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| Sunday, 3 July 2005 |
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Editorial |  |
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Editor, Sunday Observer. E-mail: [email protected] Snail mail : Sunday Observer, 35, D.R.Wijewardana Mawatha, Colombo, Sri Lanka. Telephone : 94 11 2429239 / 2331181 Fax : 94 11 2429230 Developing human capital One of the key elements in the struggle against underdevelopment is the development of human capital. The significance of it cannot be overemphasised. In the context of the modern world where knowledge has become a productive force breaking the shackles of underdevelopment with poor and underdeveloped human capital is an impossibility. The country should increase its expenditure on education. We are glad the government has been consciously taking steps in that direction. It should be viewed as an investment and not as consumption. Countries that faced similar challenges and developed fast such as the Asian Tigers and China allocated huge capital outlays for education in their formative years. Education in the modern context is not simply gaining the ability to read and write. Functional literacy is also as important or even more important for the citizen of today and tomorrow. With the onset of the revolution in information technology we are witnessing today, computer literacy has another imperative need and it means much more than word-processing abilities. This raises the problem of what to teach and how to teach. Our teaching curricula are outmoded or obsolete. This is especially true of secondary and tertiary education. Moreover it is not geared to the fulfillment of manpower requirements of the national economy. The present system of teaching should be restructured to make it pupil-centric instead of being teacher-centric. Education does not mean mere book learning. The development of creative abilities and fostering creativity should be an objective of the education process. In this sense the present emphasis on English medium teaching seems to be quite out of proportion to the national requirements. More emphasis should be laid on developing the creative abilities and talents of children. Even if the medium is changed to English if the content and methodology of teaching does not change we may end up with a product not very much different from what we have today- that is an end product that is not confident in facing the challenges of society. We have had English medium education in the country and none could say the end products of that system were adequately prepared to face societal challenges though some elderly scholars may nostalgically praise it to heaven. There should be a system to identify and encourage young inventors. Unfortunately they have been left in the lurch with no quantifiable assistance and moral support. Most of their inventions are not applied in practice due to the lack of capital or bureaucratic fetters. Our tertiary education system including the Universities does not adequately provide opportunities for research. They suffer from lack of funds. Even when they receive funds, the research is guided by the interests of the funding agencies that end up in their non-application to the national economy. Even the few research institutions we have lack adequate funding. An alternative would be to integrate research institutions, industrial institutions and Universities so that they could share the meagre resources more productively in the national interest. We have to utilise the opportunities offered by globalization and the technological revolution to leapfrog to development. This could not be done without developing the technological capacity of the nation. As long as we do not excel in technology even an export oriented economy would not be able to break the shackles of underdevelopment. It would be a perpetuation of our dependence on technologically superior countries. This is especially so in view of the unfair trade practices in the world market where the developed country producers are protected by tariff concessions and subsidies and less developed country producers are not allowed any fiscal or non-fiscal concessions or subsidies. This makes it imperative for us to seek areas where we could excel in the short-term and develop technology and human skills in those areas. It would enable us to reach a monopoly status in these few sectors. As eminent economist Prof. Amit Bhaduri told an audience in Colombo a few days ago tourism could be one such sector where we could reach a monopoly status. Development of infrastructure facilities in this sector and the optimum use of our natural heritage and splendour could pave the way for such development. In our country there is a widespread school of thought that as we are a small and poor country that we have to depend eternally on the developed countries and hence we are doomed to obey their dictates. It is not so. Unfortunately most of our politicians and bureaucrats have no idea of what constitutes the national interest. That is why they worship at the altars of the Washington Consensus and consider acceptance of their recipes a fait accompli. Such fatalistic ideas too have become an obstacle in the nation's progress. This too must be combated. |
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