Sumati Rajput
India, the fourth largest economy in the world, is a nation of over one billion people. Despite its global presence and incredible growth story, about 30% of India’s population lives in poverty. While the official unemployment rate stands at about 10%, unofficial rates predict an unemployment figure as high as 30%. If this unofficial figure is true, it would mean that India is home to over 300 million unemployed people, which is coincidently the total population figure for the USA.
The interesting story about the unemployment rate is that almost 70% of the unemployed workforce has attained a certain level of education. In the US, only 25% Americans have a higher education degree, and high school drop outs account for about 10% of the total enrolled students every year. Despite these issues, for decades the unemployment rate in the US has fluctuated between a low 4-6% and the increase in this figure over the past three years can reasonably be attributed to the global economic downturn. While it is not prudent to make a direct comparison between the literacy levels and employment rates of the two countries without accounting for resources, infrastructure, and other social development mechanisms, it is worth wondering what India can do to provide its burgeoning population with adequate means of livelihood.
Build on existing assets:
India has a large agricultural industry. However, with the developing world desperately trying to ape the west, India too has been focusing on developing what are considered ‘flashy’ and ‘sophisticated’ industries, neglecting its agricultural industry which is deemed ‘rural and backward’. Interestingly, there is a movement in the developed world towards agricultural orientation as awareness about sustainability issues and practices are being popularized. Europe and North America are encouraging urban agricultural practices by way of community gardens, local supermarkets, and the ‘Eat what you grow’ movement.
India has land which is suited to agriculture, climate which favours it, and most importantly historical experience and knowledge about the industry. However, lacking focus to augment agricultural production practices such as poor treatment of water, irrigation of land, despite its adequate water resources is causing the share of the agricultural output to fall in its contribution towards India’s GDP. This does not mean that India should refrain from making conscientious efforts towards diversifying its industrial base, but in addition to doing so, it should capitalize on its natural attributes as well. Since India has the requisite human capital, the Government should encourage and subsidize R&D for developing smart technology in agricultural practices. This would generate ‘smart’ employment opportunities in the field of agriculture as well as opportunities at every level as the industry begins to expand and lose its image of being ‘rural and backward’.
Quality Education:
The K-12 and the Higher Education system in India is highly regulated by the government, which leaves little room for any innovation in the education sector. In fact, it takes years for any reform to take effect in the education space, regardless of how small or large its impact might be. Over the past decade however, the Indian education sector has received a lot of attention with regard to educational access, as well as necessary implementation of already existing programs such as the ‘Sarva Shikshya Abhiyan’ and the ‘Midday Meal Scheme’. More recent amendments include drastic changes made to the CBSE 10th and 12th examination patterns as well as debates over switching to a semester system rather than an annual one for all higher education institutes. While these are all progressive initiatives, they are far outpaced by the developments that the global world is undergoing.
The most significant change that the Indian education sector requires is to make its population skilled and globally employable by integrating the academic curriculum with ICT. India’s educated population lags behind in terms of a basic technological skill set. While India is a booming ICT hub, these skills are contained only within the group of people who choose to specialize in the field. To give this issue some context, an average educated American first makes a simple power point presentation at the age of 8, while an average educated Indian does so at the age of 18. To bridge this gap, private players like Educomp are entering the education space by providing unique multimedia classrooms for schools, electronic libraries, and audio-visual homework assignments to enhance student learning experience. However, more needs to be done to bring the educated youth in India at par with the global technological skill level.
Use of computers for external research for projects, use of presentations as way of showcasing assignments, integration of applications such as Excel and Word in the academic curriculum are only few of the many measures that Indian educational institutes should embrace in their attempt to creating an educated-tech-friendly population. If India adopts these measures, it will generate employment for private players to design innovative educational systems as those that exist in the US, Singapore, and Europe. The population that benefits from this ICT integrated curriculum will be well informed, globally employable, highly entrepreneurial, and specialized.
Entrepreneurship:
One of the biggest advantages in emerging economies like India is the unsaturated niche and non-niche markets. This provides opportunities for locals to develop businesses especially because of India’s large market size, its rising standard of living with growing demands for consumption of goods and services, as well as opportunities for innovation through self employment. More importantly, entrepreneurs do not need to have fancy degrees and diplomas; they need to be creative individuals with unique ideas. While India has entrepreneurial opportunities, the majority of its population lacks entrepreneurial skills, and the resources to develop them. Additionally, the Indian mindset is trained to believe that working in a multinational corporate firm is more lucrative than trying to risk one’s resources and time in creating a new business venture.
In order to overcome these obstacles, the government should make efforts towards strengthening India’s Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprise (MSME) sector. For the past two years, the budget has quoted the same provisions for the MSME sector, primarily, the setting up of a funding body that would manage a budget of 5000 crores for MSME. Initiatives like this need to be prioritized given India’s dire need for entrepreneurial activities such as development of unique local businesses which will lead to higher economic growth, a globally competitive workforce, as well as lower unemployment rates because of generation of job opportunities through new ventures.
To support this entrepreneurial spirit, the government needs to adopt a twofold strategy or the ‘4Es’ strategy: Entrepreneurial Education & Entrepreneurial Environment. The Indian education system should incorporate a leadership and entrepreneurship program in the school and college curriculums. Students should be made aware of the way in which businesses develop and grow and encouraged to develop their own unique business ideas as well. An excellent example for the success of this strategy is the state of Nebraska in the US which is known for its highly entrepreneurial schooling system that teaches its youth to emerge as leaders and entrepreneurs. Secondly, India needs to create an entrepreneur friendly environment. A few things that the government can start with to achieve this include investing time in identifying sectors where businesses can flourish and subsequently endorse development in those sectors; develop a subsidized loan program to provide financial support to those individuals who show interest in developing a business in the identified industries; design specialized training programs for entrepreneurs to acquire an understanding of the identified industries; and organize networking events for entrepreneurs who are seeking to establish joint ventures which would lead to positive synergetic effects for their business ideas as well as diversification of financial risk.
In conclusion, for India to provide its population with greater employment opportunities it needs to actively work on building its existing assets, skilling its population so that it can be globally competitive, and encouraging its youth to become future leaders by acting on new ideas rather than following established ones. Furthermore, it needs to keep pace with the globally changing economy without losing sight of its strengths and honing the requisite talent in its young population.
Trending Now
E-Paper
Follow our WhatsApp channel