Why the Indian Ocean region might soon play a lead role in world affairs

The economics of countries in the Indian Ocean region are rapidly growing.
from shutterstock.com

Craig Jeffrey, University of Melbourne

In recent days, Australia’s foreign minister Marise Payne announced efforts to strengthen Australia’s involvement in the Indian Ocean region, and the importance of working with India in defence and other activities. Speaking at the Raisina Dialogue in Delhi – a geopolitical conference co-hosted by the Indian government – Payne said:

Our respective futures are intertwined and heavily dependent on how well we cooperate on the challenges and opportunities in the Indian Ocean in the decades ahead.

Among Payne’s announcements was A$25 million for a four-year infrastructure program in South Asia (The South Asia Regional Infrastructure Connectivity initiative, or SARIC), which will primarily focus on the transport and energy sectors.

She also pointed to increasing defence activities in the Indian Ocean, noting that in 2014, Australia and India had conducted 11 defence activities together, with the figure reaching 38 in 2018.

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Government report provides important opportunity to rethink Australia’s relationship with India

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Payne’s speech highlights the emergent power of the Indian Ocean region in world affairs. The region comprises the ocean itself and the countries that border it. These include Australia, India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Madagascar, Somalia, Tanzania, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

In terms of global political significance, the Atlantic Ocean can be viewed as the ocean of our grandparents and parents; the Pacific Ocean as the ocean of us and our children; and the Indian Ocean as the ocean of our children and grandchildren.

There is an obvious sense in which the region is the future. The average age of people in the region’s countries is under 30, compared to 38 in the US and 46 in Japan. The countries bordering the Indian Ocean are home to 2.5 billion people, which is one-third of the world’s population.

The countries in the Indian Ocean region host a wide variety of races, cultures, and religions.
from shutterstock.com

But there is also a strong economic and political logic to spotlighting the Indian Ocean as a key emerging region in world affairs and strategic priority for Australia.

Some 80% of the world’s maritime oil trade flows through three narrow passages of water, known as choke points, in the Indian Ocean. This includes the Strait of Hormuz – located between the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman – which provides the only sea passage from the Persian Gulf to the open ocean.

The economies of many Indian Ocean countries are expanding rapidly as investors seek new opportunities. Bangladesh, India, Malaysia and Tanzania witnessed economic growth in excess of 5% in 2017 – well above the global average of 3.2%.

India is the fastest growing major economy in the world. With a population expected to become the world’s largest in the coming decades, it is also the one with the most potential.

The strait of Hormuz is one of the world’s most strategically important choke points.
from shutterstock.com

Politically, the Indian Ocean is becoming a pivotal zone of strategic competition. China is investing hundreds of billions of dollars in infrastructure projects across the region as part of its One Belt One Road initiative.

For instance, China gave Kenya a US$3.2 billion loan to construct a 470 kilometre railway (Kenya’s biggest infrastructure project in over 50 years) linking the capital Nairobi to the Indian Ocean port city of Mombasa.

Chinese state-backed firms are also investing in infrastructure and ports in Sri Lanka, the Maldives, and Bangladesh. Western powers, including Australia and the United States, have sought to counter-balance China’s growing influence across the region by launching their own infrastructure funds – such as the US$113 million US fund announced last August for digital economy, energy, and infrastructure projects.

In security terms, piracy, unregulated migration, and the continued presence of extremist groups in Somalia, Bangladesh and parts of Indonesia pose significant threats to Indian ocean countries.

Countries in the region need to collaborate to build economic strength and address geopolitical risks, and there is a logical leadership role for India, being the largest player in the region.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi told the Shangri La Dialogue in June, 2008:

The Indo-Pacific is a natural region. It is also home to a vast array of global opportunities and challenges. I am increasingly convinced with each passing day that the destinies of those of us who live in the region are linked.

More than previous Indian Prime Ministers, Modi has travelled up and down the east coast of Africa to promote cooperation and strengthen trade and investment ties, and he has articulated strong visions of India-Africa cooperative interest.

Broader groups are also emerging. In 1997, nations bordering the Bay of Bengal established the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multisectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC), which works to promote trade links and is currently negotiating a free trade agreement. Australia, along with 21 other border states, is a member of the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) which seeks to promote sustainable economic growth, trade liberalisation and security.

But, notwithstanding India’s energy and this organisational growth, Indian Ocean cooperation is weak relative to Atlantic and Pacific initiatives.

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Read more:
Cooperation is key to securing maritime security in the Indian Ocean

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Australia’s 2017 Foreign Policy White Paper seeks to support IORA in areas such as maritime security and international law. Private organisations, such as the Minderoo Foundation, are doing impressive research – as part of the Flourishing Oceans intiative – on the migration of sea life in an effort to advance environmental sustainability and conservation.

But Australia could focus more on how to promote the Indian Ocean. In Australia’s foreign affairs circles, there used to be a sense Asia stopped at Malta. But it seems the current general understanding of the “Indo-Pacific” extends west only as far as India.

What this misses – apart from the historical relevance and contemporary economic and political significance of the Indian Ocean region generously defined – is the importance of the ocean itself.

Not just important for trade and ties

If the Ocean was a rainforest, and widely acknowledged as a repository of enormous biodiversity, imagine the uproar at its current contamination and the clamour around collaborating across all countries bordering the ocean to protect it.

The reefs, mangroves, and marine species that live in the Ocean are under imminent threat. According to some estimates, the Indian Ocean is warming three times faster than the Pacific Ocean .

Overfishing, coastal degradation, and pollution are also harming the ocean. This could have catastrophic implications for the tens of millions of fishermen dependent on the region’s marine resources and the enormous population who rely on the Indian Ocean for their protein.

Australia must continue to strengthen its ties in the region – such as with India and Indonesia – and also build new connections, particularly in Africa.

Craig Jeffrey, Director and CEO of the Australia India Institute; Professor of Development Geography, University of Melbourne

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Indians promised benefits of 100 smart cities, but the poor are sidelined again

Residents of slums like Kamla Nehru Nagar, a kilometre away from Patna Junction, have yet to share in the promised benefits of smart cities.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

Sujeet Kumar, Jawaharlal Nehru University

India’s urban population is growing. More than 50% of the country’s population is forecast to be living in cities by 2030. This is a major challenge for government because the country’s cities lack the infrastructure (affordable housing, roads) and basic services (sanitation, water, health care) for existing inhabitants, let alone the influx of people over the next decade.

Globally, one in eight people live in slums where they face issues of durable housing, access to safe drinking water and toilets, and insecure tenure. In India, one in every six city residents lives in a slum.

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Read more:
Will India’s experiment with smart cities tackle poverty – or make it worse?

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Many Indian children are growing up in very disadvantaged circumstances. These two live in Mahmudi Chak slum next to Rajendra Nagar Railway Junction in Patna.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

However, estimates of slum populations differ widely in many Indian cities due to differences in the counting criteria. For example, in cities like Mumbai and Delhi, it’s estimated more than 50% of the population live in slums, but the 2011 Indian Census put the figures at 41.3% and 14.6% respectively.

Launching the national Smart Cities Mission in 2016, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said: “… if anything has the potential to mitigate poverty it is our cities”. He said the mission, which has a target of 100 smart cities, aims to ensure access to basic services for the people. This includes houses for the urban poor.

The program aims to fulfil the aspirations and needs of the citizens through comprehensive development of institutional, physical, social and economic infrastructure. This comprehensive development would also ensure increased public participation, Modi said.

Villagers migrated to the Danapur Block slum after the Ganga river flooded.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

Smart city plan has a dark side

In one of the 100 cities selected for the Smart City Mission, Patna (Bihar), I witnessed the flip side of the smart city. Patna, the state capital of Bihar, has a rich history, but 63% of its population lives in slums. And 93% of them are from the historically oppressed “scheduled castes” and “other backward castes” (based on data collected in 42 slums).

Demolished homes at Meena Bazar.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

The city administration often demolishes slums without following due process of law in order to seize the land in the name of beautification and development of Patna.

In slums like Meena Bazar (near the famous Nalanda Medical College Hospital) and Amu Kuda Basti (near Patna Airport) people have been living there for generations in houses often partially funded by government housing projects. These have been bulldozed.

Riot police are on hand when slum dwellers’ homes are demolished at Amu Kuda Basti.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

The city administration usually makes ad-hoc loudspeaker announcements before bulldozing these settlements. A massive police presence and riot vehicles are on hand in case residents protest the demolitions. They use derogatory language and forcefully enter houses and thrash male members, say women in Amu Kuda Basti.

The government could have given them more time or relocated them elsewhere in the city, rather than just bulldozing their houses, which they had built with hard-earned money, the slum dwellers said.

Residents of slums like Amu Kuda Basti say houses they built with their own hard-earned money are being demolished with little notice.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

There is apparently reason to smash these homes. There always is. The usual arguments for demolition include: beautification of the city, construction of a government building or enterprise, extension of the airport, crime locations, governance, illegality, encroachment etc. The state says demolitions of such slums are necessary for the development of the city.

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Read more:
Smart or dumb? The real impact of India’s proposal to build 100 smart cities

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In 2011, the state proposed a slum policy to relocate slum dwellers who had lived in the city for generations to the outskirts in a plan to develop Patna and make it a smart city, says Kishori Das, an advocate for the rights of slum dwellers for years. Faced with widespread protests, the state deferred the policy, but it is silently applying it on the ground, he said.

Who speaks for the marginalised poor?

These two leaders from Meena Bazar are among 84 community representatives, elected and non-elected, interviewed by the author.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

Local and mainstream media are not reporting these demolitions and forced evictions, especially when it happens in non-metro cities like Patna. Civil society and advocacy NGOs also take little notice of these frequent demolitions, probably due to threats to life and, if not, then to co-option by the state. The roles of the ruling party and opposition are also dubious.

Bihar has been ruled by leaders who attracted votes by campaigning on issues of poverty, caste and social justice for the past three decades. In the early 1990s, the prominent leader Lalu Prasad Yadav mobilised the poor and the oppressed caste groups under the umbrella of “Vikas nahin, samman chahiye” (we want dignity, not development). The present chief minister, Nitish Kumar, also known as Sushaasan Babu (good governance man), adopted the slogan “Nyay ke saath vikas” (development with justice).

However, the frequent injustices suffered by the urban poor negate the political commitment. These actions are also in conflict with the motto of the Indian Constitution, which frames justice as a balancing wheel between the haves and have-nots.

Promises of social justice ring hollow for residents of bulldozed communities like Amu Kuda Basti.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

These challenges are not limited to one city. In the name of smart and developed cities, the government is not only taking over urban land where millions of the poor have lived for decades but is also acquiring fertile land and violating the constitutional rights of farmers, tribes and other indigenous groups in various cities.

These reports of struggle and forced evictions contradict the statements by Modi when he said smart cities development would strictly follow large-scale public participation in preparing these plans.

Such demolitions reveal a dark side to making Indian cities smart and cast serious doubt on claimed government commitment to the urban poor. These actions hardly live up to the idea of the rights of the poor. It became more challenging when the head of the biggest democracy in the world denounces those who speak up for the poor, oppressed and voiceless as “urban Naxals”.

In the words of Abraham Lincoln, democracy is “government of the people, by the people, for the people”. For India, this means the urban poor need help both from political parties and civil society so that their voice finds expression and their demands and concerns are heard and considered in public policy.

Children sleep out in the open in a slum area in Harding Park, Patna.
Sujeet Kumar, Author provided

Sujeet Kumar, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for the Study of Law and Governance, Jawaharlal Nehru University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

India: Persecution News Update

The link below is to an article reporting on persecution news from India.

For more visit:
https://christiannews.net/2018/11/26/hindu-extremist-mob-tries-to-burn-pastor-alive-in-odisha-state-india/

Government report provides important opportunity to rethink Australia’s relationship with India

Importantly, the new strategy is ambitious, and will be led by, at least for now, the governments of Malcolm Turnbull and Narendra Modi.
AAP/Ella Pellegrini

Craig Jeffrey, University of Melbourne

By 2060, India may be the world’s largest economy. It will certainly be the world’s most populous country. At that point, Australians will ask, “What did we do in the 2020s to build a relationship with this superpower?” They may also ask: “How did economic cooperation with India benefit both countries in the early 21st century?”

The federal government’s report, An India Economic Strategy to 2035, was launched last week in Brisbane. Written by University of Queensland Chancellor Peter Varghese, it is an excellent basis for reflecting on these questions and the wider issue of Australia-India cooperation.

The strategy identifies numerous sectors – health, education, and tourism, for example – that can help enhance economic cooperation, and in which Australia has some comparative advantage. It also specifies ten Indian states as targets for collaboration based on their economic heft, commitment to reform, and relevance to the sectors in which Australia has competitive advantages.

Importantly, the strategy is ambitious. It sets itself the goal by 2035 to lift India into Australia’s top three export markets. It intends for India to become “the third largest destination in Asia for Australian outward investment”, and for it to be brought “into the inner circle of Australia’s strategic partnerships.”

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The strategy emphasises two areas that need attention in order to meet these objectives. First, Australia needs to leverage the strengths of the Indian diaspora, which now numbers about 455,000.

The rapid growth of the Indian diaspora population can be a spur to economic cooperation. The Indian population in places like Silicon Valley drive the IT and biotech booms in India and the US. Canada is highly adept in enrolling its Indian diaspora in projects of national and international development.

Second, Australia needs to build more knowledge of India and support organisations that work on the bilateral relationship. While Australia made a pivot towards China in the last quarter of the 20th century, businesses, governments, and the public developed comparatively little knowledge about India.

The emphasis on China led to a neglect of India in education, media, and the policy sphere. There is a need to rebuild public understanding of India and the institutions that can activate this understanding to achieve lasting impact. Culture and arts will be very important here, both as a sector and enabler – points implicit in the strategy.

Varghese says we need to move beyond constantly drawing comparisons between India and China. “India is not the next China,” he writes. India is a distinct opportunity for engagement that merits discussion in its own terms.

The base from which Australia is working with respect to cooperation is certainly different: Australian exports to India are less than a sixth of those to China.

Two further issues will be crucial for the strategy’s successful implementation. The first concerns the relationship between growth and wellbeing. It is clear that the India Economic Strategy imagines enhanced cooperation not as a basis for economic growth as such, but also higher standards of living.

There is a need to reflect carefully here. We must think not only about spurring growth in the Australian and Indian economies, but also ensuring that growth is meaningful in four ways: that it addresses social and economic inequalities, creates jobs, is environmentally sustainable, and fosters opportunities to lead fulfilling social and cultural lives.

This is where the comparison between India and China is important. Since 2000, India’s economic growth has been not much more than half as effective at lifting people out of poverty as China’s economic growth. This means that for every 1% growth in Gross Democratic Product in China nearly twice as many people are elevated out of income poverty as in India. This partly reflects the depth of social inequalities in India.

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Read more:
Australia and India: some way to go yet

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In the context of rising concern over inequality in Australia as well, the key question is: How can international economic cooperation create growth that reduces inequalities, generates jobs, and protects the environment in the countries concerned? It is a question that puts Australia and India on the same side of the table.

A second issue concerns the term “navigation”, which is in the title of the strategy. As the Danish anthropologist Professor Henrik Vigh has pointed out, navigation is a great metaphor. It connotes plotting and re-plotting a course on a moving plane. The complexity of that plane in this case calls to mind the six degrees of motion of a boat: pitch, roll, yaw, sway, heave, and surge. The strategy’s recommendations and ideas are excellent, and can be re-calibrated as India and Australia pitch, heave, and yaw.

The India Economic Strategy is an exciting document written with confidence and ambition. It provides a foundation for reflecting on economic cooperation and striving for meaningful growth.

Craig Jeffrey, Director and CEO of the Australia India Institute; Professor of Development Geography, University of Melbourne

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

India: Persecution News Update

India: Persecution News Update

The links below are to articles reporting on the persecution of Christians in India. The most recent are at the top.

For more visit:
– http://www.bpnews.net/50626/solace-amid-persecution-for-indias-christian-minority
– https://www.worldwatchmonitor.org/2018/03/india-baptism-service-halted-by-hindu-mob-claiming-forced-conversions/
– https://morningstarnews.org/2018/03/hindu-extremists-turn-tribal-animist-villagers-christians-india/
– https://christiannews.net/2018/03/27/hindu-extremists-turn-tribal-animist-villagers-against-christians-in-india/
– http://www.persecution.org/2018/03/22/exponential-increase-attacks-christians-telangana-india/

It would cost you 20 cents more per T-shirt to pay an Indian worker a living wage

A farmer harvests cotton in Maharashtra, India.
Shutterstock

Murray Ross Hall, The University of Queensland and Thomas Wiedmann, UNSW

If we really care about protecting the people who make the things we wear and use, we need to raise wages for workers in supply chains to above the poverty line. Our research shows that this only requires a 20 cent increase in the Australian retail price for a T-shirt made in India.

This small increase can lift wages by up to 225% in India, closing the living wage gap for the most vulnerable workers in the supply chain, such as cotton farmers. The living wage gap is the difference between a living wage and current wages.

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Read more: Explainer: what exactly is a living wage?

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The living wage is the income required for a decent standard of living for a worker and their family. It lifts the worker above the poverty line and is defined by the costs to meet basic needs such as food and shelter. It also limits the number of working hours per week required to meet these needs.

A living wage has long been advocated as a way to support vulnerable and exploited workers. About 42% of all workers globally are in insecure jobs and have no social protections, 29% remain in moderate to extreme poverty and about 25 million people are in slavery.

Many of the goods we now buy are part of global supply chains. Since the 1980s the production of labour-intensive products such as textiles and footwear has shifted to countries with low-cost labour.

Cost-cutting often impacts those with the weakest bargaining position, such as cotton farmers – cotton prices have been on a downward trend over the past decade. Without realising it, our demand for low prices can cause vulnerable workers in other countries to work for less than a living wage.

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Our research calculated the living wage gaps in India, broken down by region, gender, skill and type of employment. For instance, female workers on cotton farms in Gujarat earn 207% below the living wage. Casual female workers in Haryana have a living wage gap of about 34%.

It would take on average a 15 cent price increase on T-shirts in Australia to close the living wage gap for cotton workers in India. Adding another five cents would close the living wage gap for Indian textile workers, and also account for the increase in agent fees, which are a percentage of the production costs.

The living wage gap may be larger or smaller on particular farms or factories, but a 20 cent increase on average would be sufficient to lift all Indian workers in the garment supply chain out of poverty.

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Read more: Why the fashion industry keeps failing to fix labour exploitation

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The small cost to address poverty and climate change for producing a T-shirt in India. Murray Hall.

How we can raise the living wage

The cost to close the living wage gap in developing countries is small because wages for workers in these countries make up only a fraction of the retail price charged in countries like Australia.

Our work shows it costs about A$5.30 to produce a T-shirt in a country like India and ship it to Australia. The remaining costs embedded in a A$25 T-shirt come from warehousing, distribution and retail costs within Australia itself.

As a result, a 20 cent increase represents a less than 1% increase in the Australian retail price. It would cost only another 40 cents to cover the cost of greenhouse gas abatement. This means an ethically made T-shirt would only cost 2.5% more than current prices.

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A roadblock to implementing living wages is simply knowing the source of materials. Only about 7% of fashion companies in Australia know where all of their cotton comes from. Unless an Australian retailer specifies the source of cotton, the decision is made by the overseas textile contractor, often based on price.

Another challenge is that we need an accepted method for calculating and auditing the payment of living wages in the supply chain. The retailer needs to know how much the cotton farmer should be paid and have a system to check it has been done.

Over the past four years consumer pressure has pushed fashion companies to understand their supply chains and to consider paying living wages, but there is still a long way to go.

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Read more: What businesses can do to stamp out slavery in their supply chains

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In 2012 a group of the world’s largest ethical trade organisations formed the Global Living Wage Coalition.

This organisation has developed a manual for measuring the living wage and requiring? living wages to be paid to their producers. The producers are audited along the supply chain and in return can advertise their compliance with ethical standards. Shoppers will soon be able to look for a label – similar to the Fairtrade symbol – to know that living wages have been paid throughout the supply chain.

The famous economist John Maynard Keynes argued that consumers are not entitled to a discount at the expense of the basic needs of workers. In fact, we only need to pay a small amount more to provide a living wage and make a big difference to the world’s poorest workers.

Murray Ross Hall, PhD Candidate, School of Earth and Environmental Science, The University of Queensland and Thomas Wiedmann, Associate Professor, UNSW

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

India: Persecution News Update

The links below are to articles reporting on persecution news from India (the most recent are at the top).

For more visit:
– https://www.christiantoday.com/article/new.indian.anti.conversion.law.draws.christian.protests/114259.htm
– http://www.persecution.org/2017/09/20/jharkhands-state-governor-in-india-approves-anti-forced-conversion-law-despite-opposition/
– http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Catholic-college-closed-down-in-Madhya-Pradesh.-Bishop-of-Sagar:-They-want-to-drive-out-Christians-41829.html
– http://www.persecution.org/2017/09/18/despite-persecution-in-india-i-will-live-for-him-alone/
– http://www.christianpost.com/news/christians-india-warn-spiraling-hatred-letter-pm-modi-photo-hindus-burning-cross-199451/
– http://indianexpress.com/article/india/jharkhand-guv-approves-freedom-of-religion-bill-land-act-bjp-welcomes-move/

India: Persecution News Update

The link below is to an article reporting on persecution news from India.

For more visit:
http://www.christianpost.com/news/2-indian-pastors-falsely-accused-of-converting-hindus-and-smashing-their-idols-could-face-years-in-prison-199209/

India: Persecution News Update

The links below are to articles reporting on persecution news from India (the most recent are at the top).

For more visit:
– https://www.telegraphindia.com/1170914/jsp/frontpage/story_173065.jsp
– http://www.hindustantimes.com/columns/why-jharkhand-s-anti-conversion-bill-is-against-constitution-and-not-necessary/story-FIhGsnxuqIItvniVAoiLQO.html
– http://www.persecution.org/2017/09/09/more-christians-in-indias-chhattisgarh-state-displaced-following-threats-from-hindu-radicals/
– http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Karnataka,-two-Pentecostal-Christians-arrested-for-forced-conversions-41713.html