Several notches down
Subjects like human development indices might not seem contentious, but lock up enough economists in a room to discuss them and you can be certain of mosh-pits and riots. Because there are a near inexhaustible number of alternatives to calculating a particular index. Pakistan’s slide from 129th last year on the HDI to 145th, or indeed, the absolute value of its index as well, cannot be looked at in absolute terms because it is not an apple-to-apple comparison. The methodology that went into calculating the indices that the HDR used has changed this year. Regardless of how one chooses to slice it, however, Pakistan’s position isn’t an enviable one.
Consider the gender inequality index. The GII is measured terms of three dimensions: reproductive health, empowerment and economic activity. Pakistan ranks a bleak 114th out of 146 countries in this regard despite, it should be mentioned, tweaking artificially one of these – empowerment – by arbitrarily fixing a number of reserved women legislators, a step that hasn’t proven to be of any good when it comes to gender issues.
Of course, Pakistan’s bleak circumstances can also be pinned on climate change. The devastating floods that have hit Pakistan two years in a row have upset the economic ecosystem of vast swathes of land in the country. This ranges from a destruction of crops (which leads to food insecurity) to the debilitation of infrastructure (which leads to, amongst other lifestyle downgrades, more food insecurity) to, as we are witnessing in Sindh at the stagnation of flood water (which leads to waterborne diseases and delayed infrastructure repairs.)
The need to have a bare basic agenda between all political parties to maintain public spending at a prescribed level in certain long-term yield areas is the only way to improve our lot. Spending on population control, for instance, won’t get a government any votes in the next elections but it would be the responsible thing to do. An affective all parties’ conference on issues like these would be more than welcome. Contaminated air and water, after all, will kill more of us than an attack by a foreign nation will.