The New Nation - Internet Edition

Preventing gas line explosions

A gas pipeline leakage at Bangla Motor intersection in the city caused fire on Wednesday and contributed to tremendous traffic jam for several hours. The high-pressure 16 inches domestic supply line that passes along the Kazi Nazrul Islam Avenue developed leak. The flames of the fire leaped up to ten feet. Gas oozed out through openings in the road and nearby drains. Police stopped the movements of vehicles along the road. Fire fighters took two hours to extinguish the fire.

Another gas pipe explosion on the same day at an icecream factory at Shyampur in the city left at least four workers unconscious. According to sources, Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company deals with at least a dozen of minor pipeline leakages daily. Major incidents of gas leakage and outbreak of fire are, however, not rare. Years back pilling work at Rampura in the city caused serious damage to the main gas supply line and ablaze that created panic. Gas pipe explosion at a 12-storyed hotel in the city in first week of June this year caused heavy damage.

Use of pipes made of substandard materials or installation faults might have caused those accidents. Every pipeline especially those laid along a busy roads should be set sufficiently deep. Insufficient depth of the pipeline and constant jerking of the soil caused by heavy transports might have weakened the high-pressure line at the Bangla Motor point.

The use of safety equipment like leak clamp or compressor couplings in adequate quantities are likely to bring down chances of leakage or explosions. It is learnt that the Titas Gas that handles country's 70 percent gas supplies has not been purchasing safety equipment for more than a year. Then how the company is extending new connections?

Photo voter list, a big step forward

THE Election Commission (EC) has recently accomplished a big task of successfully completing the photo voter list for national elections. It was a commendable exercise in completeness and accuracy. Nearly 10 million false voters have been shed in the latest list which only goes to show the extent of lapse by the EC authorities in the past. Not only the voters' list, the EC under new leadership has been phenomenally successful in providing simultaneously national identity cards to a large number of eligible voters with the surety of providing all of them with the cards before the coming national elections.

The question is, if the EC could now accomplish such feats, then what prevented it from doing so in the past? Clearly it was due to lack of vision and leadership. In the early nineties an initiative was taken to issue voter ID cards. But the project was dropped in the late nineties never to be taken up again with a sense of urgency. According to an estimate that appeared in the press, the EC, before its last reorganisation, had wasted public money amounting to more than 6 billion Taka on non-credible exercises of redrawing voters list repeatedly before elections. Huge amounts were lost in projects such as for making voter identity cards and improving the functioning of the EC.

The people have been satisfied by some of the steps taken by the reconstituted caretaker government against corruption and immorality. The completion of the photo voter list and ID cards would strengthen the fight against corruption, criminality, and streamline economic activities by helping identify people whom banks and financial institutions deal with. The ID cards would not only prevent the casting of false votes but also help stop impersonation which is practiced by criminals to commit big crimes.

Population growth in developing countries

Professor Mahfuz R. Chowdhury

The world's population reached six and a half billion in 2006, and is quickly approaching 7 billion. It appears to be increasing at a rate of about 6.5 million a month or 78 million a year. From a purely mathematical point of view, at the current growth rate of 1.16 per cent per year, the world's population will double in 60 years. However, it is being projected to grow to 9 billion by 2050 (as per the United Nations). If this projection holds, it would be an improvement over an earlier forty-year period (1960 to 2000) during which the population of the world practically doubled, from 3 to 6 billion.

The key point here is that the world's population keeps growing and will continue to grow unless there is a conscious effort by us to limit its growth, or nature imposes some kind of control (like the recent earthquake in China, or the cyclones and tsunami in South and Southeast Asia).

Social scientists from time to time have pondered over the problem of population growth, and rendered their individual opinions on it. Thomas Malthus, an English economist, gained fame by bringing the problem of population growth to the forefront in 1798. His central argument was that population grows at a geometric rate while food output grows at an arithmetic rate, and that makes food scarcity inevitable. His theory was later dismissed for promoting pessimism on the ground that it failed to consider technological advances in agriculture and food production.

To be sure, technology has achieved miracles and brought enormous successes in innumerable areas, especially in information technology. In terms of agriculture or food production, the result is also astounding. By applying modern technology with improved seeds, fertilizer, irrigation and machinery, it may now be conceivable that a country like the United States could produce enough food to feed the whole world. But the reality is not only different, it also is quite agonizing. As has been noted in the reports of the United Nations, World Bank and World Factbook, there are now over three billion people in the world who live in abject poverty, and a billion or about one third of them continue to suffer from severe starvation and malnutrition.

It should, therefore, be obvious that the burden of population growth basically lies with the poor countries. In developed countries, where the unemployment rate is low and future job opportunities are high, population levels aren't growing, and some countries even face shrinking populations. Some of these low growth countries are trying to encourage their citizens to become more family oriented and raise more children so that future labor shortages could be averted and their pay-as-you-go social security systems, in which pension supplements are financed by taxes on workers, could be sustained.

However, the situation in developing countries is quite the opposite. There the unemployment rates are extremely high-in some cases as high as 60 percent-and they don't have enough resources to provide their citizens with even the bare necessities of life such as food, clothing and shelter, let alone creating sufficient job opportunities. Since they can't take care of the people they already have, any increase in population simply brings an extra burden on them. But no matter what, more and more people keep filling up these countries every day, month, and year.

For a country like India, which has a population of 1.15 billion, this means preparing dinner for an extra 50,000 people every single night of the year. And for a poor country like Ethiopia, with a per capita GDP of only $800 a year and a population growth rate of 2.23 per cent, it means over 4,700 additional mouths to feed every day.

One important factor that plays a key role in population growth is the level of education. The higher the level of education of people, the less they tend to grow. The major reason is that an educated person is apt to delay marriage or having a child until a steady income has been secured. The education levels in the affluent societies being high, their growth rates have fallen. As both parents are often busy with their careers, they have little time or interest in nurturing too many kids. In this regard, education of girls is especially important, argues economist Jeffrey Sachs in his book - Common Wealth: Economics for a Crowded Planet, 2008.

The growth rate among educated people in the developing countries has also come down to a considerable extent. But the growth rate among the underprivileged people who continue to constitute a huge majority remains high. Since the poor people have no steady income (some practically live hand to mouth), they customarily want more children as security and support in old age. They usually get married very early and produce children that they can't educate or even support. The great irony is that the children born in such a situation tend to breed more of the same year after year. So the reduction in population growth among educated people in the developing countries is being more than compensated by the increase among the underprivileged. Naturally, because of their lack of proper resources, population increase in poor countries is seen as a big curse and a serious hindrance to their economic expansion.

Take the example of Bangladesh, the seventh largest country in the world in population. By every measure the country has made improvements in education, healthcare, and most importantly achieved a respectable economic growth rate of, on average, 5 per cent annually in recent years. Yet, the country's poverty level has not come down, and studies show that in real terms it has gone up. In addition to the massive corruption in the country, the main reason for this is the high growth rate among its underprivileged population. The country adds about 3 million to its population every year, where the density of population is already one of the highest in the world. At the current growth rate of 2.02 per cent, per the World Factbook (a lower growth rate is quoted in other reports) the country's population of 150 million is likely to double in 35 years. This will be very similar to the current U.S. population living within the confines of the state of Wisconsin - a state the size of Bangladesh.

Additionally, Bangladesh is a low lying country, and most of its land mass is close to the sea level. As the sea level rises because of the effect of global warming, it is expected that half of the country will be submerged under water in the next 50 or so years. In fact, not only Bangladesh, the fate of many other low lying but heavily populated areas or countries of the world like Bangladesh will be the same when the sea level rises. Now, imagine the inevitable crisis such a situation would create!

The adverse effect of climate change is no longer a theory. Clear evidence of it is being presented in various empirical studies including those of the United Nations. It is believed to have already affected us in one vital area - the world food supply. Lack of rainfall or drought condition in farmlands of Australia and elsewhere and excessive rainfall in other places of the world in recent years have significantly reduced food production. The latest massive flooding in the farmlands of the United States might also be attributed to the effect of climate change.

Rice is one of the staple foods of the world. The rice exporting countries have since curtailed or stopped exporting rice altogether. Not only rice, the shortage in other staples such as corn and soybean (many believe their increased diversion to the production of bio-fuel has made the already bad situation even worse) is being gravely felt globally. The massive food shortage in the world has created serious havoc everywhere, and many developing countries are now struggling to meet the challenge of food shortages. One government, namely Haiti's, fell because it failed to avert food shortages.

The World Bank's report on the supply of food suggests that massive starvation in developing countries cannot be averted unless developed countries make a concerted effort to increase food production.

Thus, the challenge of population growth is not imaginary but real for developing countries. In fact, the prospect of their achieving meaningful economic expansion seems to hinge in great part on their ability to limit population growth, especially among the underprivileged. Realizing this fact well, China has taken the most drastic measure - restricting the number of children per family to just one. China is in a unique situation to adopt such a policy. Even though it has embraced a capitalist economy, its Communist Party continues to exercise total control over government policy. On the other hand, China has effectively instituted a social security system for the elderly. As a result of China's population policy, the country is soon expected to slip down to the second place in population after India.

However, social scientists are worried that China's one child policy might also create a serious population imbalance between men and women since most parents prefer a male child over a female child, which, by the way, is still a common phenomenon in developing countries. Currently 119 boys are born in China for every 100 girls. Much of this is the result of the one-child policy and the availability of technology that enables the determination of the sex of the fetus and the availability of selective abortion. There are apparently 18 million more males of marriage age than females, and so the continual increase in the shortfall of women will only lead to increases in social unrest, sex crimes, prostitution, etc. Jeffrey Sachs in his aforementioned book emphasizes that state investment in the education of girls can reduce parental bias against female children.

Nevertheless, for traditional societies like Bangladesh, India, Indonesia and Pakistan (some of the most populous countries in the world), where neither a viable social security system nor a strong authoritarian government exists, the Chinese policy of one child per family would be hard to implement. The biggest hurdle these countries would invariably face is the wrath of religious fundamentalists. Less educated people are easily manipulated or swayed in the name of religion. The argument that children are the gift of God and are cared for by God is still being embraced by too many underprivileged people of the world. It will not be easy to change these attitudes.

India had once tried to restrict its population growth through legislation, but had to abandon the policy under tremendous pressure. Yet, some of the countries are now openly discussing and weighing the policy that China has adopted - one child per family. In a recent meeting of the Bangladesh Population Council, the local experts have, in fact, recommended precisely such a policy for Bangladesh.

To meet the challenge of population growth in developing countries, in the absence of a China-style mandate of one child per family, here are some minimal but essential measures that should be considered for immediate implementation: 1) establishing some kind of social security system for the elderly, 2) mandating a minimum age for marriage, 3) discouraging people from getting married or having a child without a steady income, and most importantly, 4) requiring every woman to attend a prescribed class on sexuality, health, hygiene, child bearing, family planning, and birth control before marriage.

In developed countries, girls routinely get lessons on many of these issues by the time they finish junior high school, whereas in developing countries no such formal education is provided to even the prospective wives or mothers. Such knowledge helps a likely mother's role in the decision making process of raising children. Fertility rates decline when parents feel assured that their children will survive and thrive.

The proposed lessons for women before marriage might consist of just a simple video presentation with a question and answer session. Considering the poverty level of the people in developing countries, special emphasis should be given on inexpensive and relatively safe methods of birth control like the timely withdrawal method (medically described as coitus interruptus). This form of birth control might even be more acceptable to religious leaders.

In any case, educating women on the implications of their actions or inaction on family matters would be the best way to achieve not only the desired goal of population stabilization but also basic healthcare of the child, which most developing countries are clearly striving to achieve. Considering all the consequences, developing countries could ill afford not to confront population problem head on.

(The author teaches Economics at the CW Post Campus of Long Island University, New York, and has published articles on problems of Bangladesh and developing economies)

US and Syria should talk

Theodore H. Kattouf

THE recent compromise on power sharing in Lebanon spares the country further bloodshed, and allows its people to return to a modicum of normalcy. However, the underlying causes of the conflict remain, and Lebanon continues to be an arena where external powers play out their rivalries.

Unless and until Syria and the United States reach a grand bargain, the Lebanese will continue to pay the price.

It should now be clear to the most casual observer that Syria's military withdrawal from Lebanon was hardly the end of its influence there. Iran and Syria are in an alliance to thwart US and Israeli objectives in the region whenever and wherever they can. Despite the overwhelming military advantages the United States and Israel enjoy over their adversaries, Iran and Syria have been particularly adept at playing the spoiler through proxies such as Hezbollah, Hamas, Iraqi tribal groups, and Shia militias.

Through much of its second term, the administration of US President George W. Bush has been loath to engage in a prolonged and serious dialogue with Syria, instead preferring attempts to isolate and marginalise its leadership. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, for his part, has borrowed pages from his late father's playbook to demonstrate that there are no lasting solutions to regional problems without Syria. Yet even Turkish-brokered negotiations between Israel and Syria have not enticed the United States away from its policy of ignoring Syria diplomatically while throwing verbal jabs at the regime whenever it can.

The Israelis have been more pragmatic by far in dealing with Syria than has the Bush administration. The current Israeli government and its military/security leadership have concluded that they are "better off with the devil they know than the devil they don't."

This reasoning helps to explain why Israel went to great lengths in the summer of 2006 to assure Syria that it was not the target of Israel's war with Hezbollah. It also helps to explain the lack of Israeli leaks after the bombing of an alleged nuclear reactor in Syria. Meanwhile, even after the Bush administration tried to discourage indirect Israeli talks with Syria about the Golan heights, Israel cautiously went ahead.

Both Israel and Syria recently concluded that making these talks known is advantageous to them. In the Israeli case, they can pressure the Palestinians for more concessions by suggesting they have another option for peacemaking. The more strategic reason is of course the hope that Syria can be weaned from its 30-year alliance with a nuclear ambitious Iran.

For its part, Syria wants to ensure its relevance and better position itself with the next US administration while the clock runs out on the current one. However, both leaderships know that even if they can agree on the terms of peace, the US government's role is indispensable to concluding, supporting, and enforcing a treaty.

All of this leaves Lebanon in limbo. Hezbollah has demonstrated that there is no combination of other forces in Lebanon that can challenge its military predominance. And Hezbollah's leader, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, has left no doubt that his spiritual guide is Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. As its influence with the group diminishes, Syria can no longer promise to disarm Hezbollah's militia in the context of a peace treaty with Israel and a positive new relationship with the United States.

It can, however, shut down the Iranian supply pipeline to Hezbollah through Syrian territory. Syria could be even more Machiavellian and work with the United States and others to strengthen the more secular elements in Lebanese society in the context of full peace.

The Syrian regime cares first and foremost for its survival. If ushering in a new relationship with the United States and signing a peace treaty with Israel enhances its prospects for longevity, it will go that route - even at the expense of Iran and Hezbollah. If such a deal is not forthcoming, Syria will continue to play the spoiler role to the best of its considerable abilities.

It is important that a new US administration work with Israel and our Arab allies to concoct a strategy that can pry Syria away from Iran. Despite the longevity of their alliance, the two regimes - one secular, the other theocratic - have little philosophically in common other than their shared insecurities concerning Israel and the West.

Thankfully, Syria appears open to a grand bargain, including perhaps one that could stabilise Lebanon without compromising that country's sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity.

(Theodore H. Kattouf is a former US ambassador to the United Arab Emirates and Syria. He is currently the president and CEO of AMIDEAST (www.amideast.org) and is on the Middle East board of Search for Common Ground. This article was written for the Common Ground News Service.)