PH – Inclusive Growth Or Inclusive Development, Zero Extreme Or Zero Poverty?


On Facebook yesterday, Bruce Tolentino shared “The Philippines IG Inclusive Growth Story” that is actually “a student competition on how the Philippines can achieve high-income status with zero extreme poverty by 2040.” 

From the DoF website:

The Philippine Development Forum – Sulong Pilipinas: Hakbang Tungo sa Kaunlaran is an annual consultative conference that brings together different stakeholders from all over the country. By establishing a strong partnership between the government and different sectors – from business and development partners, to the academe, youth organizations, and many others – Sulong seeks to build a truly inclusive economy, and work towards a comfortable life for all Filipinos[1].

Zero Extreme Poverty 20 years from now – Is that a realistic goal? It is. But I don’t like such a realistic goal – I like the unrealistic goal of Zero Poverty! Why because if you Dream Big, you might as well Dream the Universe.

Also: There is something I do not like in the concept of “Inclusive Growth” – I want “Inclusive Development.”

Inclusive Growth is the result of Gross Domestic Product, GDP. In effect, in GDP the poor are largely excluded as beneficiaries of the overall economic growth. Else, we would not have any poor families today!

Inclusive Development is the result of Gross Domestic Happiness, GDH. Differently, in GDH, the poor are both actors and benefactors of themselves via their own labors.

Here is a practical way of describing or presenting inclusive development – I am quoting Director General of ICRISAT based in India and now PH Secretary of Agriculture William Dar, in his Manila Times column of Friday, 14 May 2018[2]:

Achieving profitability in the rice industry will need collective action among smallholder farmers, meaning they should organize themselves into cooperatives so they can go into block farming to achieve economies of scale… and have bargaining power in the trading of rice.

Via cooperatives, the poor farmers enjoy inclusive development, because their cooperatives are the merchants themselves and share incomes that sustain the lives of the producers and their families.

GDP admits of classic individual merchants as indispensable to the economy, who take care of their own welfare. Of course.

GDH admits of modern institutional merchants as indispensable to the economy, who take care of the welfare of the merchants as well as the food producers. In fact, the merchants are in effect the food producers themselves, working through cooperatives.

So, in this 2020 student competition, via GDP, we are teaching the students to not think beyond the current dispensation, to think only via classical economic thought.

We are encouraging our students to be conformists, not alas, creative members of society!

The contest guidelines, available online[3], comprise 6 pages single-spaced. Too complicated. No cash awards mentioned. Nonetheless, if the first prize is P3 million, 2nd prize P2 million, and 3rd prize P1 million – those amounts will matter much to the student groups who will become winners, but not much to poor farmers who have always been the losers from obstacles to opportunities to options to outputs to outcomes!@517





[1] https://www.dof.gov.ph/index.php/advocacies/sulong-pilipinas/
[3] https://drive.google.com/file/d/1MUQN3F4Phv1o0ApeY-ZfjmpKH8IDYbDZ/view?fbclid=IwAR2mH_ojPVH0ju6nWNuoj2AFR9KTO69aPCJmHWM9oN7lwR8ap3CIoZ5SlL4

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Agriculture Today Is The Biggest Media Challenge – How Can Journalists Cultivate Fertile Minds?

Image
I see the new PH Agriculture under the leadership of Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/Manong Willie as the biggest challenge to Philippine journalism – many-layered, complicated. Simplifying: If farming is growing food, journalism is growing ideas in a fertile mind! I thank God I’m running 80. Now, how could I have been blogging about PH Agriculture every single day since the middle of last year when I am essentially a work-at-homer? “There is no unfertile soil with a fertile mind.” How do I cultivate my mind to stay fertile? Easy – I read. And read. And read. So I can be Good, Better, Best! (Above, superimposed image of some books to read/review in my bedroom-workroom.) In this digital age, as a journalist you must always collect enough background materials; save your files, then read them. Read, not memorize. (In Microsoft Word , turn on Track Changes – click Review, Track Changes – and write down your thoughts as you read. You go back to them when you ...
Read more

From Kobe Bryant, Basketball Legend, Via Frank H, Lessons For Communicators In Agriculture!

Image
Above, note my source of this essay. Buhay Teacher ( A Teacher’s Life , my translation), whoever you are, you have my utmost admiration. You are unique; you are wonderful.  I was teary-eyed today, 27 January 2020, reading about the helicopter crash in Los Angeles, California, that took 9 lives: Kobe Bryant, 41, daughter Gianna, 13, and 7 others. Listen, I am not a fan of basketball. So, it is quite surprising for me to read that basketball is not simply physical: it is also or mostly psychological. If you want to be a star. Thank you, Buhay Teacher, for sharing your story: “8 Life Lessons We Can All Learn From NBA Legend Kobe Bryant [1] .” And yes, since I myself am trying to inspire the new Department of Agriculture under the leadership of Secretary of Agriculture William Dar/ Manong Willie , I am dedicating this essay to all the communicators of the DA, national, regional, provincial. Yes! We will now try to learn from the basketball legend’s “8 Life Lessons...
Read more

Green Sugarcane Accounting – What About Green Sweet Sorghum?

Image
In November 2016, out of the press came a book I edited, UPLB Professor Teodoro "Ted" Mendoza's Green Sugarcane Accounting , with the long subtitle, "A Pioneering Work In Accounting For Energy Use And Carbon Footprint For An Energy-Efficient And Climate Change-Compliant Sugarcane Production." If you don't know Ted, the "About The Author" says of him: He is a member of the Philippine American Academy of Scientists and Engineers (since May 2011). He is also a member of the Board of Trustees of the Philippine Employer Labor Social Partnership Inc (PELSPI), as well as the Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) representing the academic community in recognition of his incisive analyses of food security issues, rice production systems and climate change adaptive farming. In the "Editor's Introduction," this was my last paragraph: This book is for consciousness-raising as well as reality-assessing inside the sugarca...
Read more