KARACHI: I am an ardent supporter of social equality and consensus management on a global scale. However, after reading a recent research article, my belief in this concept was shaken. I write this article with scepticism, but also with a strong desire to bring to the forefront the arguments put forth by Robert D Kaplan in his piece titled “Anarchy and Hegemony”.

The breakthrough insight is that stability is not the normal order of things in the geopolitical arena; in fact, history has shown that periods of relative peace and stability usually existed as a function of imperial rule.  It is interesting to note that during the reign of hegemonic and imperial powers, such as the Austrian Hapsburgs (1278 – 1918) in Central and Eastern Europe, or the Ottoman Empire (1299 – 1923) in the Balkans and the Middle East, rights of minorities were protected and ethnic wars were prevented. These periods were known for their relative peace that they brought to their regions.

Generally ‘equality’ is accepted as a concept that reflects fairness in society and hence is preferred by everyone. Equality at a geopolitical level, however, gets complicated and usually does not work very well.  Centuries of data has shown that when major states in Europe had rough equality amongst them, it led to frequent wars; including the infamous 100 year war between England and France in the 14th century. Even in Asia, between the 14th and early 19th centuries, there were generally placid relationships between states when China was the dominant power in the region.

According to the author, the reason for such peace is that domination of one sort or another has a better chance at preventing outbreak of war than a system in which no one is in charge or overly powerful. That is why Columbia University’s Kenneth Waltz, arguably America’s preeminent realist, says that the opposite of anarchy is not stability, but hierarchy.

Hierarchy is defined as a system in which only certain people have authority and where there is a lack of balance of power; ie, some are more equal than others. The inherent inequality built into hierarchy, which connotes authority and power over others, is what prevents chaos. Hence presence of inequality creates conditions where peace reigns. To quote Thomas Hobbes, the 17th century English philosopher, right and wrong have practical meaning only when it is possible to punish the wicked, and that requires a certain degree of coercive power. The presence of equality only causes chaos, which can be seen in countries facing the Arab Spring.

When I look at Pakistan and apply the same principles, I see that whenever we had a military government or single-party majority government like in the early 70s, we had relative peace in the country. The heightening law and order situation in the last five years, when government was a coalition of parties with no overall authority, has made some of us question whether one of the consequences of alliances is worsening law and order, lack of criminal prosecution linked with political party affiliation, rampant spread of weapons and so on. I am not sure if many of you are aware, but during General Ayub Khan’s era in the 50s and the 60s, Pakistan was known globally as the first Asian Tiger. Similarly, during Musharaf‘s first three years, when power resided in a small group of people, we faired far better in economic growth, anti-terrorism policy and other related social issues than during his last five years, when the coalition government, alliances and partnerships with various parties were the rule of the day.

Hegemony or one-party domination unfortunately has a bad reputation in the media and public, despite the fact that in human history, periods of relative peace have been the product of hegemony of one sort or another. The point to ponder is that if we need one dominant party in power in this election, or life will continue with compromises, concessions and give and takes. This will result in the lack of ability in pushing a solid economic agenda and social development of the country. No one can make everyone happy, but someone with a strong mandate and authority can make the majority happy.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, May 13^th, 2013.

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KARACHI: Karachi is under siege. Every day one hears of someone close to them being robbed, being coerced, being kidnapped or being shot and killed. People who lived in Karachi in the 70s and 80s, but left to live abroad or in another city, would not recognise Karachi if they were to visit it today.

I remember that we had never heard of no-go areas till two decades ago. We were never afraid of going out of our homes in the dark, never worried of walking in the park or visiting restaurants. Cold drink shops and paan stalls would be open, doing robust business late into the night.

Today, our beloved city is captive of a terror campaign: people are afraid to leave their homes at night, teenagers are told not to stay out after dark and the lives of its citizens is filled with constant panic and fear.

The reality on the ground is getting scarier and more out of control by the day. The worst and most worrying statistic concerns citizens being killed in Karachi. From a low of 88 reported killings per year on average between 1999 and 2003, the number of homicides has mushroomed and continues to grow at an uncontrollable rate. Some of our most loved and respected citizens have been killed in the last few years. Using 2005 as the base year, killing by gunshot has increased at a rate of +50% per year over the last seven years; 2012 alone saw 2,172 total reported killings, which comes to one person being killed every four hours that year!

Looking at other crimes, like car and motorbike theft or cell phone snatching, data is just as shocking: in 2012, a car and motorbike was stolen or snatched every 23 and 12 minutes respectively. Kidnapping for ransom, one of the most despicable crimes, has also increased over the last few years. For the first time in our history, kidnapping incidents reporting to the Citizens Police Liaison Committee (CPLC) in Karachi passed the 100 per year mark in 2010, and have remained above 100 since then.

Total incidents of kidnapping in the last six years have increased by a whopping 140% versus the total incidents of kidnapping in the previous 17 years. To be fair, the CPLC has an amazing 98.3% success rate in solving kidnapping cases, with over 248 gangs busted in the last 23 years. On 4-wheel automobile thefts, they have a success rate of 45% on recovery, while that drops to 11% for motorbike thefts.

There is one thing that is common in every crime that takes place in Karachi. All criminals have access to a weapon. If guns were not in the possession of the criminals, they would not be able to carry out their crimes. No one would hand over their car or mobile phone to a person who simply walked up to them and demanded it without brandishing a gun? They would only tell the person to get lost.

It is the gun which the robber taps on our window that does the damage: it scares us, and we end up handing over our cars and other valuables. Similarly, no kidnapping or mugging incident can ever be successful if criminals do not have access to guns and armaments.

As citizens and businesspersons based out of Karachi, we need to ask how long this can go on for. How long should the residents of Karachi allow this to continue? Despite continuous assurances from our government officials and security agencies, nothing concrete has ever happened. The time has come when civil society must say that enough is enough and take action.

The single most potent strategy to fight the war against crime is to de-weaponise Karachi. Every Tom, Dick and Harry should not be allowed to carry a gun. Even licenced weapons must not include automatic and sophisticated weapons. Strong systems of controlling and checking the proliferation of weapons, as well as strict punishments for breaking the law should be imposed. We need to have an ongoing programme for people who wish to surrender weapons and sell them back at market prices. We need to create weapon-free areas, especially in schools, colleges and hospitals. We need to push our judiciary, police and the intelligence agencies to own this agenda and keep on pushing until we get them to take action. Only then will we see some kind of normalcy return back into the lives of Karachi’s residents.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, April 15^th, 2013.

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KARACHI: We have an amazing planet, the only one in the universe with a perfect ecosystem. It has enough food and water, amazing species and a nature which has created the perfect balance for long-term sustenance. Human intervention and abuse is unfortunately destroying this fine balance and if we do not take corrective action soon, we may not leave an inhabitable planet for future generations.

Why is Earth hurting? The reason has nothing to do with the fact that humans have passed the 7 billion mark and another 2 billion will be added by 2050; God’s grand design can sustain human population far beyond this number.  The reason has more to do with how we treat Earth, how callous we are when it comes to controlling pollution, deforestation and ozone depletion.

Global warming is playing havoc with our planet. Over the last century, average temperatures have increased 1.8o F and ocean levels have risen four to eight inches. All this is the result of the greenhouse effect caused by burning fossil fuels, which releases heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere. Keeping “The Kyoto Protocol” in limbo for 15 years, which tries to legally bind emissions of greenhouse gases, is a blatant and callous attitude towards Earth ‘s sustainability.

Today, we are seeing its devastating impact in larger-than-life floods, massive hurricanes, widespread droughts and freak weather changes.

Human losses due to pollution cause some 100 million deaths every year. We dump 6 billion kilogrammes of garbage, mostly plastic, into our oceans every day. All of this causes diseases and other ailments with devastating impacts. It is estimated that nearly 7.6 million children in developing and poor countries die before the age of five; one child dies every two seconds. Diarrhea alone kills 1.8 million children every year.

One major reason behind these alarming numbers is increasing poverty, which is augmented by the presence of illiteracy, lack of sanitation, poor healthcare and no financial support.

The richest citizens of the world earn in three days what the poorest earns in a whole year. According to a Human Development study, the richest 20% own 86% of global GDP, while the poorest 20% a mere 1% of global GDP. Unfairness is written all over it.

Remember poverty and illiteracy drive behaviours such as extremism, intolerance and radicalism. The developed and affluent nations have a strong responsibility towards Earth and its sustainability. We cannot just live for today and forget what happens to our future generations. If we are to make Earth a habitable planet, we not only need to address the physical damage we are doing, but also address the wealth and income disparity conundrum.

My humble submission is that while the developing countries like Pakistan, India, Nigeria, Brazil, etc try to get their economies under control, people educated and poverty reduced, the developed nations take responsibility for saving this Earth as well as human lives. We have immense wealth in some nations and barely any in others. Fixing pollution and global warming is not rocket science, it just needs an honest and sincere effort. We have solutions for providing clean water to the entire population and eradicating major diseases. We have enough wealth piled up in a few nations to address issues related to sanitation, healthcare and education.

The key is to feel responsible for our mother Earth and our fellow human beings and help drive sustainability within our own circle of influence.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, April 1^st, 2013.

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KARACHI: Last month, a top-rated European business school gifted the efforts of 400 of its International MBA (IMBA) students to Pakistan. These students worked 24 hours a day for five days on the ‘LettuceBee Kids’ project, an Islamabad-based social enterprise aiming to provide a self-sufficient mechanism of survival to street children. Students brainstormed ideas on its sustainability, solving operational challenges and finding a multitude of creative ways to raising much-needed funds.

The opportunity was provided by the IE Business School in Madrid, Spain. This amazing programme exposed and challenged their entire IMBA class (which was made-up of students from 75 nationalities) to projects from developing and poverty-stricken countries. It raised much-needed awareness among its elite student body about poverty and its associated challenges.

The module is named “Change in Action” (CIA), and forms a core part of their IMBA program focussed on tackling global problems. The module was launched in 2008, and their class has worked on many poverty projects, most recently from South America (Columbia and Guatemala). I was able to convince the professors to work on a rehabilitation project for street children in Islamabad.

The real challenge for the faculty was to take a group of 400 top-notch students from around the world, who have no clue about Pakistan’s demographics and cultural idiosyncrasies, and bring them up to speed in just five days to make them able to come up with feasible and workable solutions to our problems. To guide them, Professor Todd Lombardo introduced the students to the concept of ‘design thinking’ to help structure the five days. Design thinking is a methodology that imbues the full spectrum of innovation activities with a human-centred design philosophy.  The students had to go through six specific stages to recommend a viable solution: namely. understand, observe, synthesise, ideate, prototype and test.

LettuceBee Kids Founder and Director Sarah Adeel and I spent an inordinate amount of time answering questions, helping the students visualise Pakistan’s dynamics, and in synthesising and testing various hypotheses.

On the last two days, all 50 groups presented their insights and solutions, and we walked away with some invaluable, distinct and creative solutions which will not only help LettuceBee Kids meet its challenges, but many of these ideas will also help other social sector organisations move towards financial and operational sustainability.

I would strongly urge other elite institutions around the world to expose their students to the grave reality of poverty, which can be resolved only if we all work together. Issues such as global greed, lack of value-based business models, shocking income disparities between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’, as well as global polices of advanced nations towards poor nations needs to be revamped, or else issues such as radicalism, terrorism and extremism will continue to plague us all.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, March 25^th, 2013.

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Economic growth has to come from the grassroots level as large local business houses and multinationals, put together, will not be able to provide enough employment or generate enough quantum of revenues to help put the country back on track.

Recently my brother started a small business under the name of “Big Thick Burgers” with a mission to make the best ‘home-made’ charcoal grilled burgers in town. I spend an inordinate amount of time advising him and his team on how to make the new start-up successful and sustainable. Much of this advice can be reapplied by other start-ups to increase their chances of success, such as:

Business insights

Find a unique niche: As a start-up business never try to do everything. Firstly you cannot afford it and secondly your organisational capacity will not be able to handle it. Concentrate on a fairly narrow market offering where only you have an innovation. Stick to what you can do best and make sure you differentiate your product offering from others to stand out.

Have a clear vision: Always start with the end in mind, don’t plan to grow incrementally. Although you are small but think big, only then you will ever achieve greatness. Set milestones to achieve your vision as that will allow you to track your progress and intervene when needed.

Corporate reputation is the key: Future success of your business will depend on your reputation, quality and service provided. Always remember the age-old adage “First impression is the last impression” and from day-one strive for quality and excellence in whatever you do. You will not get a second chance with a customer who walks away unsatisfied.

Business owner’s role

Passion & competence: Pursue a business for which you have true passion and in-depth knowledge. Don’t pick an idea that someone else has been successful with, unless you have some unique insights. Many fail as they copy paste ideas. Your passion and competence will help you overcome hurdles, break down barriers and survive through tough times.

Role model appropriate behaviours: Employees will look up to you for setting the example. They will emulate you and if you display a culture of honesty, trust and hard work that is what you will get in return.

Be open to criticism: Always listen to your customers. Admit your mistakes. Encourage your employees to talk honestly even if it proves you wrong. Be brave and be a good listener.

Work smart not hard: As an entrepreneur you have limited resources, use them smartly. Plan everything in detail and live the famous adage “90% preparation and 10% implementation”.

Culture needed for success

Drive fairness: To achieve sustainable success, be fair in all your dealings. Create a strong value-driven culture. All decisions and policies should be fair and transparent. Treat your employees fairly (even if the market practice is unfair) and set transparent policies for performance and promotion. Everyone must display honesty, competence and ownership behaviour. Such culture at start-up will be a force multiplier driving cost lower, improving focus and delivering better results.

Bring to life a set of values: No words, no actions and no management assurances will have as much of an impact on business success as a simple set of values ingrained into the company’s culture.

Be flexible: Business environment is dynamic and competition can change the paradigm very fast. You will need to be flexible with your plans and strategy.

Don’t be discouraged by failures: Despite failures, believe in your idea and continue on. Your people can feel your passion and they must never see you waver. Failure is a part of life, learn from it but never make the same mistake twice.

Your success is a function of your competence, your belief, your passion and the novel new idea that you plan to pursue. Never compromise on executional excellence and in having right people, systems and processes in place and tested before start-up.

To get economy on track and to help new business owners, the government must create an environment where innovation is protected, security provided for personal assets and intellectual property and regulatory institutions help business owners, else our economy will remain in dire straits.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, January 14^th, 2013.

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KARACHI: Some negative character traits of human beings – such as greed, hatred, and envy – impact our society and entail certain serious consequences such as crime, war and poverty. Based on a study completed in 2006, the richest 2% individuals in the world own more than half of the global household wealth. The report further elaborates that the richest 10% of adults hold 85% of the world’s total wealth. In contrast, the bottom half of the adult population owns barely 1% of the global wealth.

Clearly, such disparity is unfair and can be blamed for incidences of extreme poverty. Excessive wealth accumulation amongst a few people is a result of a flaw in the system, whereby a few intelligent and powerful persons get away with exploiting the entire system.

Why is it so?

According to the capitalist ethos, greater intelligence deserves greater monetary rewards. Does this signal that intelligent people work harder and hence deserve higher compensation? The answer is, no.

The truth is that the poor work much harder and longer to earn their minimum wage. The jobs that the poor do are equally important for the sustainability of any society, if compared to the jobs that the rich undertake. The disparity in earnings arises because the power to make wage decisions lies in the hands of the intelligent. It is no surprise then that the rich and influential mercilessly exploit the system for their personal gains and use their power to accumulate even more power and more wealth. The graph clearly shows this glaring disparity: 90% of global wealth lies in North America, Europe and the rich Asia Pacific nations (Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, etc).

This disparity is even more evident if we consider the salaries drawn by the highest paid executives. For example, the Apple CEO’s total package in 2011 was worth $378 million, which was 11,100 times higher than the pay of an average worker in the US. This essentially means that he earns every 47 minutes what a worker earns in an entire year. This disparity is ludicrous and points to the blatant abuse of the economic system. There is no way that the value added to product by a company’s CEO can justify such lavish pay scales.

Where do we go wrong?

In a majority of countries, democracy is seen as a cure to greed and envy, mainly due its objective of creating conditions that allow individuals to achieve happiness and prosperity through the freedom of choice. The system is expected to create laws that discourage the excessive accumulation of wealth. However, democracy can be hijacked if the freedoms of choice are not properly defined and protected. Democratic regimes, run supposedly by the citizenry, can turn into authoritarian regimes under the guise of democracy if too much power gets concentrated in a few hands.

How do we fix it?

The root cure is to have society focus more on fairness rather than freedom alone. This change in paradigm will results in better democratic rules, better life for citizens and a more fair society. We all need to create a culture that favours fairness in our circles of influence, be it in businesses, family or the political process. The impact of doing so will be huge, long term and sustainable. It will result in better sharing of resources, fairer compensation for labour and also result in an improved standard of living for the working masses. Over time, with continued focus, we will see the huge gap between the ‘have’ and ‘have nots’ shrink.

This problem cannot be solved by waiting for governments to take the lead. Rather, it should be driven by personal initiative at the grassroots level.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, December 31^st, 2012.           

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To me, traditionally economic growth is a function of four factors, namely population growth, capital accumulation, productivity and knowledge and its application.

There are two forces that are playing a key role in defining the knowledge economy, namely the intense need of knowledge in enhancing economic activities and the increasing globalisation of economic affairs. The intense need of knowledge is driven by the combined forces of information technology revolution and the increased pace of technological change. Globalisation, on the other hand, is driven by national and international deregulation and assisted by IT-related communication revolution.

But it it is not just education, it is also about systems, processes, regulations, discipline, trade, innovation, information technology, etc.

The million-dollar question is how to take full advantage of this latest revolution. Although Pakistan lost out in the earlier two, that is the agricultural and the industrial revolution – today we have one of the lowest yields and an industry which is resilient but neither competitive nor has global reach.

To evaluate a country’s status in this new knowledge economy, the World Bank has created a tool that it calls Knowledge Assessment Methodology (KAM) from which a Knowledge Economic Index (KEI) is created.

Per capita income of countries is directly proportional (correlation factor of 0.87), in fact exponentially proportional to KEI, ie higher the KEI, higher is the per capita income of that country and vice versa. Highest KEI is of Denmark at 9.58 on a scale of 1 to 10, and the lowest KEI is of Myanmar at 0.96 at rank 145. Pakistan is ranked 117th with a KEI score of 2.45, with India at 110th position and KEI of 3.06 and Bangladesh at 137th place and has KEI of 1.49.

The World Bank in its research to rank and quantify a knowledge economy has identified four pillars, namely economic and institutional regime, education and skills, information and communication infrastructure, and innovation systems.

The first pillar reflects the quality and independence of a country’s economic and regulatory environment. How strong are its institutions such as SECP, FBR, Competition Commission, Intellectual Property Organisation and State Bank? How well the government creates a level playing field for local and international corporations and entrepreneurs?

Second pillar is all about education and skill building. This is a key latent strength of our country being the 7th largest in the world in terms of population but education remains a promise unkept to millions of illiterates.

The third pillar is the strongest of all four pillars and is rated significantly higher than both India and Bangladesh. This aptly highlights the strength of our ICT sector and institutions on which we must build and positively impact our knowledge economy.

The final and fourth pillar is all about having an eco-system for driving innovation which includes having presence of high-tech firms, research institutes, universities, think tanks and other private and public organisations to tap into the growing global knowledge. A recent initiative, of which I am a founding member, Pakistan Innovation Foundation, is a step in this direction.

How do we now harness and use new and existing knowledge to improve productivity in our four key sectors, ie agriculture, industry, services and overall welfare. I would propose the following actions by knowledge economy pillars, namely:

Economic and institutional regime

Further strengthen government institutions, hire quality people with competitive salary and benefits, enhance tax-to-GDP ratio to 15 by 2015, lower sales tax to 10% and rationalise tariff, open trade barriers, improve logistics, improve rule of law, and eliminae of nepotism and preferential treatment.

Education and skills

Triple the percentage of GDP spending on education, open 25 additional technical and engineering institutes in next five years, encourage public and private partnerships, sign partnership with successful nations, make primary education mandatory until class five.

Information and communication infrastructure

Open new research facilities in public and private sectors, create an eco-system for innovators and entrepreneurs, encourage technology transfer and partnership, incentivise graduate and doctorate programmes, enhance scholarship programmes.

Innovation systems

Create indigenous computer manufacturing facilities, incentivise creation of patents and trademarks, strong incentives to drive high-tech innovation and remove regulatory and tariff hurdles in ICT.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, December 17^th, 2012.

KARACHI: There is no dispute today that Pakistan needs a disproportional focus on developing its social sector. Unfortunately very little support is being provided by the government for miscellaneous reasons. As a consequence, conscientious members of our civil society feel the urge to step in and help make a difference.  Individuals who take the initiative to address, fund and fix a social problem are known either as ‘philanthropists’ or ‘social entrepreneurs’.

Philanthropists versus social entrepreneurs 

Both of these individuals are focused on bringing a social impact, but with a key fundamental difference.  Philanthropists have an innate passion to help using their personal wealth and funds. They help the poor and needy by donating to NGO’s and foundations, but they personally do not get involved in its operation.

On the other hand, a social entrepreneur finds innovative solutions to pressing social problems. He or she invests their time and money in an opportunity that has a measurable social and environmental impact. But more importantly, within the design of such an activity is built-in a financial return – a business idea with social benefits.

Philanthropy or charity is unfortunately not a sustainable solution.  After a while, donor fatigue settles in – especially as the demands and expectations for additional funds keeps on piling up with no clear relief in sight.  Social entrepreneurs, on the other hand, seek to place their capital in the positive power of enterprise, with the clear intention of helping people at the bottom of the pyramid while making a respectable return on their investment. Social impact in this case is sustainable, as the entrepreneur does not think twice when the need arises for additional capital in order to expand the venture into different areas and sectors.

The most critical stage for a social entrepreneurship venture is in its inception, when the need to ‘validate’ a business model for financial viability and scalability manifests itself. This is an iterative process which requires running market trials and testing various assumptions to fine-tune the business model. Many ambitious ideas die at this stage. This is where a philanthropist can help plug the gap and fund the validation process without any expectation of a return. Once the business model has been validated, the social entrepreneur can use their investment to sustain and scale it further.

Two key advantages of social entrepreneurship is that efforts are both sustainable and scalable. Just like any business venture, the owner expands and continues to invest as long as they keep getting a respectable return.

What drives a social entrepreneur?

Social entrepreneurs are businessmen with hearts of gold. They are driven by a passion to bring about wide-scale social change and dedicate their lives in achieving these goals. They are very persistent, as a social enterprise ‘working model’ requires a lot of testing and efforts to garner the support of communities in order to have a widespread and meaningful impact.

Interestingly, social entrepreneurs have existed throughout history, but today this is developing into a mainstream vocation. In Pakistan, the social sector is doing amazing work, running complete hospitals, imparting education, providing health insurance, rehabilitating disabled workers and street kids, but these are unfortunately run on donations and are not sustainable. My request and challenge to these organisations is to look for a sustainable idea, convert the social work into a business venture with investment, return and shareholders. This way the much needed social impact will be sustainable, scalable and not under threat in case their passionate founder or volunteers depart.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, December 3^rd, 2012.

In each of these activities, feedback is gathered on an individual’s performance from peers, partners and stakeholders and is rated on a scale of ‘outstanding’ to ‘weak’.  The same benchmarking activity can be carried out for countries based on economic, demographic, institutional and political performance.

Some of the best known global benchmarking studies are carried out by reputable organisations annually. Each of these studies reviews a different aspect of a country, its economy or its prosperity.  Lets go through some:

Human Development Index (HDI)

The HDI is a composite statistic of life expectancy, education, and income indices. It ranks countries into four tiers of human development: ‘low’, ‘medium’, ‘high’ or ‘very high’. It was created by renowned Pakistani economist Prof Dr Mahbubul Haq, and economist Amartya Sen in 1990, with an explicit purpose “to shift the focus of development economics from national income accounting to people-centred policies”. Pakistan ranks 145 out of a sample of 187 countries in this index, ie in the fourth or the ‘low’ human development tier.

Global Competitive Report (GCR)

The GCR integrates macroeconomic and micro/business aspects of competitiveness into a single index. The report assesses how productively a country uses its limited resources and its ability to provide high levels of prosperity to their citizens. Pakistan ranks 124 out of 144 countries.

Democracy Index

The democracy index measures the state of democracy and is based on 60 indicators grouped in five different categories: ie, electoral process and pluralism, civil liberties, functioning of government, political participation and political culture. The countries are finally categorized into ‘full democracies’, ‘flawed democracies’, ‘hybrid regimes’ and ‘authoritarian regimes’. Pakistan is now rated as a hybrid regime, versus an authoritarian regime back in early 2000. Pakistan ranks 105 out of 167 countries.

Global Innovation Index (GII)

The GII is calculated as a simple average of seven pillars, of which the first five are ‘input’ pillars and the last two are ‘output’ pillars. The pillars are: institutions, human capital and research, infrastructure, market sophistication, business sophistication, scientific outputs, and creative outputs. Overall Pakistan ranks 105 out of 125 countries

Legatum Prosperity Index (LPI)

The LPI is an annual ranking of 110 countries and is based on a variety of factors including wealth, economic growth, personal well-being, and quality of life.  It reviews 89 variables that are grouped into eight sub-indexes, each with an equal weight.  The eight factors are: economy, entrepreneurship and opportunity, governance, education, health, safety and security, personal freedom, and social capital. Pakistan ranks at a poor 107 out of 110 countries.

As can be seen from the table, Pakistan has a long way to go, because in four out of the five studies, we are ranked at the bottom or fourth quartile (in red). In the Democracy Index, we have recently moved up from the fourth to the third quartile.  In addition, when we compare ourselves with our three closest neighbours – ie India, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka –  we are ranked last in each benchmarking study with the only exception being HDI, where Sri Lanka is ranked one position behind us.

One of the best ways to bring an improvement across the board is to focus on the 2015 Millennium Development Goals (MDG), set by the United Nations in 1990 for the entire world. The MDG are made up of eight key goals ranging from: eradicating hunger (reducing poverty); providing universal primary education; providing gender equality and woman empowerment; reducing infant mortality (needs improved health care, sanitation and safe drinking water); improving maternal health; combating diseases; ensuring environmental sustainability; and, finally, global partnerships for development.

Our popularly-elected government will have to take extraordinary measures in order to achieve many of the targets set up for each of the MDG goals. This will only be possible if these targets are given the status of ‘no-miss’ goals to relevant ministries, with strong accountability and punitive measures accompanying them if no progress is made.

We can forget about competing with the rest of the globe if these measures are not taken, as there is much stronger commitment, planning and strategising to achieve these goals elsewhere. I have no doubt that we deliver a few of the MDG goals by 2015, if we as a nation focus single-mindedly in driving prosperity and improving the standards of living for the average Pakistani.

THE WRITER WORKS IN THE CORPORATE SECTOR AND IS ACTIVE ON VARIOUS BUSINESS FORUMS AND TRADE BODIES

Published in The Express Tribune, November 5^th, 2012.