Pakistan's Human Capital Deficit
Pakistan's human capital has doubled from three years of learning in 1990 to six years of learning in 2016, according to a human capital study of 195 countries recently published in the journal The Lancet. However, Pakistan still ranks a poor 164th in the first-ever scientific study ranking countries for their levels of human capital. India has also more than doubled its human capital from 3 years to 7 years but Bangladesh stands out by tripling its human capital from two years to six years of learning since 1990. In 2016, the Lancet study shows that 44 countries achieved more than 20 years of expected human capital while 68 countries had expected human capital of less than 10 years. Bangladesh, India and Pakistan have less than 10 years of learning, putting them in the category of low human capital countries. Learning is based on average student scores on internationally comparable tests.
What is Human Capital?
Dictionary defines human capital as "the collective skills, knowledge, or other intangible assets of individuals that can be used to create economic value for the individuals, their employers, or their community".
The Lancet study says it "provides a new measure of expected human capital for 195 countries, consisting of four components: educational attainment, learning, health, and survival, based on a systematic analysis of all available data. This measure, in units of health, education, and learning-adjusted expected years lived between age 20 and 64 years, is estimated each year from 1990 to 2016 and can be updated annually." Learning is based on average student scores on internationally comparable tests.
South Asia's Low Human Capital:
Both Pakistan and India have seen their human capital double from three years of learning in 1990 to six years of learning in 2016 but both still rank low with significantly less than 10 years of learning, according to a human capital study of 195 countries recently published in the journal The Lancet.
In fact, the entire South Asia region continues to rank low in terms of human capital. Among South Asian nations, Sri Lanka ranks the highest at 102 (13 years), Maldives 116 (12 years), Bhutan 133 (9 years), Nepal 156 (7 years), India 158 (7 years), Bangladesh 161 (6 years), Pakistan 164 (6 years) and Afghanistan 188 (4 years). Countries with less than 10 years of learning are considered having "low human capital" by the authors of the study.
In 2016, the Lancet study shows that 44 countries achieved more than 20 years of expected human capital while 68 countries had expected human capital of less than 10 years. Bangladesh, India and Pakistan have less than 10 years of learning, putting them in the category of low human capital countries.
Global Human Capital Rankings:
Finland tops the human capital charts with 28.4 years of learning, United States ranks 27th with 23 years of learning and Turkey and China rank 43rd and 44th respectively, each with 20 years of learning. The countries with the least human capital are those in sub-Saharan Africa. Mali ranks 191st (3 years), Burkina Faso 192nd (3 years), Chad 193rd (2 years), South Sudan 194th (2 years) and Niger (2 years) at the very bottom ranked 195th.
Conducted by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington in collaboration with University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), the study on the measurement of human capital has been published in the journal The Lancet.
Impact of Human Capital on Economic Growth:
The Lancet report says that "human capital is characterized as the aggregate levels of education, training, skills, and health in a population, affecting the rate at which technologies can be developed, adopted, and employed to increase productivity".
Growth in human capital is associated with faster economic growth. The top quartile of countries in terms of absolute change in human capital from 1990 to 2016 had a median annualized growth in gross domestic product of 2·60% (IQR 1·85–3·69) compared with 1·45% (0·18–2·19) for countries in the bottom quartile, according to the Lancet report.
Human Development in Pakistan:
In addition to the human capital report by The Lancet, UNDP’s Human Development Index (HDI) is another indicator of human progress that combines information on people’s health, education and income. The latest Human Development Report (HDR) shows Pakistan's HDI ranking sank to a new low of 150 in 2018.
Pakistan saw average annual HDI (Human Development Index) growth rate of 1.08% in 1990-2000, 1.57% in 2000-2010 and 0.95% in 2010-2017, according to Human Development Indices and Indicators 2018 Statistical Update. The fastest growth in Pakistan human development was seen in 2000-2010, a decade dominated by President Musharraf's rule, according to the latest Human Development Report 2018.
The Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite index focusing on three basic dimensions of human development: the ability to lead a long and healthy life, measured by life expectancy at birth; the ability to acquire knowledge, measured by mean years of schooling and expected years of schooling; and the ability to achieve a decent standard of living, measured by gross national income per capita.
Not only has Pakistan's economy slowed since 2008 but its progress in education sector has seen a dramatic slowdown. Data shows that Pakistan's literacy and enrollment rates are not rising in spite of significantly increased education spending over the last several years. Education budgets at federal and provincial levels have seen double digit increase of 17.5% a year on average since 2010. And yet, school enrollment and literacy rate have remained essentially flat during this period. This lack of progress in education stands in sharp contrast to the significant improvements in outcomes seen from increase education spending during Musharraf years in 2001-2008. Why is it?
Is the money not being spent honestly and wisely? Is the education budget being used by the ruling politicians to create teacher jobs solely for political patronage? Are the teachers not showing up for work? Is the money being siphoned off by bureaucrats and politicians by hiring "ghost teachers" in "ghost schools"? Let's try and examine the data and the causes of lack of tangible results from education spending.
Pakistan Education Budget:
The total money budgeted for education by the governments at the federal and provincial levels has increased from Rs. 304 billion in 2010-11 to Rs. 790 billion in 2016-17, representing an average of 17.5% increase per year since 2010.
Education and Literacy Rates:
Pakistan's net primary enrollment rose from 42% in 2001-2002 to 57% in 2008-9 during Musharraf years. It has been essentially flat at 57% since 2009 under PPP and PML(N) governments.
Similarly, the literacy rate for Pakistan 10 years or older rose from 45% in 2001-2002 to 56% in 2007-2008 during Musharraf years. It has increased just 4% to 60% since 2009-2010 under PPP and PML(N) governments.
Four Levels of Development:
The extensive data compilation and research by Professor Hans Rosling of Sweden has shown that the binary categorization of nations into developed and developing is no longer useful. Instead, he has proposed using 4 levels of development based on health and wealth indicators, a proposal that has now been accepted by the United Nations and the World Bank. Here's how Rosling and the United Nations define these 4 levels:
1. Level 1: One billion people live on level 1. This is what we think of as extreme poverty. If you’re on level 1, you survive on less than $2 a day and get around by walking barefoot. Your food is cooked over an open fire, and you spend most of your day traveling to fetch water. At night, you and your children sleep on a dirt floor.
2. Level 2: Three billion people live on level 2, between $2 and $8 a day. Level 2 means that you can buy shoes and maybe a bike, so it doesn’t take so long to get water. Your kids go to school instead of working all day. Dinner is made over a gas stove, and your family sleeps on mattresses instead of the floor.
Level 3: Two billion people live on level 3, between $8 and $32 a day. You have running water and a fridge in your home. You can also afford a motorbike to make getting around easier. Some of your kids start (and even finish) high school.
Level 4: One billion people live on level 4. If you spend more than $32 a day, you’re on level 4. You have at least a high school education and can probably afford to buy a car and take a vacation once in a while.
Imran Khan's Ambitious Agenda:
Imran Khan laid out his agenda in his first speech to the nation after taking the office of the prime minister. It was more like a fireside chat in which he spoke directly to the people to explain his priorities that emphasize education, health care and human development. These are the keys to leading Pakistan from level 2 to level 3. In order to pursue his priorities, Mr. Khan needs to first address the more urgent economic crisis which he acknowledged. Pakistan needs to deal with excessive public debt and pay for the necessary imports to move forward. He must also deal with financial corruption and mismanagement to free up the resources for his ambitious agenda of economic and human development of the nation.
Mr. Khan will almost certainly face stiff opposition from the status quo forces which stand to lose from the changes he seeks. They will fight to preserve their patronage networks and their power and privilege. They will try to bring down his coalition government with all they have got. They might even threaten his personal safety and security.
Democracy and Development:
Professor Hans Rosling has compiled extensive socioeconomic data and done serious research to understand how nations develop. He has shared his work in "Factfulness" that he co-wrote with his son Ola Rosling and daughter Anna Rosling Ronnlund. Here's an except on democracy and development from Factfulness:
"This is risky but I am going to argue it anyway. I strongly believe that liberal democracy is the best way to run a country. People like me, who believe this, are often tempted to argue that democracy leads to, or its even a requirement for, other good things, like peace, social progress, health improvement, and economic growth. But here's the thing, and it is hard to accept: the evidence does not support this stance.
Most countries that make great economic and social progress are not democracies. South Korea moved from Level 1 to Level 3 faster than any other country had ever done (without finding oil), all the time as a military dictatorship. Of the ten countries with the fastest economic growth, nine of them score low on democracy.
Anyone who claims that democracy is a necessity for economic growth and health improvements will risk getting contradicted by reality. It's better to argue for democracy as a goal in itself instead of as a superior means to other goals we like."
Summary:
Pakistan's human capital has doubled from three years of learning in 1990 to six years of learning in 2016, according to a human capital study of 195 countries recently published in the journal The Lancet. However, Pakistan still ranks a poor 164th in the first-ever scientific study ranking countries for their levels of human capital. India has also doubled its human capital from 3 years to 6 years but Bangladesh stands out by tripling its human capital from two years to six years of learning since 1990. Learning is based on average student scores on internationally comparable tests.
Pakistan saw average annual HDI (Human Development Index) growth rate of 1.08% in 1990-2000, 1.57% in 2000-2010 and 0.95% in 2010-2017, according to Human Development Indices and Indicators 2018 Statistical Update. The fastest growth in Pakistan human development was seen in 2000-2010, a decade dominated by President Musharraf's rule, according to the latest Human Development Report 2018. Pakistan's newly elected Prime Minister Mr. Imran Khan has laid out an ambitious agenda that could accelerate Pakistan's human development progress to take his country from level 2 to level 3 of socioeconomic development. It is achievable but the odds are against him because he faces stiff opposition from the status quo forces. The powerful dynastic duopoly of PPP and PMLN still dominates Pakistan's Senate whose support will be required for major reforms. The research by Professor Hans Rosling shows: "Of the ten countries with the fastest economic growth, nine of them score low on democracy." It's also supported by Pakistan's economic history where pace of development has consistently been faster under military governments than during civilian democratic rule. Can Prime Minister Imran Khan's leadership change the course of history and deliver faster human progress under democratic rule? Let's wait and see.
What is Human Capital?
Dictionary defines human capital as "the collective skills, knowledge, or other intangible assets of individuals that can be used to create economic value for the individuals, their employers, or their community".
The Lancet study says it "provides a new measure of expected human capital for 195 countries, consisting of four components: educational attainment, learning, health, and survival, based on a systematic analysis of all available data. This measure, in units of health, education, and learning-adjusted expected years lived between age 20 and 64 years, is estimated each year from 1990 to 2016 and can be updated annually." Learning is based on average student scores on internationally comparable tests.
 |
| Human Capital Growth in South Asia. Source: The Lancet |
Both Pakistan and India have seen their human capital double from three years of learning in 1990 to six years of learning in 2016 but both still rank low with significantly less than 10 years of learning, according to a human capital study of 195 countries recently published in the journal The Lancet.
In fact, the entire South Asia region continues to rank low in terms of human capital. Among South Asian nations, Sri Lanka ranks the highest at 102 (13 years), Maldives 116 (12 years), Bhutan 133 (9 years), Nepal 156 (7 years), India 158 (7 years), Bangladesh 161 (6 years), Pakistan 164 (6 years) and Afghanistan 188 (4 years). Countries with less than 10 years of learning are considered having "low human capital" by the authors of the study.
In 2016, the Lancet study shows that 44 countries achieved more than 20 years of expected human capital while 68 countries had expected human capital of less than 10 years. Bangladesh, India and Pakistan have less than 10 years of learning, putting them in the category of low human capital countries.
 |
| Change in Global Human Capital Maps. Top 1990, Bottom 2016. Source: Lancet |
Global Human Capital Rankings:
Finland tops the human capital charts with 28.4 years of learning, United States ranks 27th with 23 years of learning and Turkey and China rank 43rd and 44th respectively, each with 20 years of learning. The countries with the least human capital are those in sub-Saharan Africa. Mali ranks 191st (3 years), Burkina Faso 192nd (3 years), Chad 193rd (2 years), South Sudan 194th (2 years) and Niger (2 years) at the very bottom ranked 195th.
Impact of Human Capital on Economic Growth:
The Lancet report says that "human capital is characterized as the aggregate levels of education, training, skills, and health in a population, affecting the rate at which technologies can be developed, adopted, and employed to increase productivity".
Growth in human capital is associated with faster economic growth. The top quartile of countries in terms of absolute change in human capital from 1990 to 2016 had a median annualized growth in gross domestic product of 2·60% (IQR 1·85–3·69) compared with 1·45% (0·18–2·19) for countries in the bottom quartile, according to the Lancet report.
Human Development in Pakistan:
In addition to the human capital report by The Lancet, UNDP’s Human Development Index (HDI) is another indicator of human progress that combines information on people’s health, education and income. The latest Human Development Report (HDR) shows Pakistan's HDI ranking sank to a new low of 150 in 2018.
 |
| Pakistan's Human Development Growth Rate By Decades. Source: HDR 2018 |
Pakistan saw average annual HDI (Human Development Index) growth rate of 1.08% in 1990-2000, 1.57% in 2000-2010 and 0.95% in 2010-2017, according to Human Development Indices and Indicators 2018 Statistical Update. The fastest growth in Pakistan human development was seen in 2000-2010, a decade dominated by President Musharraf's rule, according to the latest Human Development Report 2018.
The Human Development Index (HDI) is a composite index focusing on three basic dimensions of human development: the ability to lead a long and healthy life, measured by life expectancy at birth; the ability to acquire knowledge, measured by mean years of schooling and expected years of schooling; and the ability to achieve a decent standard of living, measured by gross national income per capita.
Not only has Pakistan's economy slowed since 2008 but its progress in education sector has seen a dramatic slowdown. Data shows that Pakistan's literacy and enrollment rates are not rising in spite of significantly increased education spending over the last several years. Education budgets at federal and provincial levels have seen double digit increase of 17.5% a year on average since 2010. And yet, school enrollment and literacy rate have remained essentially flat during this period. This lack of progress in education stands in sharp contrast to the significant improvements in outcomes seen from increase education spending during Musharraf years in 2001-2008. Why is it?
Is the money not being spent honestly and wisely? Is the education budget being used by the ruling politicians to create teacher jobs solely for political patronage? Are the teachers not showing up for work? Is the money being siphoned off by bureaucrats and politicians by hiring "ghost teachers" in "ghost schools"? Let's try and examine the data and the causes of lack of tangible results from education spending.
Pakistan Education Budget:
The total money budgeted for education by the governments at the federal and provincial levels has increased from Rs. 304 billion in 2010-11 to Rs. 790 billion in 2016-17, representing an average of 17.5% increase per year since 2010.
Education and Literacy Rates:
Pakistan's net primary enrollment rose from 42% in 2001-2002 to 57% in 2008-9 during Musharraf years. It has been essentially flat at 57% since 2009 under PPP and PML(N) governments.
 |
| Source: Economic Survey of Pakistan 2015-16 |
Similarly, the literacy rate for Pakistan 10 years or older rose from 45% in 2001-2002 to 56% in 2007-2008 during Musharraf years. It has increased just 4% to 60% since 2009-2010 under PPP and PML(N) governments.
 |
| Source: Economic Survey of Pakistan 2015-16 |
Four Levels of Development:
The extensive data compilation and research by Professor Hans Rosling of Sweden has shown that the binary categorization of nations into developed and developing is no longer useful. Instead, he has proposed using 4 levels of development based on health and wealth indicators, a proposal that has now been accepted by the United Nations and the World Bank. Here's how Rosling and the United Nations define these 4 levels:
1. Level 1: One billion people live on level 1. This is what we think of as extreme poverty. If you’re on level 1, you survive on less than $2 a day and get around by walking barefoot. Your food is cooked over an open fire, and you spend most of your day traveling to fetch water. At night, you and your children sleep on a dirt floor.
2. Level 2: Three billion people live on level 2, between $2 and $8 a day. Level 2 means that you can buy shoes and maybe a bike, so it doesn’t take so long to get water. Your kids go to school instead of working all day. Dinner is made over a gas stove, and your family sleeps on mattresses instead of the floor.
Level 3: Two billion people live on level 3, between $8 and $32 a day. You have running water and a fridge in your home. You can also afford a motorbike to make getting around easier. Some of your kids start (and even finish) high school.
Level 4: One billion people live on level 4. If you spend more than $32 a day, you’re on level 4. You have at least a high school education and can probably afford to buy a car and take a vacation once in a while.
Imran Khan's Ambitious Agenda:
Imran Khan laid out his agenda in his first speech to the nation after taking the office of the prime minister. It was more like a fireside chat in which he spoke directly to the people to explain his priorities that emphasize education, health care and human development. These are the keys to leading Pakistan from level 2 to level 3. In order to pursue his priorities, Mr. Khan needs to first address the more urgent economic crisis which he acknowledged. Pakistan needs to deal with excessive public debt and pay for the necessary imports to move forward. He must also deal with financial corruption and mismanagement to free up the resources for his ambitious agenda of economic and human development of the nation.
Mr. Khan will almost certainly face stiff opposition from the status quo forces which stand to lose from the changes he seeks. They will fight to preserve their patronage networks and their power and privilege. They will try to bring down his coalition government with all they have got. They might even threaten his personal safety and security.
Professor Hans Rosling has compiled extensive socioeconomic data and done serious research to understand how nations develop. He has shared his work in "Factfulness" that he co-wrote with his son Ola Rosling and daughter Anna Rosling Ronnlund. Here's an except on democracy and development from Factfulness:
"This is risky but I am going to argue it anyway. I strongly believe that liberal democracy is the best way to run a country. People like me, who believe this, are often tempted to argue that democracy leads to, or its even a requirement for, other good things, like peace, social progress, health improvement, and economic growth. But here's the thing, and it is hard to accept: the evidence does not support this stance.
Most countries that make great economic and social progress are not democracies. South Korea moved from Level 1 to Level 3 faster than any other country had ever done (without finding oil), all the time as a military dictatorship. Of the ten countries with the fastest economic growth, nine of them score low on democracy.
Anyone who claims that democracy is a necessity for economic growth and health improvements will risk getting contradicted by reality. It's better to argue for democracy as a goal in itself instead of as a superior means to other goals we like."
Summary:
Pakistan's human capital has doubled from three years of learning in 1990 to six years of learning in 2016, according to a human capital study of 195 countries recently published in the journal The Lancet. However, Pakistan still ranks a poor 164th in the first-ever scientific study ranking countries for their levels of human capital. India has also doubled its human capital from 3 years to 6 years but Bangladesh stands out by tripling its human capital from two years to six years of learning since 1990. Learning is based on average student scores on internationally comparable tests.
Pakistan saw average annual HDI (Human Development Index) growth rate of 1.08% in 1990-2000, 1.57% in 2000-2010 and 0.95% in 2010-2017, according to Human Development Indices and Indicators 2018 Statistical Update. The fastest growth in Pakistan human development was seen in 2000-2010, a decade dominated by President Musharraf's rule, according to the latest Human Development Report 2018. Pakistan's newly elected Prime Minister Mr. Imran Khan has laid out an ambitious agenda that could accelerate Pakistan's human development progress to take his country from level 2 to level 3 of socioeconomic development. It is achievable but the odds are against him because he faces stiff opposition from the status quo forces. The powerful dynastic duopoly of PPP and PMLN still dominates Pakistan's Senate whose support will be required for major reforms. The research by Professor Hans Rosling shows: "Of the ten countries with the fastest economic growth, nine of them score low on democracy." It's also supported by Pakistan's economic history where pace of development has consistently been faster under military governments than during civilian democratic rule. Can Prime Minister Imran Khan's leadership change the course of history and deliver faster human progress under democratic rule? Let's wait and see.
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Comments
Here are some excepts from the World Bank report:
Unfortunately, although more children are in school, the region still has a major learning challenge in that the children are not acquiring basic skills. For example, only 50 percent of grade 3 students in Punjab, Pakistan, have a complete grasp of grade 1 mathematics (Andrabi et al. 2007). In India, on a test of reading comprehension administered to grade 5 students across the country, only 46 percent were able to correctly identify the cause of an event, and only a third of the students could compute the difference between two decimal numbers (NCERT 2011). Another recent study found that about 43 percent of grade 8 students could not solve a simple division problem. Even recognition of two-digit numbers, supposed to be taught in grade 2, is often not achieved until grade 4 or 5 (Pratham 2011). In Bangladesh, only 25 percent of fifth-grade students have mastered Bangla and 33 percent have mastered the mathematics competencies specified in the national curriculum (World Bank 2013). In the current environment, there is little evidence that learning outcomes will improve by simply increasing school inputs in a business-as-usual manner (Muralidharan and Zieleniak 2012).
In rural Pakistan, the Annual State of Education Report (ASER) 2011 assessment suggests, arithmetic competency is very low in absolute terms. For instance, only 37 percent of grade 5 students can divide three-digit numbers by a single-digit number (and only 27 percent in India); and 28 percent of grade 8 students cannot perform simple division. Unlike in rural India, however, in rural Pakistan recognition of two-digit numbers is widespread by grade 3 (SAFED 2012). The Learning and Educational Achievement in Punjab Schools (LEAPS) survey—a 2003 assessment of 12,000 children in grade 3 in the province—also found that children were performing significantly below curricular standards (Andrabi et al. 2007). Most could not answer simple math questions, and many children finished grade 3 unable to perform mathematical operations covered in the grade 1 curriculum. A 2009 assessment of 40,000 grade 4 students in the province of Sindh similarly found that while 74 percent of students could add two numbers, only 49 percent could subtract two numbers (PEACE 2010).
https://www.riazhaq.com/2014/08/pakistani-children-outperform-indian.html
By Asma Ghan
https://tribune.com.pk/story/1811588/1-pakistan-ranks-164th-terms-human-capital/
The rankings are determined after calculating six years of expected human capital, measured as the number of years a person can be expected to work in the years of peak productivity, taking into account life expectancy, functional health, years of schooling, and learning.
The study “Measuring human capital: A systematic analysis of 195 countries and territories, 1990 to 2016” was published on Tuesday in the international medical journal The Lancet.
“Our findings show the association between investments in education and health and improved human capital and GDP – which policymakers ignore at their own peril,” said Dr Christopher Murray, the director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME).
“As the world economy grows increasingly dependent on digital technology, from agriculture to manufacturing to the service industry, human capital grows increasingly important for stimulating local and national economies,” he said.
According to the survey, Pakistanis only have 5.7 years of expected human capital while Finland’s level of expected human capital in 2016 was 28 years. It reveals that people do not live as long in the workforce as most people in the world, taking into account number of years between ages of 20 and 65 – a time when people are the most active in the workforce. On average, Pakistanis lived 39 of those 45 years, putting Pakistan at number 140 of the 195 countries.
Overall, Pakistan’s residents had 39 out of a possible 45 years of life between the ages of 20 and 64; expected educational attainment of nine years out of a possible of 18 years in school and a learning score of 68 along with a functional health score of 45, both out of 100.
76% Pakistan youth drop out of education: UNDP
The research also shows Pakistanis spend fewer years in school than most in Asia and around the world. An average national spends 8.6 years out of a possible of 18 years in school; as compared to Bangladesh’s 8.2 years and India’s 10.4 years. That puts Pakistan at number 171 in the world in terms of educational attainment. The country has, however, moved up five places since 1990, when it ranked 176.
Meanwhile, Pakistan has done slightly better in terms of education quality. The study measures quality of learning in school and Pakistan ranked 135 in the world – lower than Nepal (127) but higher than India (150).
But the country struggles with illness and disability hampering its workforce. The study’s measure of functional health – which calculates the work impact of ailments like stunting, hearing and vision loss, or infectious diseases like malaria or tuberculosis – ranked Pakistan 177th in the world while India’s functional health ranking is much worse at 187.
The study places Finland at the top. Turkey showed the most dramatic increase in human capital between 1990 and 2016. Asian countries with notable improvement include China, Thailand, Singapore, and Vietnam.
Over the past quarter century, there has been limited progress in building human capital in selected countries that started at a high baseline. The US was ranked sixth in human capital in 1990 but dropped to 27th in 2016 because of minimal progress, particularly in educational attainment, which declined from 13 years to 12.
https://menafn.com/1097503189/Impressive-improvement-in-quality-of-Bangladeshs-human-capital
A study conducted by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the request of the World Bank president, has found that Bangladesh's human capital has improved in quality between 1990 and 2016, reflecting growth in the economy.
The improvement in Bangladesh's case has been better as compared to India and Pakistan, the study reveals.
Bangladesh's ranking of 161th out of 195 countries in 2016 represents an improvement of nine notches from its 1990 ranking of 170th.
However, during that period, India improved only 4 notches from 162 to 158 and Pakistan only one from 165 to 164.
Bangladeshis have 6.1 years of expected human capital, measured as the number of years a person will work in the years of peak productivity, taking into account life expectancy, functional health, years of schooling, and learning.
The study looks at how many years between the ages of 20 and 65 – when people are most active in the workforce – they can expect to live.
On average, Bangladeshis lived 40.7 of those 45 years. That put Bangladesh at 118 of 195 countries. Nepal, Pakistan and India all scored below Bangladesh in this component of the study, but Sri Lanka scored better.
Bangladeshis have an expected educational attainment of 8.2 years out of a possible of 18 years in school; as compared to Pakistan 8.6 years and India 10.4 years out of a possible of 18 years in school.
Bangladeshis struggle with sickness and disability at work. The study's measure of functional health – which calculates the work impact of ailments like stunting, hearing and vision loss, or infectious diseases like malaria or tuberculosis – ranked Bangladesh at 165 in the world. India's functional health ranking is significantly lower at 187.
Bangladesh does slightly better in terms of education quality. The study measures the quality of learning in school and Bangladesh ranked 132 in the world – lower than Nepal (ranked 127), Bhutan (120), and Myanmar (106), but higher than India (150).
Learning is based on average student scores on internationally comparable tests.
The study places Finland at the top, with the highest human capital score in the world.
Turkey showed the most dramatic increase in human capital between 1990 and 2016. Asian countries with notable improvement include China, Thailand, Singapore, and Vietnam.
Within Latin America, Brazil stands out for improvement.
All these countries have had faster economic growth over this period than peer countries with lower levels of human capital improvement.
In addition, the greatest increase among sub-Saharan African countries was in Equatorial Guinea. Some of the world's most rapid improvements were in the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
(The featured image at the top shows a female civil engineer supervises men at a Bangladesh construction site. Photo: Dhaka Tribune)
https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/economy/india-inches-ahead-on-human-capital-study/article25034783.ece
Explaining India’s ranking of 158th in 2016, an improvement from its 1990 ranking of 162, an IHME note said that it came from seven years of expected human capital, measured as the number of years a person can be expected to work in the years of peak productivity, taking into account life expectancy, functional health, years of schooling, and learning.
“Overall, India’s residents had 39 out of a possible 45 years of life between the ages of 20 and 64; expected educational attainment of 10 years out of a possible of 18 years in school; and a learning score of 66 and a functional health score of 43, both out of 100. Learning is based on average student scores on internationally comparable tests. Components measured in the functional health score include stunting, wasting, anemia, cognitive impairments, hearing and vision loss, and infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis”, the note said.
Finland topped the study, while Turkey showed the most dramatic increase in human capital. Asian countries that showed an improvement in the period included China, Thailand, Singapore, and Vietnam. Within Latin America, Brazil stood out for its improvement, the IHME said, adding that all these countries showed a faster economic growth than peer countries with lower levels of human capital improvement.
Over the past quarter century, there has been limited progress in building human capital in selected countries that started at a high baseline. The US was ranked sixth in human capital in 1990 but dropped to 27th in 2016 because of minimal progress, particularly in educational attainment, which declined from 13 years to 12, the note explained.
Automation and malnutrition could create a global underclass and provoke unrest on a par with the Arab Spring.
This isn’t the opening sentence of a dystopian novel, it’s the bleak picture painted by the head of the World Bank, Jim Yong Kim in a speech at Stanford University about the Bank’s new Human Capital Index, which measures the knowledge, skills and health of populations.
The index is a wake-up call to countries that don’t invest in the health and education of their populations. Some countries, however, are getting it right.
Top scores for advanced Asian economies
The World Bank’s Human Capital Index aims to capture the amount of “human capital” a child born today could expect to accumulate by age 18.
It does this by breaking down human capital into a series of indicators on health and education.
For instance, the index looks at how likely it is that a child will reach the age of five, how many years of schooling they can expect to receive and the quality of that education, as well as whether they eat a full and complete diet and how likely they are to live to the age of 60.
The index scores countries between 0 and 1. In a country with a score of 1, all adults can expect to survive until the age of 60, every child can expect to receive 14 years of high-quality education and no child would suffer stunting (when children don’t grow and develop properly and are too short for their age because of poor nutrition).
Asian economies take four of the first five places, with Singapore at the top, with a score of 0.88.
The vast majority (98%) of Singaporean children can expect to reach the international benchmark for basic levels of proficiency in secondary school.
Human capital index Image: World Bank in Forum Social Images
The Republic of Korea and Japan are next with scores of 0.84. A girl born in 2018 in the Republic of Korea can expect to live more than 85 years.
Hong Kong SAR is in fourth place with 0.82. Finland completes the top five.
‘Left behind’
However, too many countries achieve a low score.
Children in rich countries can expect to receive the full 14 years of schooling used by the index as a benchmark. But in the poorest countries, children can expect to complete only half of that.
Meanwhile, 115 million children are stunted as a result of malnutrition, leaving them vulnerable to poor cognitive development and hampering their ability to learn.
The World Bank estimates that 250,000 children are in school but aren’t learning because of the poor quality of educational provision.
These issues become a stark reality when you compare Singapore’s index rating with that of South Africa’s.
In South Africa, which scores 0.41 on the index, only 26% of children can expect to complete secondary school to the same standard as their Singaporean counterparts. In Singapore, a child born today can expect to live until they are 89. In South Africa, it’s 68.
Adjusting to an automated future
This gap in human potential becomes even more urgent when we consider the changing nature of work. Technological advancements will require us to adapt to machines and algorithms taking over tasks previously done by humans.
According to the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report, the Fourth Industrial Revolution will bring significant job disruption.
The shift in the division of labour between humans, machines and algorithms could displace 75 million current jobs, but the report also finds that 133 million new roles may emerge at the same time.
The World Bank report argues that workers will need “advanced cognitive and sociobehavioral skills" such as “problem-solving, critical thinking and adaptation to new methods”. Otherwise, they will be unable to adjust to the coming changes.
https://gulfnews.com/world/asia/pakistan/science-festival-inspires-students-in-rural-pakistan-1.60991206
With their vibrant scientific models and stimulating explanations, students from the historical city of Thatta, in Pakistan’s Sindh province, not only displayed their talent but also fascinated visitors at the first ever Laar Science Festival.
More than 7,000 students from over 50 regional schools and colleges participated in the two-day (Dec 14-15) festival at Thatta’s Sports Complex.
A large number of teachers, entrepreneurs, science specialists and government officials also attended the event including Dr Nawaz Sogho, Deputy Commissioner of Thatta, Senator Sassui Palijo from Thatta district, Sindh’s Minister of Science and Technology Taimur Talpur.
Admiring the talent of local students in science and technology, minister Talpur promised to establish science centres in the region to groom young scientists.
“It’s amazing to see the scientific spirit in the ancient city of Thatta famous for its archaeological, cultural sites and the seat of three successive dynasties,” said Junaid Ahmad Dahar, CEO of Sindh Education Alliance.
He agreed with most of the visitors that the high level of participation by the students was a clear indication of their interest in utilising everyday science to work towards solving issues in their towns and cities.
Organised by Thar Education Alliance (TEA), Campaignistan, and Laar Education Campaign with the support of District Government of Thatta, the festival reached rural students who would not typically have the chance to attend science and technology events.
The science fest promoted a culture of inquiry and hands-on learning in STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics) subjects.
“We started this journey of organising science festivals from Tharparkar back in February 2018, and continuing this campaign for quality education in Pakistan” remarked Partab Shivani, CEO Thar Education Alliance and organiser of the event.
The theme of the event was ‘climate change’ to raise awareness on the issue as Pakistan has been ranked 7 on the list of climate vulnerable countries. To raise public awareness on the effects of climate change, the event was held in Sindh province, which is vulnerable to increased intensity of extreme weather events such as frequent floods and droughts.
Young scientists exhibited projects on solar panels, windmills, water purification, offering innovative solutions to climate change.
A project by Nimra Memon, a Grade 12 student at Concept School, Thatta, was highly acclaimed at the festival as well as on social media where her video received appreciation from Climate Change Adviser Malik Amin Aslam.
“The festival in my hometown Thatta has enhanced my interest in science and encouraged me to work on solutions to climate change and aware the people of Laar on the issue.”
After explaining the phenomenon and impact of global warming, she asked the visitors: “If it is not the time to talk about climate change, then when will be the right time?”
Campaignistan CEO Farhad Ahmad Jarral said: “We live in a digital age, where there is need to connect online and offline to bring change in the education discourse. The festival was appreciated by thousands online and sparked interest among students in other regions of Pakistan when the pictures and videos of students of Thatta were shared online.”
Pakistan ranks 51, above Italy (60), Russia (72), Turkey(94) and Brazil (124) among 140 countries.
https://twitter.com/spectatorindex/status/1117095097064095744
1. Switzerland
2. US
3. Netherlands
6. Malaysia
7. Germany
20. Canada
28. UK
33. Indonesia
35. France
36. India
37. China
40. Japan
43. S Korea
50. Saudi
51. Pakistan
60. Italy
63. Mexico
72. Russia
94. Turkey
124. Brazil
135. Nigeria
136. Egypt
(WEF)
https://www.ceicdata.com/en/pakistan/education-statistics/pk-school-enrollment-primary--gross
https://tribune.com.pk/story/1811588/1-pakistan-ranks-164th-terms-human-capital/
The list of 195 countries places Pakistan behind Rwanda (ranked 163rd) and just ahead of Tanzania (ranked 165th), with United States standing at 27th place and India at 158th.
Shockingly, Pakistan has improved its ranking just two places from 166 in 1990 to 164 in 2016 in more than two and a half decades, the study reveals. Pakistan is also falling behind in terms of health and human resources, which could have long-term negative effects on its economy.
The rankings are determined after calculating six years of expected human capital, measured as the number of years a person can be expected to work in the years of peak productivity, taking into account life expectancy, functional health, years of schooling, and learning.
The study “Measuring human capital: A systematic analysis of 195 countries and territories, 1990 to 2016” was published on Tuesday in the international medical journal The Lancet.
“Our findings show the association between investments in education and health and improved human capital and GDP – which policymakers ignore at their own peril,” said Dr Christopher Murray, the director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME).
“As the world economy grows increasingly dependent on digital technology, from agriculture to manufacturing to the service industry, human capital grows increasingly important for stimulating local and national economies,” he said.
According to the survey, Pakistanis only have 5.7 years of expected human capital while Finland’s level of expected human capital in 2016 was 28 years. It reveals that people do not live as long in the workforce as most people in the world, taking into account number of years between ages of 20 and 65 – a time when people are the most active in the workforce. On average, Pakistanis lived 39 of those 45 years, putting Pakistan at number 140 of the 195 countries.
Overall, Pakistan’s residents had 39 out of a possible 45 years of life between the ages of 20 and 64; expected educational attainment of nine years out of a possible of 18 years in school and a learning score of 68 along with a functional health score of 45, both out of 100.
https://www.riazhaq.com/2019/05/growing-china-pakistan-collaboration-in.html
With 6,000 Pakistanis working on their PhDs in China, the two countries are enjoying rapid growth in scientific and technological collaboration, according to Journal Nature. Pakistan's scientific output is now growing at the fastest rate in the world. With nearly 3,000 papers jointly authored and published by Chinese and Pakistani researcher, China has now emerged as Pakistan's top partner in scientific collaborations, surpassing Saudi Arabia (about 1,500 papers) and the United States (about 1,200 papers) in 2018, according to an analysis of co-authored papers from Elsevier’s Scopus database. China is co-sponsoring a range of research centers in Pakistan that are studying topics from rice agriculture to artificial intelligence and railway engineering.
Pakistan-China ties are rapidly growing well beyond the economy and the military with tens of thousands of Chinese and Pakistani citizens regularly traveling between the two countries. More Pakistanis than ever are learning the Chinese language. China with its world class educational institutions is emerging as one of the top destinations for Pakistanis studying abroad. Currently, 6,156 Pakistani students are studying in Ph.D., 3,600 in Masters, 11,100 in Bachelors and 3,000 in Short Term Exchange Programs across China. Pakistan ranks third in the number of international students currently studying in China with 28,023 Pakistani students, according to a statement issued by China’s Ministry of Education. It is becoming a truly multi-dimensional relationship which will help Pakistan rise with China on the world stage.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-05/29/c_138099444.htm
After the conclusion of the First Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation (BRF) in Beijing in 2017, a delegation of Pakistan's largest province Punjab headed to Tianjin and signed an agreement with the coastal municipality to cooperate on vocational education.
In July 2018, Tianjin Modern Vocational Technology College and Punjab's Technical Education and Vocational Training Authority co-founded the Pakistan Luban Workshop in Punjab. The workshop offers courses such as new energy vehicles and electromechanical integration technology.
Ali (Arqam, 19) was among the first batch of students recruited by the workshop. "The learning process is so much fun, just like playing toys," he said, adding he was impressed by the advanced training facilities of the workshop.
Apart from the workshop in Pakistan, eight Luban Workshops have been set up in Asia, Africa and Europe since 2016, training more than 4,000 students and about 600 teachers.
"The workshop doesn't teach local students directly but trains local teachers at first. This is a bridge connecting China's vocational education with the world," said Lyu Jingquan, deputy director of Tianjin Municipal Education Commission.
In addition, the Punjab Tianjin University of Technology (PTUT) featuring vocational education was established in 2018, by three Tianjin universities and a vocational education training organization of Punjab. With nearly 500 students, PTUT offers seven specialties including mechanical engineering, automotive engineering, electrical engineering, electric engineering, fashion design and architecture.
"The students show great interest in our courses and are able to quickly acclimate to the new teaching methods," said Zhao Wei, a teacher from Tianjin University of Technology and Education, who's now teaching at PTUT.
VOCATIONAL EDUCATION BOOSTS DEVELOPMENT
Of the nearly 200 million people in Pakistan, people aged between 16 and 30 accounts for about 60 percent of the entire population.
"We have a large number of young people, who need to be trained to master a skill, which could help them secure a job," said Muhammad Asif, the academic dean with PTUT.
Asif believed that professional and technical personnel have played an important role in China's economic development and helped China achieve great prosperity. The government of Punjab hopes to promote vocational education, cultivate highly skilled labor force, and increase youth employment, by learning from China's experience.
"Punjab attempts to improve employment through enhancing vocational education, while we also want to foster more talents for both Pakistani and Chinese enterprises along the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)," said Liu Xin, president of Tianjin University of Technology and Education.
Pakistan hopes to learn from China's experience of vocational education development to stimulate the development of the CPEC, according to Syed Javed Hassan, Chairman of Pakistan National Vocational and Technical Training Commission.
After over five years of construction, CPEC has yielded fruitful achievements, creating more than 75,000 jobs for Pakistan.
Aside from vocational education cooperation, China and Pakistan have a wider range of cooperation in education.
Statistics showed around 2,500 students from Pakistan went to study in China in 2017, and the number of Pakistani students in China stands at 22,000 as of May 2019.
The Prime Minster met with the visiting President of the World Economic Forum, Mr.BorgeBrende, at the Prime Minister’s office. At the meeting, the Prime Minister announced the establishment of the National Accelerator on Closing the Skills Gapin Pakistan, in partnership with the World Economic Forum, with Punjab Skills Development Fund (PSDF) serving as its national secretariat.
The World Economic Forum is the international organization for public-private cooperation. The Forum engages the foremost political, business and other leaders of society to shape global, regional and industry agendas. It is independent, impartial and not tied to any special interests. The Forum has established the Centre for New Economy and Society (CNES) to provide leaders with a platform to understand and act on emerging economic and social challenges.The Forum’s Centre for New Economy and Society has partnered with PSDF to work together on the future of education and work by setting up a National Accelerator on Closing the Skills Gap in Pakistan. The Accelerator will aim to increase the employability of the current workforce and increase work-readiness and critical skills in the future workforce.
The National Accelerator will be led and guided by a team of Co-Chairs from the public and private sectors. The Government will be represented by Mr. Shafqat Mahmood, Federal Minister of Education and Professional Training and Mr. Zulfiqar Bukhari, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister on Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resource Development. The Co-Chairs from the private sector include Ms. Shazia Syed, MD Unilever Pakistan, Mr. Mohammed Aurangzeb, President and CEO, Habib Bank Limited, Mr. Ghias Khan, CEO, Engro Corporation. PSDF CEO, Mr. Jawad Khan, will be the National Coordinator.
Focusing on the most strategic sectors in the economy, the Accelerator will also onboard the CEOs of 50 to 100 leading companies in Pakistan as well as academics, policy makers and technical experts from the education and skills development space. The Centre for New Economy and Society has already established 5 such Accelerators in Argentina, Oman, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates and India, with 10 more Accelerators expected by 2020.
At the meeting, the Prime Minister shared his Government’s political and financial commitment to reform the skills development sectors in Pakistan and thanked the World Economic Forum for choosing Pakistan as a founding member of the Closing the Skills Gap National Accelerator initiative. Given its global reach, experience and expertise, the Prime Minister expressed his confidence that the Forum’s engagement will help provide new opportunities for Pakistan’s youth and help them develop new skills to fully embrace the impact of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
Mr. BorgeBrende, President, World Economic Forum, said: “The launch of the National Accelerator on Closing the Skills Gap is an important milestone in our relationship with Pakistan and it is just the start. Many of Pakistan’s national priorities are the core focus of the Forum’s work. From climate change, water scarcity and connectivity to regional cooperation, the Forum is ready to offer its platform to support Pakistan’s economic transformation.”
Ms. Saadia Zahidi, Managing Director and Head of the Forum’s Centre for New Economy and Society, said: “The Fourth Industrial Revolution will lead to significant change in the employment and skills landscape globally over the coming years – and Pakistan is no exception. Through our Accelerator initiative we look forward to supporting Pakistan with an integrated platform for learning and action to proactively manage this change.”
They (Scandinavians) look at education differently than we do. The German word they used to describe their approach, bildung, doesn’t even have an English equivalent. It means the complete moral, emotional, intellectual and civic transformation of the person. It was based on the idea that if people were going to be able to handle and contribute to an emerging industrial society, they would need more complex inner lives.
Today, Americans often think of schooling as the transmission of specialized skill sets — can the student read, do math, recite the facts of biology. Bildung is devised to change the way students see the world. It is devised to help them understand complex systems and see the relations between things — between self and society, between a community of relationships in a family and a town.
As Lene Rachel Andersen and Tomas Bjorkman put it in their book “The Nordic Secret,” “Bildung is the way that the individual matures and takes upon him or herself ever bigger personal responsibility towards family, friends, fellow citizens, society, humanity, our globe, and the global heritage of our species, while enjoying ever bigger personal, moral and existential freedoms.”
The Nordic educators worked hard to cultivate each student’s sense of connection to the nation. Before the 19th century, most Europeans identified themselves in local and not national terms. But the Nordic curriculum instilled in students a pride in, say, their Danish history, folklore and heritage.
“That which a person did not burn for in his young days, he will not easily work for as a man,” Christopher Arndt Bruun wrote. The idea was to create in the mind of the student a sense of wider circles of belonging — from family to town to nation — and an eagerness to assume shared responsibility for the whole.
The Nordic educators also worked hard to develop the student’s internal awareness. That is to say, they helped students see the forces always roiling inside the self — the emotions, cravings, wounds and desires. If you could see those forces and their interplay, as if from the outside, you could be their master and not their slave.
Their intuition was that as people grow, they have the ability to go through developmental phases, to see themselves and the world through ever more complex lenses. A young child may blindly obey authority — Mom, Dad, teacher. Then she internalizes and conforms to the norms of the group. Then she learns to create her own norms based on her own values. Then she learns to see herself as a node in a network of selves and thus learns mutuality and holistic thinking.
The purpose of bildung is to help people move through the uncomfortable transitions between each way of seeing.
That educational push seems to have had a lasting influence on the culture. Whether in Stockholm or Minneapolis, Scandinavians have a tendency to joke about the way their sense of responsibility is always nagging at them. They have the lowest rates of corruption in the world. They have a distinctive sense of the relationship between personal freedom and communal responsibility.
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/549580-pakistan-produces-20-000-it-graduates-engineers-annually-says-minister
LAHORE:Provincial Minister for Industries and Trade Mian Aslam Iqbal Friday said that government was moving towards right direction by adopting more business friendly policies.Addressing Lift Pakistan 2019 conference hosted by a business group here in a hotel, the minister said the government was fully committed to serve and facilitate its business community.He said Pakistan was ranked at number 4 for free lance development in the world and IT exports increased 70 percent during the last three years. Pakistan has more than 2,000 IT companies and call centres, and 300,000 English speaking IT professionals and 20,000 IT graduates and engineers being produced annually.At present, around 52 incubation and acceleration programmes exist in the country from each of which 7-15 startups are graduating every year. In addition to incubators and accelerators, the start-up of echo system has been strengthened by co-working spaces, business process outsourcing services, 11 fellowship programmes growing scale of angel investment and the launch of local chapter of global initiatives, he said.The minister appreciated the organisers for collaborative efforts in organising an excellent platform to bring together the creative young mind professionals, academicians, entrepreneurs and leading business personalities to explore new opportunities in the real potential of growth of our nation.The minister said the government was working aggressively towards creating a comprehensive start of ecosystem so as to channel the real potential of this growing market. He said that in the World Bank doing business report 2020, Pakistan improved by 28 points on the ease of doing business ranking from 136 to 108 out of 190 economies. He said in order to make national economy grow faster, it is utterly important to continue efforts to ensure a conducive business environment.The government has taken measures which will guarantee and ensure that the business community’s investments in Punjab are secured and their returns are assured. The Punjab government has recently launched e-pay, a mobile application for all business to government and public to government payments in order to facilitate the public and improve country’s revenue collection through easy payment solutions, he concluded.Kilns’ closure delayed: Environment Protection Secretary Salman Ijaz has said that brick-kilns will not be closed immediately in case of improving of air quality index. He stressed upon kiln owners to make their kilns environment friendly by converting the same on zigzag technology to get production throughout the year. This was stated by him while presiding over a meeting here Friday.Director General Environment Tanveer Ahmad Warraich, Director Environment Naseem-ur-Rehman, central and provincial presidents of All Pakistan Mines and Mineral Associations Mir Behroz and Khalid Pervaiz, Chairperson Hyderabad Mir Samad, other representatives, owners of kilns and coal agents were present on this occasion.
@javedhassan
“We design courses in collaboration with industry and play a very important role in terms of international linkages and accreditation in the skills area. Traditionally, these skills would include plumbing, electrical, welding, carpentry, etc; today they encompass high-tech areas”
“such as AI, coding and web design. To summarise, NAVTTC designs policy for the government, allocates resources and ensures that the standards meet the local market requirements and are internationally accepted as well.”
https://twitter.com/javedhassan/status/1450857983966130179?s=20
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https://aurora.dawn.com/news/1144225
MAB: How receptive is the industry to this idea?
SJH: People in the industry always maintain that training is the critical need of the country and we should be investing much more in that direction. The reality is that they look to the government to provide all the training and the facilities; they don’t want to invest time and energy in a more involved collaboration. We have tried to work with the Chambers of Commerce, but so far, we have not seen the kind of enthusiasm that is needed. However, things are changing. For example, we are working closely with the Hashoo Group to train young people in the hospitality sector. We are also working with a few manufacturing companies that are providing training on the factory floor. Pakistan’s main problem is productivity and productivity is dependent on the capability of the labour force; unless industry is prepared to invest in them, it will not have a capable labour force.
MAB: From which educational stream do most trainees come from?
SJH: When we were just offering traditional skills, we were attracting young people from the Matric or FSC level from government schools; young people who probably were unable to get into a university. As a result, there was a stigma attached to vocational training, an unfair one in my view – and people preferred not to opt for vocational training, even though there are good jobs out there and with good earning potential. Under Hunarmand Pakistan’s Kamyab Jawan Scheme, we have introduced high-end technical skills that offer entrepreneurial or digital facing opportunities, and since then we have seen a very different kind of student body coming in. Many are graduates who have not found jobs because they lack industry experience (it makes you wonder what kind of graduates we are producing that the industry is unwilling to hire them) and have taken advantage of the courses we offer and almost immediately found jobs. In the first phase, we trained about 40% of our intake in traditional skills, and according to an internal survey, almost 65% found a job. In terms of the high-end technical skills, about 80 to 85% have either started their own companies, are freelancing or are in jobs. We are now seeing young people from different social stratas taking up the trainings we offer. We cannot know everything about the market and one of the best proxies to understand the market requirements is to find out what the young themselves want to learn; they better than anyone else know what kind of jobs are out there and we have persuaded the institutes to talk to industry as well as to the young people and design the courses accordingly. As a result, applications have been much higher compared to the previous ones, when NAVTTC as well as the vocational institutes had to run after people to persuade them to enrol; in fact, this time, the courses have been oversubscribed. We should not underestimate the wisdom of young people. Most of them want to find jobs and stand on their own feet; do not force them on to a certain path; instead, ask them what path they want to follow and enable it.
By Atta-ur-Rahman December 08, 2021
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/915013-quality-higher-education
The landscape of higher education changed dramatically between 2002 and 2008 so much so that Pakistan not only caught up with India but also overtook it in the year 2018. This is no small achievement as India had been investing in higher education since its very birth – this includes the visionary policies of Nehru who established the IITs and other good quality higher education institutions in the 1950s and 60s.
The single most important element that determines the quality of higher education is the quality of faculty. For this reason, when the HEC was set up in 2002 under my chairmanship, the highest priority was given to the training and recruitment of high-quality faculty in our universities.
After a rigorous screening process, some 11,000 students were sent to the world’s leading universities, and to attract them back on completion of their doctorate degrees, several important initiatives were introduced. First, a new contractual salary structure was introduced with the salaries of professors several times higher than that of federal ministers in the government. Second, students completing their PhD degrees could apply for research grants of up to $100,000 – one year before completion of their work.
Third, graduates would have jobs on arrival with the HEC paying the salary. Fourth, an excellent digital library was set up that provided free access to 65,000 journals and 25,000 textbooks through the Pakistan Educational Research Network (PERN) that connected all universities with high-speed internet. Fifth, free access to sophisticated instruments was provided. Sixth, grants were made available through a liberal research grants scheme – National Research Projects for Universities (NRPU) – to help young academics to win sizeable research funding. These and other such measures led to a 97.5 percent return rate of scholars.
To control plagiarism, specialised software was introduced, which controlled this problem to a great extent. However, this issue persists – to a small extent – both in India and Pakistan and other countries. According to an article published in 2019 in ‘Nature India’, 980 papers published by top Indian institutions, including those from the IITs, between 2000 and 2017, were fraudulent or plagiarised and had to be retracted. Between 2005 and 2021, 254 publications were also retracted from Pakistan. This is an average of 15 papers per year (about 0.1 percent to 0.3 percent retractions annually).
To promote blended education, a mirror website of the MIT Open Courseware was set up in 2005 when I was the HEC chairman, and many undergraduate computer science courses were downloaded, copied on CDs, and distributed to all universities. An exciting scheme for live distance education was also introduced by us with top professors delivering daily lectures which were listened to live and interactively across Pakistan. A major programme was initiated to attract our highly qualified Pakistan diaspora back to the country.
Some 600 eminent academicians returned and played a valuable role in uplifting the quality of higher education in the country. Split PhD programmes were introduced so that PhD students in Pakistan could do a split PhD with a part of their time being spent in good foreign universities under the supervision of eminent foreign scholars. Pakistan was soon recognised internationally for these efforts, and glowing tributes were paid in numerous articles written by the world’s leading educational authorities as well as by neutral experts of the British Council, World Bank, USAID, and UN. I was conferred the highest prize for institution-building by the World Academy of Sciences (Italy) and by the Austrian and Chinese governments.
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/915013-quality-higher-education
Unfortunately, there was a sharp decline in the quality of higher education due to the actions of the former chairman HEC in the last three years which were condemned by 178 out of the 180 vice chancellors of different public and private universities, who participated in a recent event organised in Bhurban.
Prime Minister Imran Khan is interested in the development of science and higher education in Pakistan. This is reflected in several actions of his government to support the efforts of the PM Task Force of Knowledge Economy: First, after years of stagnation, the present government has announced a sizeable increase in the operational budget of universities by a grant of an additional Rs15 billion on top of the Rs66 billion previously allocated – this is an increase of about 23 percent.
Second, after a decade of neglect, the salary structures of the tenure track faculty have been increased by 35 percent for all and by 100 percent for the best faculty members. Third, the Pakistan-Austrian University of Applied Science and Engineering has been established which is the only university in the country (and possibly in the Subcontinent) with 100 percent PhD-level faculty. This university has been developed in collaboration with three Austrian and five Chinese universities – its academic session has already started. Two other such universities are now being set up in Sialkot and Islamabad.
Fourth, a huge scholarship programme of Rs13 billion has again been launched. Fifth, the research grants NRPU initiative that had been dropped by the previous chairman has been given a new life and some 1,200 research grants will be given to young faculty members across Pakistan this year. Sixth, centres of excellence in new and emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, materials engineering etc are being set up across Pakistan, and 26 projects worth over Rs67 billion have already been approved.
Seventh, the development budget of the Ministry of Science and Technology has now been increased by about 600 percent by the Knowledge Economy Task Force projects after years of stagnation. Eight, IT education is being prioritised. The visionary new policies proposed by the IT/Telecom task force of which I happen to be co-chairman have resulted in a 50 percent growth of IT exports from $1.3 billion to $2.1 billion during the last one year, and a huge revival of the IT industry is underway.
A silent revolution is now finally underway in Pakistan. The credit for this goes to Prime Minister Imran Khan and his whole-hearted support to three important task forces – the Science and Technology Task Force, the IT/Telecom Task Force and the Knowledge Economy Task Force – that are being steered by us.
By Dr Ayesha RazzaqueMay 22, 2022
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/959718-pakistan-s-generational-shift
In this generation only 18.7 per cent of rural women are without an education, down from 75.5 per cent from their mothers’ generation. Nearly 50 per cent have an education ranging from a primary to secondary education, up from just 20 per cent in the previous generation. A stunning 22.9 per cent have a higher secondary or above education, up from an almost nothing 0.3 per cent in their previous generation.
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Last year saw the publication of ‘Womansplaining – Navigating Activism, Politics and Modernity in Pakistan,’ a book edited by Federal Minister Sherry Rehman to which I was able to contribute a chapter. It connected education with women’s rights and argued that indigenous movements like the Aurat March should focus on education as a core part of their agenda.
Detractors of Pakistan’s women’s rights movement have been taking potshots at it by claiming that the issues it raises are not the issues of ‘real’ (read: rural) women. Put aside for a minute the fact that Pakistan’s rural population now accounts for 62 per cent, down from 72 per cent in 1980, and is on a steady decline. While the numbers may differ, and women’s power to negotiate may differ, rural and urban women share basic challenges and better education can yield similar opportunities and improvements in life circumstances.
Indigenous progressive and women’s rights movements have adopted the cause of education as an agenda item but should make it front and center, specifically K-12 education for girls in rural areas. New data further substantiates that connection with numbers. Education up to the higher secondary level, just the education that rural schools offer today, is the enabler that brings increased women’s labour force participation, delayed first marriage, lower rates of consanguinity, increased income, increased spousal income, and is a contributing factor to greater freedom of movement and communication – all positives.
Studies exploring the relationships between levels of education and life circumstances around the world are plentiful and capture the situation at a point and place in time. The Learning and Educational Achievements in Pakistan Schools (LEAPS) programme is qualitatively different because it already spans a period of almost two decades. The LEAPS programme has been tracking lower- and middle-income households in 120 randomly selected villages across three districts in rural Punjab since 2003. It has been revisiting them since then, most recently for the sixth time in 2018, roughly once every three years. That makes it one of the largest and longest panels of households in lower- and middle-income countries. This study is also unique as it looks at return on investment in education beyond an individual’s income and looks into the possible spillover into life circumstances and quality-of-life which is especially interesting for those interested in women empowerment and feminist movements.
In this latest round it surveyed 2006 women now aged 20-30. All these women were from the same 120 birth villages and have been tracked to their marital homes within or outside the village if they have married, migrated or moved for any other reason. Preliminary descriptive results of the long-running LEAPS study tell interesting stories. The headline finding of LEAPS investigators is that Pakistan is in the midst of a ‘generational shift’ where, for the first time in its education history, we have a ‘critical mass of moderately educated women’.
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Existing plans, at least in the domain of education, remain unguided by some of the very excellent evidence that is available. Meanwhile, the Planning Commission is organizing a ‘Turnaround Pakistan’ conference perhaps as early as May 28 to conduct national consultations. Whether a hurriedly thrown together conference can change the way business is done remains to be seen.
https://www.finance.gov.pk/survey/chapter_22/PES10-EDUCATION.pdf
Pakistan is committed to transform its education system into a high-quality global
market demand driven system in accordance with the Goal 4 of Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs) which pertains to quality of education. The progress
achieved by Pakistan so far on Goal 4 of SDGs is as under:
Primary, Lower and Upper Secondary Education Completion Rate stood at 67
percent, 47 percent and 23 percent, respectively, depicting higher Primary
attendance than Lower and Upper Secondary levels.
Parity Indices at Literacy, Youth Literacy, Primary and Secondary are 0.71, 0.82, 0.88
and 0.89, respectively.
Participation rate in organized learning (one year before the official primary entry
age), by sex is 19 percent showing a low level of consideration of Pre-Primary
Education.
Percentage of population in a given age group achieving at least affixed level of
proficiency in functional; (a) literacy and (b) numeracy skills is 60 percent.
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Literacy, Gross Enrolment Rate (GER) and Net Enrolment Rate (NER)
Literacy
During 2021-22, PSLM Survey was not conducted due to upcoming Population and
Housing Census 2022. Therefore, the figures for the latest available survey regarding
GER and NER may be considered for the analysis. However, according to Labour Force
Survey 2020-21, literacy rate trends shows 62.8 percent in 2020-21 (as compared to
62.4 percent in 2018-19), more in males (from 73.0 percent to 73.4 percent) than
females (from 51.5 percent to 51.9 percent). Area-wise analysis suggest literacy increase
in both rural (53.7 percent to 54.0 percent) and urban (76.1 percent to 77.3 percent).
Male-female disparity seems to be narrowing down with time span. Literacy rate gone
up in all provinces, Punjab (66.1 percent to 66.3 percent), Sindh (61.6 percent to 61.8
percent), Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (52.4 percent to 55.1 percent) and Balochistan (53.9
percent to 54.5 percent). [Table10.2].
Table 10.2: Literacy Rate (10 Years and Above) (Percent)
Province/Area 2018-19 2020-21
Male Female Total Male Female Total
Pakistan 73.0 51.5 62.4 73.4 51.9 62.8
Rural 67.1 40.4 53.7 67.2 40.8 54.0
Urban 82.2 69.7 76.1 83.5 70.8 77.3
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During 2021-22, PSLM Survey was not conducted due to upcoming Population and
Housing Census 2022. Therefore, the figures for the latest available survey are reported
here.
Table 10.3: National and Provincial GER (Age 6 -10 years) at Primary Level (Classes1-5)(Percent)
Province/Area 2014-15 2019-20
Male Female Total Male Female Total
Pakistan 98 82 91 89 78 84
Punjab 103 92 98 93 90 92
Sindh 88 69 79 78 62 71
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
(Including Merged Areas)
- - - 96 73 85
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
(Excluding Merged Areas)
103 80 92 98 79 89
Balochistan 89 54 73 84 56 72
Source: Pakistan Social and Living Standards Measurement (PSLM) District Level Survey, 2019-20,
Pakistan Bureau of Statistics.
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Annual Status of Education Report (ASER)
Annual Status of Education Report (ASER-Rural) 2021, is the largest citizen-led
household-based learning survey across all provinces/areas: Sindh, Balochistan, Punjab,
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), Gilgit Baltistan (GB), Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) and
Azad Jammu Kashmir (AJK). According to the ASER 2021, 10,000 trained
volunteer/enumerators surveyed 87,415 households in 4,420 villages across 152 rural
districts of Pakistan. Detailed information of 247,978 children aged 3-16 has been
collected (57 percent male and 43 percent female), and of these, 212,105 children aged
5-16 years were assessed for language and arithmetic competencies. Moreover, 585
transgenders were also a part of the surveyed sample. Major findings of ASER 2021 and
its comparison with 2019 is given in Box-II
https://www.finance.gov.pk/survey/chapter_22/PES11-HEALTH.pdf
Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) in Pakistan has declined to 54.2 deaths per 1,000 live births
in 2020 from 55.7 in 2019, while Neonatal Mortality Rate declined to 40.4 deaths per
1,000 live births in 2020 from 41.2 in 2019. Percentage of birth attended by skilled
health personnel increased to 69.3 percent in 2020 from 68 percent in 2019 (DHS & UNICEF). Maternal Mortality Ratio fell to 186 maternal deaths per 100,000 births in
2020, from 189 in 2019 (Table 11.1).
With a population growing at 2 percent per annum, Pakistan’s contraceptive prevalence
rate in 2020 decreased to 33 percent from 34 percent in 2019 (Trading Economics).
Pakistan’s tuberculosis incidence is 259 per 100,000 population and HIV prevalence rate
is 0.12 per 1,000 population in 2020.
Table 11.1: Health Indicators of Pakistan
2019 2020
Maternal Mortality Ratio (Per 100,000 Births)* 189 186
Neonatal Mortality Rate (Per 1,000 Live Births) 41.2 40.4
Mortality Rate, Infant (Per 1,000 Live Births) 55.7 54.2
Under-5 Mortality Rate (Per 1,000) 67.3 65.2
Incidence of Tuberculosis (Per 100,000 People) 263 259
Incidence of HIV (Per 1,000 Uninfected Population) 0.12 0.12
Life Expectancy at Birth, (Years) 67.3 67.4
Births Attended By Skilled Health Staff (% of Total)** 68.0 (2015) 69.3 (2018)
Contraceptive Prevalence, Any Methods (% of Women Ages 15-49) 34.0 33
Source: WDI, UNICEF, Trading Economics & Our World in data
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Food and nutrition
Calories/day 2019-20 2457 2020-21 2786 2021-22 2735
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Table 11.9: Availability of Major Food Items per annum (Kg per capita)
Food Items 2019-20 2020-21 2021-22 (P)**
Cereals 139.9 170.8 164.7
Pulses 7.8 7.6 7.3
Sugar 23.3 28.5 28.3
Milk (Liter) 168.7 171.8 168.8
Meat (Beef, Mutton, Chicken) 22.0 22.9 22.5
Fish 2.9 2.9 2.9
Eggs (Dozen) 7.9 8.2 8.1
Edible Oil/ Ghee 14.8 15.1 14.5
Fruits & Vegetables 53.6 52.4 68.3
Calories/day 2457 2786 2735
Source: M/o PD&SI (Nutrition Section)
Bilal I Gilani
@bilalgilani
Close to 350k engineers in Pakistan ( registered with engineering council)
Largest number is electrical , followed by civil engineers
https://twitter.com/bilalgilani/status/1577366163700465664?s=20&t=WBzayqQ-JdSiEUMBO2EdXA