What is development

 What is development

Positive change

 

People families communities and countries are always changing. Development is change which brings improvement in the lives of everyone in a country. Changes which only benefit men or city-dwellers do not represent true development. A true development thus benefits all people and has capa

city to run smoothly for a long time.

Level of development is not equal everywhere. Some countries such as those in western Europe have been developing rapidly for over 200year. These countries are now quite developed. Although there are poor people most people enjoy a high standard of living. Other countries, mainly in Africa, Asia and south America, have only been developing for about 50 years and for historical or geographical reasons these developing nations are much poorer. In these countries average people’s living standard is low.

Achieving Development

Development is often connected with economic growth. In this sense, to obtain higher economic status is development. But economic growth alone doesn’t represent true development. In other world, development is concerned not merely with the fulfillment of physical needs of people but also with socio-cultural amelioration . according to the human development report 1996, published by the united nations development program , “ human development is the end-economic growth a means. So true development should improve the overall human condition.

Development takes place with a proper utilization of available means and resources. factors such as health, education, transport and communication are essentials for providing services. For people and to run development activities. So these are called infrastructures of development. A country  with good system of these factors can run development easily. Appropriate planning helps to bring about  a sustainable and balanced development for which skilled manpower and appropriate technology are also essential. Development works cannot run smoothly without peace and stability. Above all good leadership is important for development. In other words proper planning for development and its effective execution cannot be expected form corrupt leaders

 

The economy of a country is stronger if it has more export  and less import. Money is earned from exports , goods sold abroad and it is lost by buying imports from other countries. Though Nepal loses a lot in its imports, it has been earning well from foreign employment. In many parts of the world, fruit of development is not equally enjoyed by all people. There is a huge gulf between rich and poor in capitalist societies. So countries should make efforts to achieve development that can benefit poor societies more.

Measuring Development

Level of development can be measured and compared with the help of several figures known as indicators. Gross domestic product (GDP) which is the total value of goods product and services provided within a country’s border irrespective of the nationalities of the producers or providers, is a common indicator,. GDP thus, includes the contribution but the non-nationals within the country but excludes that by the nationals abroad and excludes that by non-nationals within the concerned country. Nowadays gross national income (GNI) is used as a main indicator of economic development. GNI includes both GDP AND EARNING  from abroad. If we divide it by the total population, we get the per capita income, which is the average amount earned by each person is one year. Per capital income is a common indicator of development. It shows the average income status of citizens in a year’s time.. 

The distribution of jobs is another indicator. In poor countries people work hard mainly in non-industrial fields but without skills, power or machinery, they cannot earn very much. Human  development index (HDI), to new  studied in detail in the next lesson, is a collective indicator calculated on the basis of per capital income, literacy and life expectancy. So it can reflect the overall status of development achieved by a country in the areas of economic growth, education and health. But average values always hide differences. For example , a country with many poor people may have high per capital income because of the high incomes of some very rich people. Per capital income is same for rich and poor and for earning and not earning.

Means and resources

 

 Worlds to know

Amelioration: improvement, upgrading

Sustainable: able to continue; long lasting

Foreign employment: job done in other countries

Remittance : money sent by people doing jobs in other countries

Indicator: figure showing condition and development

Non-national : foreigner

Literacy: ability to read and write

Life expectancy : average length of life of all people in an area

Points to remember

1. development is a positive change that improves the quality of life of all people.

2. the level of development as  well as its rate differs from one country to another.

3. true development can be achieved with appropriate planning, skilled manpower provision, application of modern technology, and maintenance of peace and stability.

4.  development indicators such as GDP and HDI measure and compare levels of development between countries as well as over periods.

5. raw materials, capital, manpower, transport, communication , etc. are means and resources of development.

                                                            

Prerequisites of development    

Development                                                                                                                                                  Development is a continuous process. But it doesn’t take place automatically. Human resources are the agents of development. They need other means and resources as mentioned in the previous lesson for development. All these necessary things and conditions necessary for development are called prerequisites. Here the term ‘prerequisite’ is derived from two words pre and requisite where pre means prior and requisite means something needed. Thus the literal meaning of prerequisite is on objects, quality or condition that is required for something else to happen.                                                                                                                             Below is a short description on some major prerequisites of development.                  

Prerequisites of development                                                                                                           

a Literacy                                                   

people can only be a resources for development if they are knowledge thoughtful, skillful and creative. For this at least they need literacy and training of many different kinds. Literacy means the ability to read and write in ordinary sense. But now with changes in time and circumstances, literally means more than just ability to read and write . If it meant 3Rs ( reading writing and arithmetic) earlier, now it means 7Rs rights, responsibility, relationship and recreation  addition. In our time, literacy also means agility the importance of rights and duties as well as build proper relation  and use means of recreation.        

For development , people need various types of training in addition to literacy. Mrs. Limbu needed one kind of training. An animal health research worker would need mathematical, scientific and computer, skills as well as goods English reading abilities and the this would means a different kind of training.

B public participation                                                                                                                                                 It is the responsibility of the government to plan and carry out development projects. But it cannot accomplish without the participation of the public. The involvement of people in development activities is called public participation.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    C Entrepreneurship                                                                                                                                         without proper utilization of nature financial and human resources development is not possible. If there are resources there are skilled people but they don’t try to invest their money and run a business then development doesn’t take place. If people are not motivated, capital formation is also difficult and without capital business cannot be started. Therefore people need to have interest, motivation and courage to make investment and run business. For instance, countries such as japan, USA,UK, and germane are so developed because people there have great entrepreneurship.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    D peace and stability                                                                                                                                         

peace is the absence os conflict and violence. Peace brings prosperity but violence brings misery. peace is essential both for secure life and development activities. Without peace, life and property are not secure. One cannot get opportunity to use his/her skill and dexterity either. They are not confident and fear free. Available means resources are either destroyed or left unused. Peace is essentials to for the implementation of development projects smoothly. When there is peace resources can be utilized and infrastructures can be constructed. Many Africa counties are  so backward because they are passing through prolonged conflicts. In Nepal development activities  are widely resuming with the start of the peace process in 2007. In this way, peace and stability is considered a very important prerequisite of development.                               

     Infrastructure of development                                                           

what is infrastructure?          

When people live in communities, certain systems need to be provided foe everyone. The services needed for a country to run smoothly and for economic and social development to take place are country infrastructures . In others words, these are basic structures of development. In richer countries, many services are provided. In poorer countries, people do most things themselves.                                                                                                                       It is difficult t build developmental infrastructures in Nepal foe several reasons like these below.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       

A.  Funding is difficult due to widespread poverty.                                                                                   

B. capital cannot be generated inside the county due to the trend of exercise dependency external sources; grants donations and loans.                                                                          

C.  projects are affected due to lack of technology and technically skilled manpower.                    

D.  construction are damage due to disasters like landslide and flood.                                     

E.  corruptions and irregularities are common.                                                                           

F.  people are not aware about their responsibility and the need and importance of their participation.

A  Education: the most important infrastructure                                                                                           The most important resources of any country are its people. But they must be educated and trained to utilize available means and resources to an optimum level. It is education people know about the importance of their health and need of national development as well. They make rapid progress and live a happy life. Besides, education people are more enlightened and make better voting choice to help maintain good governance and make democracy successful. Since education produces skilled manpower needed in all areas for development , it is often taken as the first and foremost infrastructure of development. A good education includes both academic and technical education.                                                                                                                                                                                                                            

  Education in Nepal                                                                                                                                          Education in Nepal has not developed well. English education  has started in 1910 BS with the establishment of Durbar high school in Katmandu during the Rana rule. There were only 321 schools and a college in 2007 BS when democracy was established in the country. The number rose to 34782 in 2066 Bs . when compared to the growth in the number of school going children the number of schools is quite insufficient. Even those available are not evenly distributed and properly managed. Facilities of higher education are also far to be enough. Technical education is highly limited provided by very few educational institutions. It is difficult to find jobs according to qualification. Above all the general public are still not aware about the value of education and poor people cannot afford good education. But things are greatly changing now. According to the national census 2011, average literally rate had just increased to 65.95% where women way only 57.4    

                                                                                     Health                                                                                                                                                            

Health is your greatest wealth. You cannot study well if your health is bad. Nor can you learn well and work hard. You cannot enjoy foods, games and books either. Living with some diseases is really very painful. You have to swallow bitter medicines and mostly are confined in bed waiting others to do everything for you. Even a huge property is spent in caring for health.                                                                                                                                                      

Only skilled and healthy citizens can work sufficiently to raise the level of their country. Unhealthy citizens become no doubt the burden foe their family, society and the nation. Government has to make huge investment in heath sector if public health is poor. It causes lack of sufficient budget for improving other infrastructure such as education and industry because health is to be given the topmost priority. Industries and construction cannot run smoothly due to lack of enough manpower. Nature resources in spite of their high potential are  just wasted.                                                                                                                                                           

  Status of health in Nepal                                                                                                                           

     In Nepal huge budget is allocated and many organization are working in health sector. However, expected changes have not taken place in the health the general public. Life expectancy is hardly 70 years. Many children are still malnourished. Epidemic and endemic diseases are common. Drinking water is not safe. Environment in urban areas is highly polluted. Doctors are not ready to serve in the remote villages. There are not enough hospitals and health centers for medical services. Superstition and ignorance is high. Many people have not realized the importance of medical treatment yet. Population growth rate is high so it is difficult to provide good health service for all. Even the available  facilities have not been fairly distribution. Most good hospitals are located in a few cities like Katmandu, pokhara and bharatpur. The level of nutrition is poor for majority of people. Economics level is also poor. Private hospitals offerings quality health services are too expensive for the average nepali population to afford.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

 Drinking water                                                                                                                                                

water is one of the essentials conditions of life. The earth has life also because it has water. But drinking water should be clean and free from contamination. When contaminated it brings many diseases. Definitely health of people greatly depends on the quality of drinking water they are supplied to. Supply of poor drinking water may affect the manpower provision for development because unhealthy people cannot be useful manpower. Demand of drinking water is growing in our country with population growth and urbanization. It is the prime duty of government to make proper supply of drinking waters its citizens. While is is consumers duty to cooperate with the distribution system and helps make proper utilization.                                                                                                                                                                            

Drinking water in Nepal                                                                                                                             

Nepal is the second richest country of the world in water resources. There are more than 6000 rivers and rivulets. Many of these are snow-fed and perennial. There are quiet many lakes in the country. In the Terai and the Kathmandu valley underground water can be easily reached. There is also good monsoon rain at least in summer. Thoughts rich in resources, we have not been able to make proper use of these vast resources. poor economics conditions, difficult landscape poor technology and inefficient planning are causing wasting of water. Hardly about 60%  of the people in Nepal have access to safe and enough water. The scarcity is very acute in dense cities. Kathmandu has long been waiting for the completion of the melamchi project which has been prolonging. At the same time, more drinking water projects are felt necessary for supplying enough water for the corded valley. In addition these source of drinking water  are getting pollution due to garbage, sewage and improper  use. People are also not very aware about the need of safe drinking water.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        Things to do                                                                                                                                                 with the explosive growth in population and expansion of cities, shortages of drinking water getting acute. The government should give topmost priority to the supply of safe drinking water. Large projects should be launched with international assistance for the supply of water in large city areas. Consumer must be made alert about water-leakage  and environmental pollution. Everyone should understand the value of drinking water. Local resources should be preserved through afforestation's reforestation, sanitation and constructions. Rainwater can be collected for dry period use. The ongoing uncontrolled urbanization also needs to be checked.        

Others infrastructures: Transport,                                                                                                     Communication and electricity

Transport                                                                                                                                                    

    The world has become smaller due to the advance systems of transport and communication available in the modern time. You can travel a great distance within a short time and you can make contact with anybody in any part of the world immediately. Everyday you are using various means of transport directly or indirectly . probably many of you and your teachers use vehicles to come to sudden halt. Or remember how economic and social aspects of a daily life are affected by a transport strike.                                                                                      

Goods systems of transport network is needed for a country economic and social growth. Industries get their raw materials and agricultural as well as finished goods get markets. Tourists can visits places of interest. Trade and business can flourish. Local products find market . human relations and cooperation are widened. But lack of of transport on the contrary makes all these activities difficult and the overall socio- economic development is obstructed.

Transport in Nepal                                                                                                                                          As other infrastructures, development of transport in Nepal also started late. Today we have got several systems of transport: roadways, railways ,ropeways, and waterways. Due to our mountainous topography, landlocked position, backward  technology and poor economic condition, these systems have not been developed well. We have not got any sea and large navigable rivers, suitable for water transport. Only small boats and rafts are operating in limited course of a few rivers. We have also not been able to expand the only railway i.e janakpur, jayanagar railways even across the terai plain. The main reasons is lack of capital and technology. Though airways and ropeways are very suitable for a mountainous country like ours, these systems are also quite limited. Even the available services cannot be afforded by ordinary Nepalese. Roadways is developed more in Nepal. But is has not connected all parts of the country yet. Remote areas of the north have still to rely on the expensive air transport that is often unreliable too.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

  Plans for roads                                                                                                                                              

  Due to our poor economic condition, backward technology and mountainous and landlocked features, roads transport is the most suitable systems of transport in our country. The current 14^th plan has planned to adopt some strategies like these below for the development of road transport in the country.                                                                                               

A.  to expand road networks among the state capitals.                                                           

    B.   to construct roads to all districts and village which are not connected yet.                         

C.  to strengthen the roads in the Kathmandu valley and make them better- managed.                     

D.  to proceed the construction of shorter alternatives road links to the Kathmandu valley including the Kathmandu nijgadh fast track.                                                                                         

E.   to upgrade the links roads and to construct or upgrade the roads to the northly and south of the highways connecting trade centers along the boarder and main entry points.                       

F.  to introduce tunnel technology for making roadways safer and shorter.                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

Many years pema had come from olangchunggola to Kathmandu for her higher studies. Pema who had never been to city before was surprised at two things. The first things was electricity and the others was television. What a surprise. If switched the room got lighted; it got warm with heater and fan started moving.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

Electricity: goods servant but bad master                                                                                                    

  once pema had been to pokhara along with her friends on an educational tour. One morning she was a dead young man holding a bundle of grass in one hand and a sickle in another under an electricity  iron pole surrounded by wires inside the compound of prithvi narayan campus. Perhaps the man could not read the word danger at the wired place and entered there pushing the wire aside for a bundle of grass and lost his precious life. After then pema started using electricity carefully. Once she felt a hard push while repairing a table lamp, she had forgotten to turn off the switch. Now she does any electric work after getting the mains off.                                                                                                                                                            

A dreams that comes true      

                                                                                                                        Dolma one of pema sisters is an electricity engineer. Pema learnt about the use of electricity from her and was developed to be an engineer. She studied very hard and her dreams came true. She wants to make the dark nights of her country illuminate with the lights of electricity.                                                                                                                                                          When she was a student her letter took one month to reach her home. But nowadays one can talk on telephone to anyone in any place at once. Sometimes she used to show children in her village electricity produced from battery. The children became glad to see that.                    Now pema has two daughters who were born with many electric and electronic goods at home. Her husband use to the operation of industries and heavy computer in her room. She has a deck, video and computer in her room. She listens and watches programmes  on science and technology on radio and television. She sends her research activites through fax and e mail limited and she also gets information from abroad.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

Importance and status                                                                                                                          

Electricity is a main power available in the modern world. It is used in all fields ranging from household use to the operation of industries and heavy construction. So it is called as infrastructure of development. Similarly means of communication are needed for passing news, views and notices. In the people are also limited when these facilities are lacking.                  

Nepal has high potential of hydroelectricity because there are quite many rivers flowing swiftly along mountainous surface. Feasibility studies have shown that as much as 83000 mw of electricity can be generated in Nepal. But mainly for economic and political reasons so far we have been able to generate only about one percent of the total capacity. This is a serious challenge to face for the economic growth of the country. so the government must brings effective policies and make funding from various sources to install more hydropower projects. The current 14thy plan of Nepal has an aim to produce 2301 mw more electricity within the plan period and to raise the percentage of people using electricity to 87%. This is a highly ambitious targets. It is a matter of happiness that we have made a remarkable progress in the field of communication over the last decade. Majority of people now have access to telephone and quite a many people are using mobile phones and internet services. According to the approach paper of the current 3 years plan, about 46.4% people in the country have already got the internet access and the plan has set an aim to reach this figure 65% in the plan period by fy 2075/76.                  

Importance of tradition                                                                                                                      

knowledge, skills and technology         

Nepal gifts of the nature                                                                                                                               

Nepal has been endowed with rich physical diversity. If you look at the land topography, you will find high Himalayan ranges in the north and smooth plains in the south with hills and valley in the center. There is very varied climate over these distinct landforms. The land is suitable for the cultivation of many types of crops. Owing to the diversity of landform and climate nature vegetation differs greatly from place to place. The country is very rich in wildlife too. There are perennial rivers fed by the Himalayan snow. We get drinking water from these rivers, rivulets lakes and underground sources. Utilizing the same water, water- mills small hydrail projects and irrigation canals are possible at many places. This diverse land topography in our country is really a boon of nature. We have been provided with enough resources for industry and tourism, too.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

Traditional skills and technologies                                                                                                                     physical diversity of Nepal has created rich culture diversity because lifestyle is highly influenced by landform and climate conditions. Our ancestors were highly creative and tried to be self- reliant. Based on their environment and resources, they have developed many skills and technologies since early times. These are known as traditional or local skills and technologies. They had their own methods of farming, harvesting, storing, grinding, cooking ,building and so on. These are our valuable assets but some are on the verge of extinction due to the influence of modernization and ignorance in youths. Its our responsibility to discover them know them and preserve them necessary modification. Below are some traditional tools and machines of Nepal.         

Importance of traditional skills and technologies                                                                                        

  The traditional skills and technologies are the creations of our ancestors. They are their gifts us. If we really try to know about them we can realized their value and try to use and preserve them. The following points highlights their importance.                                                        

A.   They give our cultural identify.                                                                                                     

B.   They are based on our local means and resources.                                                                    

  c.   They reflects our original lifestyles.                                                                                            

  D.    They helps in preservation of knowledge and art.                                                                      

E.     They arouse pride in us.                                                                                                                 

F.      They are highly environment friendly.                                                                                    

G.      They are not very expensive.                                                                                                     

H.      They can be modernized with the application of necessary machinery of the modern                          time.                                                                                                                                       

I.        They save our investment and time.    

Methods of preservation   

                                                                                                                             its our responsibility to protect what our ancestors have given us. We have to use them to their best and should protect them for the future generations. Definitely youths have their duty to inherit them from their predecessors and pass on the same to their successors. The following measures are very important in this regard.                                                        

A.  we have to try to know about these traditional skills and technologies and their advantage.                                                                                                                                                     

B.  we have to modify them with the application of modern machinery retaining their originality.                                                                                                                                                       

C.  The  government should brings effective policies and programmers for the same.                

D.  it has to support those who are involved in the exploration and preservation of these tradition skills and technologies.                                                                                                                

E.  young people should be taught about the uniqueness, glory and advantages of these things formally at schools and college.