advantage because it has direction and purpose. And when individual values are harmonized with those of the political enterprise, people work together for common purpose that is deeply felt. They contribute more as a team than individually. Thus the productivity not just gets better it gets dramatically excellent.

Today Pakistan is in dire need of people-service engineers, political-democratic entrepreneurs, and change agents who can dedicate their careers to the job of serving their people in solving their micro and macro-societal needs.

Pakistan needs those political leaders who can yield their personal interests to national interests and have the need of maintaining public accountability; who can keep the political machinery going for the future growth of their political career which is needed by the society; and who can discern that the military is right there seeking and watching out to grab power and impose dictatorship.

The new challenge lays ahead—the challenge to enable society to operate in dynamic balance with the threatening external environment. The nation yearns for leadership capable of providing direction and inspiration needed to survive and prosper into the 21st century. Pakistan desperately needs political re-engineering for driving the nation toward survival and prosperous future. (www.asifjmir.com)

Nanotechnology: The Thrilling Breakthrough of 21st Century

Nanotechnology is all about examining the world at a millionth of meter and utilizing the ability to manipulate universe at a molecular perspective. The projected uses of nanotechnology are exciting and potentially life altering. All scientific disciplines are now meeting at a common level, the nanoscale, and their discoveries will more than likely change our world in a profound way.

The idea of nanotechnology begins with the idea of a molecular assembler, a device resembling an industrial robot arm but built on a microscopic scale. A general-purpose molecular assembler will be a jointed mechanism built from rigid molecular parts, driven by motors, controlled by computers, and able to grasp and apply molecular-scale tools. Molecular assemblers can be used to build other molecular machines–they can even build more molecular assemblers. Assemblers and other machines in molecular manufacturing systems will be able to make almost anything. In effect, molecular assemblers will provide the microscopic hands. To bridge all scales from atoms to material properties, mathematics is the language and the tool to orchestrate the principles of physics and chemistry.

Humanity will be faced with a powerful, accelerated social revolution as a result of nanotechnology. Within a few short years, and five billion trillion nano-robots later, virtually all present industrial processes will be obsolete as well as our contemporary concept of labor. Consumer goods will become plentiful, inexpensive, smart, and durable. Medicine will take a quantum leap forward. Space travel and colonization will become safe and affordable. For these and other reasons, global life styles will change radically and human behavior drastically impacted. What the computer revolution did for manipulating data, the nanotechnology revolution will do for manipulating matter, juggling atoms like bits.

Given the scope of the enterprise, it is not surprising that estimates of its eventual financial impact are large. Starting soon molecular engineering will emerge as a multi-trillion dollar industry that will dominate the economic and ecological fabric of our lives. Scientists agree that nanotechnology is likely to dominate 21st century.

At least 30 countries have initiated national activities in this field. The worldwide annual industrial production in the nanotech sectors is estimated to exceed $1 trillion in 10 to 15 years from now. America is leading the field. The total world research effort can be imagined as split in roughly equal parts between US, Japan, and Europe. They are investing billions of dollars in nanotechnology research, examining how and where nano-scale science can improve defense capabilities.

The military aspects of nanotechnology have gotten more attention: In a recent speech President Bush emphasized the role of technology in American military success, and noted that the USA was seeing weapons that are simultaneously more effective and less lethal. Some people wondered if this was entirely a good thing: weapons that are enormously powerful, but nonlethal, might tend to be used a lot. There seems to be a lot of military interest in nanotechnology, and for obvious reasons: mastery of nanotechnology could lead to the kind of military supremacy that mastery of steam power and repeating firearms gave the West in the 19th Century. On a sunny day, an area just a few paces on a side would generate a kilowatt of electrical power. With good batteries (and enough repaved roads and solar-cell roofing), present demands for electrical power could be met with no coal burning, no oil imports, no nuclear power, no hydroelectric dams, and no land taken over for solar power generation plants.

The story of nanotechnology in medicine will be the story of extending surgical control to the molecular level. The easiest applications will be aids to the immune system, which selectively attack invaders outside tissues. Immune machines will have no difficulty identifying cancer cells, and ultimately be able to track them down and destroy them wherever they may be growing. Destroying every cancer cell will cure the cancer.

Devices working in the bloodstream could nibble away at atherosclerotic deposits, widening the affected blood vessels. Cell herding devices could restore artery walls and artery linings to health, by ensuring that the right cells and supporting structures are in the right places. This would prevent most heart attacks.

Cell-herding capabilities should also be able to deal with the various forms of arthritis. Where this is due to attacks from the body's own immune system, the cells producing the damaging antibodies can be identified and eliminated. Then a cell-herding system would work inside the joint where it would remove diseased tissues, calcified spurs, and so forth, then rework patterns of cells and intercellular material to form a healthy, smoothly working, and pain-free joint. A similar process—but again, specially adapted to the circumstances at hand—could be used to strengthen and reshape bone, correcting osteoporosis.

When nanotechnology emerges from the world of ideas to the world of physical reality, we will need to be prepared. For now, drafting of new regulations seems premature. The government departments in medicine, economy, environment, and other issues of public policy to put nanotechnology on their agendas, join in debating and ultimately implementing sensible development policies.

Pakistan already has suffered for responding late to the Information Technology and consequently lost to India. The development of nanotechnology will seriously challenge the ability of our preparedness to respond quickly and to maintain the critical balance between dangers and benefits.

In the 1960s, the New Math that was introduced into American grade schools and junior high schools included extensive study of arithmetic using numbers written in something other than the familiar base 10. This was to prepare the Adults of Tomorrow for The Computer Age. Can Pakistan induct nanotechnology at campuses to prepare the Adults of tomorrow for nano-age? Or else, very soon Pakistan’s industry is going to find itself in a squeeze for nano know-how. (www.asifjmir.com)

Lahore: A Frustrating Relic

Pakistan has already entered into the 21st century with the nefarious bag and baggage containing nauseating political environment and the stomach-churning poverty. While we read about great strides the Asian Tigers are making in economic development and prosperity, Pakistan continues to lurch around with moral degeneration and lust for guzzling the vitals of nationhood. As we hear that China and India are going to emerge as economic giants in this century, the up-and-coming trends illustrate the murky future of Pakistan.

Having toured more than forty countries, I can rightfully claim to be a globe trotter. And I have traveled to China so repeatedly that I should be eligible to call it my second home. In one of the trips with wife, an incident made me embarrassed quite a bit. The story runs thus: While in Shanghai, before having a nap my wife cursorily glanced a tourism magazine provided by the hotel where we were staying. A story attracted her attention, which was about Lahore that happened to be our birthplace and the heart of Pakistan. Although it did not fall short of truth in any way, reading in a foreign magazine about our eroding national character really saddened us. Indeed it was morally wrong my wife ripped off the article penned by Josephine Bow that unfortunately reflected the dominating way of life in Pakistan. I am sharing some of its excerpts as follows:

“ . . . . Languishing on the sidelines instead of jostling in the mainstream, Lahore is a gracious but frustrating relic of an era long gone. The economic boom and accompanying quickening of pace that has swept over Asia—from Delhi to Seoul—like a giant tidal wave during the past two decades seems to have stopped short at the gates of Pakistan.

Beset by corrupt politicians and businessmen—often one and the same—government policies seesaw wildly depending upon which interest group squawks the loudest. Recent years have seen revolving door of governments, resulting in a sense of helplessness and inertia at the individual level. The oft-heard lament is what can one man do against the system?

Lahore looks as if it’s becoming a sleepy town. Don’t expect to get anything done in a hurry. For one thing, nobody of responsibility gets to their offices before 11 AM and secretaries never know where their bosses are. Punctuality is not a widespread practice—arriving within an hour either side of the appointed time seems to be considered acceptable.

For local businessmen, the inability of government to formulate stable policies has generated an ‘every man for himself and the rest be damned’ attitude. Young professionals educated abroad despair that their hard-earned degrees and legitimate career choices are looked upon with disdain. Instead it’s those who can make money in the quickest and often most illegal manner who are admired.

What is probably more difficult to adjust is the lack of a developed work ethic or observance of basic business practices. Here everyone’s a director or manager giving orders, but there’s little follow-up. Be prepared to insist if you want to get anything done.

In the sluggishness to embrace the global economy, ironically even the country’s strengths can become weaknesses. Take, for example, the fact that Pakistan is self-sufficient in cotton. Lahore, in the heart of the rich Punjab cotton-growing region, is considered by many to be the country’s future textile capital. Yet despite occasional pockets of progress, overall export growth in value-added items has been disappointing.

Bangladesh, on the other hand, registered tremendous growth in garment exports. The analysis is that, with its weak local raw-materials base, manufacturers were exposed early to overseas business practices as they learned to deal with fabric suppliers in Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Rich from the earnings and experience amassed over the past 15 years, large Bangladeshi garment groups are now opening carefully thought-out textile units.

As Pakistan enters yet another period of political uncertainty, it’s difficult to say whether conditions will improve in the near future.

Lahoreans are considered to be great talkers. Indeed residents of nearby Sialkot, the world’s manufacturing capital for soccer balls and martial-arts uniforms, explain their city became globally competitive because it hosts no other extracurricular activities—not the case with Lahore, which boasts theatre, art galleries and other cultural pastimes.

Horse drawn carts, motorcycles, trucks and every other imaginable form of vehicular transport make their way in a confused shambles on often unpaved and potholed roads—a nightmare during the rainy season.

Driving is very much local style and no one respects lanes or direction, for that matter. Watch out for three-wheel scooters crossing lane dividers and careening wildly in the wrong direction. . . . . ”

Baba Bulleh Shah has truthfully said: truth inflames. Initially the critique about our national attitude caused us noticeable irritation. Just the same, when we recuperated rationalism we recognized that the writer put across the harsh facts quite rightly.

Past civilizations, nations and peoples perished due to lack of purpose, nationhood and when self-centered attitude dominated the national purpose. Today Pakistan also stands face-to-face with such erosion. The value system is under serious attack—not by someone from outside, but internally at individual level. This is simply contrary to norms of freedom.

Pakistan must learn from past and future. It must change its ways to shun disaster. It must recreate itself. The confronting challenge calls for a leadership capable of eliciting the best out of the people. Traditional top down notions of leadership are giving way to concepts of attitudinal reforms, social transformation, and collective restructuring. Pakistani society desperately needs to look into the future and see the nation not as it is … but as it can become. A choice nevertheless lies ahead: either to change or become a French song once sung by swan. (www.asifjmir.com)