Saturday, September 27, 2014

Understanding Middle East - GCC countries

The Middle East region has about 55% of the world oil reserves, of which the Gulf Cooperation council (GCC) countries of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates(UAE), Qatar, Oman and Bahrain own 45% of the world reserves.

Few of the factors that are strongly influencing the economies of the GCC in the second half of 2014 are:

The 'Arab Spring' factor
The GCC countries have boosted social spending in the wake of the Arab Spring, this means increased wages and subsidies. The funding for this has to necessarily come from oil revenues.

The 'Diversification' & 'Big Show-case events' factor
The GCC countries are investing huge amounts of money in infrastructure development - Qatar for the 2022 Football world cup, Dubai for World Expo in 2020. Also, in an effort to reduce their reliance on oil revenues, GCC countries are making major efforts to develop alternative economic activities. Efforts are being made to further develop sectors such as banking, tourism, light manufacturing, and agriculture. 

These kind of spending is putting a lot of money in the economy and in the hands of people which is leading to increase in inflation in these countries.

The 'Oil' factor
The price of oil has fluctuated over the years, sometimes drastically. The prices have varied due to various reasons in the past due to over production of oil, geo-political reasons, lower global demand etc. Most recently, the slump in oil prices was in 2009. All the GCC countries were hit due to this, all economic indicators slumped in 2009 and the idea of reducing the reliance on oil assumed importance.

A fall in oil prices would push many GCC countries perilously close to their break-even oil prices. Then, there is also the factor of further fall in oil prices if Iranian oil is to return to international markets which would then force the governments to trim subsidy spending and public wage bills. 

Lower prices would also reduce the incentives to invest in new oilfields elsewhere in the Middle East, affecting the growth forecasts. 

Government spending is in local currency while oil related revenue is in USD, which has depreciated significantly in the last decade. GCC currencies are pegged to USD using a fixed exchange rate. So a dip in USD leads to lower purchasing power for the same amount of oil sales, which these countries might make up by pushing for an increase in oil price by influencing the production quota in OPEC, this would be very hard on the global economy.


The 'Population' factor
The region has a population growth rate which is higher than world average rate. This puts tremendous stress on the resources of the country and the economy as there is an enormous need to create new jobs in order to absorb the growing labour supply and the need to generate higher revenues to sustain the earlier levels of per capita income.

By 2020, as populations begin to age and middle classes continue to grow, GDP per capita will fall across many of these countries – most notably in Qatar, but also in Kuwait, the UAE and Saudi Arabia. GCC economies will become less reliant on hydrocarbons in future as prices fall and diversification efforts bear fruit. Once this is achieved, the pattern of economic growth across these countries is likely to shift away from the current emphasis on investment towards consumption which is a sign of a maturing economy.

In the near future, though, rising GDP** per capita should bring benefits to people across the GCC countries in coming years. Although people may not feel the benefits directly in pay packets, quality of life should also improve by access to better public services and improved transport networks as the benefits of strong economic growth trickle down. At the same time, however, households across the region will feel the pinch of inflation. After many years in which daily essentials such as food and power had been heavily subsidised by governments, fiscal pressures mean that many would seek to cut the spending on supporting household consumption. The immediate impact of this will be to increase the prices of goods, leading to raising inflation.


Kingdom of Bahrain
Bahrain possesses the lowest reserves among the GCC countries and thus has heavily invested in the banking sector. Oil exports account for around 10% of its GDP. It is one of the most diversified economies in the GCC region with the government making strenuous efforts to attract foreign investors and pursue limited privatization to achieve the goal of economic diversification to reduce the country's dependence on oil. Major segments of Bahrain's economy include financial and construction sectors. Bahrain is focused on Islamic banking and is competing on an international scale with Malaysia in the Islamic banking sector. With its highly developed communication facilities, it is home to numerous multi-national firms with business in the Gulf.

Bahrain has displayed a high degree of price and currency stability. Bahraini Dinar is the second strongest currency in the world. Inflation has risen post 2009 oil slump because of weakening USD and domestic demand increase.

State of Kuwait
Kuwait has a geographically small, rich, relatively open and oil-dominated economy. Oil exports account for about 60% of its GDP. 97% of its total exports are hydrocarbons (crude oil, refined oil, gas etc). Kuwaiti Dinar is the strongest currency in the world. 

Apart from fish, all the food requirement has to be imported. Cars also form huge part of its imports. Most of its potable water is either distilled (an expensive process) or imported.

Kuwait had survived the crash in oil prices and consequent economic crisis on the strength of budget surpluses generated in earlier years riding on the high oil prices. The government had passed an economic development plan in 2009 pledging USD 140 billion in five years to diversify the economy away from oil, attract more investment, and boost private sector participation in the economy. By law 10% of all income of Kuwait is deposited in a special reserve fund to provide for the future when oil revenues are exhausted.

Kuwait's economy has a proven track of low inflation. Even with the USD weakening, inflation is still at very low levels. 

Sultanate of Oman
Sultanate of Oman is a middle-income economy with notable oil and gas resources and substantial trade and budget surpluses. Petroleum exports account for about 45% of GDP. It has a strong and diversified private sector, which covers industry, agriculture, textile, retail and tourism. The major industries are copper, mining and smelting, oil refining and cement plants. It further seeks private foreign investors, especially in the industrial, IT, tourism and higher education fields. Oman is actively pursuing a development plan that focuses on diversification, industrialization and privatization, with the objective of reducing oil sector’s contribution to GDP to about 10% in 2020. 

Oman’s monetary policy focuses on controlling inflation, which has remained generally modest, partly reflecting the openness of the economy. The government controls the prices of many goods and services through subsidies. 

State of Qatar
Oil and gas have made Qatar one of the world’s fastest growing economies and due to its meagre population its per capita income is the highest in the world. Sustained high oil prices and increased natural gas exports till late 2008 have helped build Qatar’s budget and trade surpluses and foreign reserves. Gas exports account for over 55% of GDP. This dependence on gas export revenues makes the economy highly sensitive to fluctuations in international energy prices. 

Qatar has permitted substantial foreign investment in the development of its gas fields during the last decade and is the world's top Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) exporter. Qatar has been trying to attract foreign investment in the development of its non-energy projects by further liberalizing the economy. As investment in downstream industries and diversification begins to bear fruit along with an increased standard of living, there would be a dramatic improvement in Qatar, where per capita GDP is expected to double between 2014 and 2025, thanks to the low costs of producing natural gas and the influx of money in the economy on account of country’s hosting of the 2022 football World Cup.

Inflation rose post 2009 oil slump because of weakening USD, domestic demand increase and rising property prices.

Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia is the largest producer and exporter of petroleum in the world. Though Oil exports account for over 75% of its total exports, it only forms 45% of its GDP which means the country is producing and consuming products within the Kingdom thereby reducing the imports and keeping inflation under check which otherwise would have fluctuated more on the back of fluctuating imports.

The Kingdom has a proven track record of very low inflation rates over a long period of time. A slight increase in the marginal inflationary pressure over the last 2-3 years is mainly because of increase in the cost of imported non-USD commodities, the largest chunk of imports being cars priced in Euro and/or Japanese Yen (due to depreciation of the US$ against these currencies), plus rising domestic demand pressures. In general, the relative price stability achieved has largely been due to the prudent management of the fiscal and monetary policies and the adequate availability of goods & services in the country.

The Kingdom is susceptible to fluctuating oil prices due to its huge USD based oil exports. Therefore, the Kingdom is making efforts to attract foreign investment and diversify the economy, it has launched mega projects, including establishment of six economic cities in different regions of the Kingdom to achieve balanced development of the regions. The non-oil sector, especially construction and real-estate industries, has also played an important role in the economy. Both the private and the public sectors have contributed, as FDI and increased government spending supported the development of an effective and sustainable non-oil economy. 

United Arab Emirates
The UAE is a Federation of seven Emirates including Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Ajman, Al-Fujayrah, Umm Al-Quwain and Ras Al-Khaima, which are governed by the Federal Supreme Council (FSC) of rulers. Abu Dhabi and Dubai, the largest and the wealthiest two Emirates, dominate the UAE economy. It is a rich and open economy with a high per capita income and a sizable annual trade surplus. Oil exports account for just 30% of its GDP. The Emirates also earns substantial amount of revenues from export of gold & jewellery.

Factors like high oil prices, increased export revenues, strong liquidity, housing shortages and cheap credit in 2005-08 led to a surge in asset prices (shares and real estate) and consumer price inflation. But the global financial and economic crisis, tight international credit, falling oil prices, and deflated asset prices, caused the UAE economy to shrink in 2009. The UAE government has since increased spending and boosted liquidity in the banking sector to tackle the crisis. The crisis hit Dubai hardest than its counterparts in the GCC region, as it was heavily exposed to depressed real estate prices. The UAE’s strategic plan for the next few years focuses on diversification and creating more job opportunities for nationals through improved education and increased private sector employment. In its diversification efforts, the UAE has developed its tourism sector and held the leading position for the destinations attracting business in the future. The UAE will continue to remain open for international investors due to its economic vibrancy and flexibility in legislation that allows 100% foreign ownership in Free Trade Areas.

Inflation in the UAE had remained in the range of 1.3% to 3.2% during 2000 to 2003. It flared up to peak rates of above 11% in 2007-08 because of depreciation of the USD and increase in prices of non-oil, non-USD imported goods and increasing domestic demand pressures. Although high food prices, rents and imported inflation were important contributing factors, yet rising real-estate and property prices were the main driver behind inflation. CPI inflation slowed down to 1% in 2009 due to timely fiscal and monetary management policies. Inflation is expected to remain manageable.


** The gross domestic product (GDP) is one the primary indicators used to gauge the health of a country's economy. It represents the total value of all goods and services produced over a specific time period.

The factors mentioned above are quite specific to the GCC countries and do not apply to other countries in the region where the political & economic scenario is drastically different from that of GCC countries.

Bibliography:

  • The figures in the table have been taken from www.economywatch.com
  • www.gulfbase.com
  • IMF's Regional Economic Outlook-Middle East and Central Asia-November 2013 issued by World Economic and Financial Surveys
  • IMF's Regional Economic Outlook Update-May 2014 issued by the Middle East and Central Asia department



  • 'A different view to fiscal break-even oil prices (November 2013)' by Akira Yanagisawa, Senior Economist, Energy data & Modelling center, The Institute of Energy Economics, Japan

Saturday, July 26, 2014

Off the map Himachal Pradesh

I had trained, packed and prepared for 15,000 Ft ASL. It was the magic of Rupin Pass that beckoned me to cross over its ridges. 

The trip started in Dehra Dun. This was the second time I was coming back to the Doon valley, having come here for the Kedarkanta trek in 2007 in the month of May, a full month before the present trip and it was hot and dirty to say the least. There was a certain charm about the place in 2007 and in 2014 the weather and the place itself resembled some over populated place on the plains, of course back then the ‘city’ was not a capital of a state and now it didn't feel like a valley in the Himalayas. A steep price paid by nature for a measly gain for one species.

The first overnight stop to Rupin pass was at a tiny hamlet Dhaula in Uttrakhand, which was in the middle of everything nice. Mountains on 3 sides, Tons river flowing by on one side with a beautiful bridge over the river visible from the over reach of the village. This also was where the road ended, literally. It’s almost a given, ‘where the road ends, trek begins.’

The drive from Dun to Dhaula itself is a journey worth undertaking almost independent of the trek. Once out of the ‘city’, the roads grow narrower, the hold of nature stronger and air chillier. We passed through Mussoorie, without as much as a pause for a single click, a very famous hill station that people throng to and I didn't even make an effort to pick up the camera, If Mussoorie were a person, she would have been offended for sure.

We passed through many villages on the way, our course running almost parallel to the river Tons or Tamsa.  There is a theory as per which Tons is supposed to be the long lost Saraswati. Millennia ago, she ran parallel to Yamuna and then due to tectonic changes, her course altered and she merged with Yamuna, becoming her tributary. She meets Yamuna near Dehra Dun and drains in more water into Yamuna than Yamuna herself brings. The greenish tinge of the river Tons is very soothing to look at as she meanders her way through the mountains, widening her width at times as she moves along at a saintly gait and then narrowing down at places and rushing along complaining as more water gushes into narrower space.

We ascended and then descended many mountains, always coming back to meet Tons at the valley. We saw picture card perfect terraced farms on the opposite mountain faces with tiny hamlets bordering the farms. It looked as if the crop had been colour coordinated, it looked so pretty, and tiny houses that sat like guardians on the edge of the farms. We passed by Purola where sweet lassi made of fresh curd, ‘imported  from the plains’ coconut burfi and a refined flour ‘matri’ made my lunch.

We entered the precincts of the Govind Pasu Wildlife Sanctuary of Uttrakhand and passed by Naitwar, which is famous for a temple dedicated to Karna, the eldest of Kunti’s sons. A detour from an old friend, lovely town of Sankri,  which had been the base camp for the Kedarkanta trek, lovely Deodar tree lined roads later after a 10 hour see-saw ride we reached the ‘end of road’. A crossing of the bridge and an uphill climb brought us to Dhaula, where humans shared the place with high altitude preferring Eurasian Blackbirds and Crested Kingfishers.

The 2 rooms on the 1st floor vacated for us had photos of Gods pasted around the circumference of the room, intervened in places by photos of Bollywood demigods.  A short walk from here to fill up our bottles brought us to a bridge where the river Rupin thundered down a few feet through a gashing hole that the pressure of the water had carved out for itself. A little time spent packing, unpacking and wondering where some of the essential rouge items had disappeared to and we were all set for the trek the next day. The bit of spare time in the day light was spent sharing 'chaklis' with our village neighbours and with the horses as they strengthened up for carrying our bags the next day. A few us watched enthralled as a Crested Kingfisher whose mate had flown off a distance sat 10 feet from us on a Deodar branch and sang to his mate, but unable to impress a return, flew off to join her.  The first time ever I saw a Crested Kingfisher and was almost inclined to believe that I was looking at a black and white Hoopoe. The pleasure of going to these places which is nowhere near anywhere is the unexpected that seizes your every moment if only one would keep the senses awake.

The next day we started our trek. The trek that day had a fair share of climbs, a glimpse of things to come, after all we were just at 6,000 Ft ASL and we had to get to 15,000 Ft ASL in 6 days time. The day started hazy and soon enough a light drizzle was about us, but we could still see enough of the villages and the cultivated patches on the opposite side to admire it. I passed by an old lady who wanted medicine for tummy ache but since most of us were just carrying a day pack, we didn't have any tablets on us, when I told her that, she wanted the jade pendent I was wearing. It saddened me, what had ‘civilisation’ done to the people of the mountain, of what use would the jade be to her?

We stopped at a even tinier hamlet where the lady of the house served us hot tea in long brass glasses made on a wood stove. The tea drinkers savoured the hot tea having come out of a damp patch. As the tea warmed the inside, the clouds parted to warm the outside. The rain gears packed, we continued to trek passing through some glorious sights, a near vertical mountain face with sheep grazing on it, a majestic Himalayan Griffin that hovered above and huge trees that made me wonder what they were. Our path also took us close to a thick Deodar forest, which we had been told was to be our refueling point but we bypassed it to quench our hunger some place else.

En route we met a few villagers going about their daily affairs and covering distances that we would have covered in 2 days in just a few hours.  Some were friendly, some a little distant. One of the ladies I met was especially chatty and I had a very pleasant conversation with her. She had gone to visit her mother and was now going back to her husband’s home. Her mother had cooked breakfast and her mother-in-law would cook the dinner, she probably didn't realise she was luckier than many of her city counterparts. We walked a KM together sharing tit-bits from each other’s life. It doesn't take too much for 2 people from 2 different places to strike a conversation if only one has a little inclination and interest to compare notes.

As we neared the village Sewa, the last village in Uttrakhand on the border of Himachal Pradesh, the quintessential single layered white rose bushes greeted us with its lovely hue and fragrance. The children also greeted us with requests for chocolates. We trekkers are ‘outsiders,’ why had we meddled with their life style? The entire path was littered with chewing gum packets. Why had the fig chewing people taken to chewing something which had no benefits at all? Or did they feel the need to look ‘hep’ chewing the gum?

We reached the Sewa village and a short climb brought us to a 2 storied building that was to be our rest point for the night. After lunch, followed immediately by some flavoured drink followed by pakoda and tea, we assembled in the open space for some ‘fun and learn.’ The ‘how to pack your trek bag’ left most of us astounded, the message was clear, take an hour to pack your bag and feel easy on the trek or pack as you will and feel the burden of the back-pack every step of the way. An easy decision but a tuff choice.

The local lads entertained us with cricket played with a ball made of cloth. A hard core of tightly wrapped cloth and a top layer of red cloth neatly stitched with white thread. An environment friendly, cruelty free, economical alternate to the leather and cork balls, which brings us to another pertinent question, why do we feel they are missing out something in life playing with the local hand-made ball? Why do we feel sorry for the villagers for improvising and making-do with local items? And another question to ponder upon, why even the trekkers supposedly inclined towards nature not understand this simple fact? What is called for on treks with regards to the local populace is empathy not sympathy. We go there seeking something that is lost in cities we come from, who should be sympathizing with whom? Let’s not feel patronizing to the extent of having those hand-made balls replaced with rubber and leather balls that will last long after civilization is gone, nor let us be condescending to the extent of thinking they are no better than animals to live in houses like those and to play with balls like those. Harsh words but bitter truth. By the way, those balls were a mix of precise engineering and art, each ball weighed exactly 100 grams.

Another night spent in a room full of posters of Gods and the ‘demis’, the proportion of demigods to the Gods increasing by almost the same proportion as that of the number of houses in Sewa to number of houses in Dhaula. More people, more the need for entertainment or more the need to comply with the crowd?

A highlight of our trip to the village was a visit to the village temple. The temple made of Deodar logs interlaced with slate stones was an impressive structure. It had the trophies won by the village cricket team over the years and was adorned with coins that people had pushed into the crevices. The idol of the goddess is circulated between the various village temples, each village hosting the goddess for a year. An ingenious system of keeping comradeship between the villages alive in the remote mountain region.

The next day we set across for the village of Bauta across the border in Himachal Pradesh. The trek path went through remote forest, so remote that even the chewing gum wrappers became scare and so quiet that it felt like we were in another world. We walked parallel to river Rupin, whose flow defined the boundary between the 2 states.

As we moved closer to our destination for the day, we moved along from mountain to mountain, coming down to the valley, following the course of the river upstream as we walked with a good friend for a while sharing secrets only to part way again, as we ascended.

A wrong path chosen and we took a longer route through villages, getting to see how as villages came closer the presence of polythene increased. The waste lying like a sleeping dragon, strengthening with every addition, bidding it’s time to raise it’s head and strike. There was also a path for the used water to flow down, the underbelly of the village.

We passed by another village temple, women working in their wheat fields, how I wished to break my trek there, lend them a hand, live their life at least for a day, but time, path and my trek lead beckoned me to move on.

We were now a good 200 feet from the river and ascending, all the while walking on a narrow motorable path cut out into the mountain parallel to the river. A snow clad far-off mountain seemed like a bridge between the mountain we were on and the mountain on the other side of the river. We passed by a beautiful water falls, where many of us rested and shared a sweet lime, an abandoned stone structure where we posed for photos and a flock of sheep that grazed on the mountain. Every few steps gave us a different angle of the river, there were certain places from where we could see the length of the river down stream, deep into the far away mountains. Then began our ascent through an almost vertical face of the mountain. It was a lung challenging climb in the afternoon on a narrow winding path. At 3/4th of the way, a calf began to follow us, we stood aside to let him pass and comically when we stopped to let him pass, he would put his head down to eat. There were 4-5 kids sitting at the top of the mountain and shouting. We assumed it was their calf, as we got closer to them, they even came down and chased the calf up the mountain only for us to eventually realise that the calf wasn't theirs.

At the top of the mountain was the village Bauta. We passed by a beautiful 2 storied house, where cows housed on the ground floor peeped out of their huge windows. Our house for the day had a field adjacent to it with a local food grain of reddish leaves interlaced with green potato leaves which looked like a carpet that beckoned us to sit down on it.

We spent the evening going around the village, meeting the villagers, passing by granaries the size of a garage with lovely locks on them, the local shop where the shopkeeper showed us the ubiquitous 'ball-in-progress', the villagers involved in their everyday activities - women going about their work, a couple of them carrying heavy stones on their back while kitting a sweater for the winter as they walked on, an old lady grinding the feared 'bichoo booti', the stinging 'scorpion herb' to feed the cows and many were about with their little one's in the evening, chatting and catching up with other ladies of the village, of course our presence there was also a source of excitement for them. Men were conspicuous by their absence, many we were told were on the mountains collecting medicinal herbs that sold for handsome amount of money, well supplementing their income.

We spent time with a person who patiently answered our questions about the ways of the villagers, how they stocked up for winter when they would be snowed out for a good 3 months at the very least, how they helped one another with the house construction and repairs, how lack of medical facilities was a challenge. So many things that we just take for granted in the cities came by the hard way. Every piece of stone and wood that went into the house was collected from the forest, transported over their own backs, every blade of grass for the cows, collected from the mountains in huge baskets.

We made our way back to our house munching fresh peas that a villager gave us by handfuls from her farm.
That was my last day en route Rupin. The next day I had to retrace my steps back to the motorable road down the steep decline, past the calf still guarding the approach to the village.

We took a Himachal transport bus, passing small villages, carrying twice the number of people it should have been carrying especially given the narrow roads but the jourrney was beautiful, lovely snow clad mountains all along, Deodar forests with rhododendrons, through to the top at 12,300 Ft ASL passing Chanshal pass (Chanshal peak is the highest peak in Shimla district) with lovely mountains visible all around and with beautiful white snow lying intermittently that the fellow passengers on the bus gorged on. Then down the mountain to the valley passing by various rivers. Our 7 hour journey ended in the town of Rohru at 5,100 Ft ASL on the river Pabbar, a tributary of Tons. Rohru is known for its quality apples. A walk in the evening to the river where a lovely swinging wooden bridge made up the passage for the villagers connecting the 2 sides of the river. The town was a small place in the lap of Himalayas but the activity all around was a mimic of the city. The waste being burnt by the municipality right on the river bed, sewage being drained into the river, garbage dumped into the river over the bridge on the road. How long before nature gave up her fight?

The next day another journey on a state road transport bus brought us to Rampur Bushar, at above 3,300 Ft ASL in Shimla district on the banks of river Sutlej. Bushar was a principality under the British rule and in 1948 joined the Indian union. A town with lovely buildings, a legacy of the English occupation, couple of old temples, legacy of Mahabharata times, built by the Pandawas on their exile. The temple of Narasimha, the Lion headed man, an incarnation of Vishnu, was being renovated and not being under the Archaeological society of India (ASI)  the villagers took up the renovation to redo the entire wooden structure of pillars and ceiling all around the sanctum sanctorum.  This would have never happened under ASI with their policy of preserving monuments as they find it. A bit of street food, a bit of shopping for the local wool coats and we left the place the next day for a place recommended by a restaurant owner. Rampur and the surrounding area, as does the entire region has a lot of hydro electric projects, probably as ill-planned and stressing the environment as the ones in Uttrakhand which caused such damage just a year ago in 2013.

Another lovely journey in a state transport bus of about 3 hours for just 30 Kms brought us to a tiny town of Bagipul in the Kullu district. A local SUV hired from here for the 11 km journey up the mountain to Sarahan - Baga Sarahan at Rs 700 made its lonesome journey which would have impressed any trekker returning from a trek to a beautiful un-touched place, so beautiful was this journey. If you are a traveler, I highly recommend this place at 7,500 Ft ASL for a beautiful holiday in the midst of unspoilt greenery. A huge, beautiful  meadow on one side surrounded by rising mountains and the town of Sarahan on the other side. The journey was worth it just to sit down in the meadow watching the cows grazing blissfully. There are just a couple of buses plying to the village other than a van carrying milk from the place to the villages below. There is a lovely school at the edge of the meadow, all the children of nearby villages trek up the mountain to reach the school. And surprisingly there is a basic but nice guest house as well, reason enough to spend a couple of days at the very least. There is also a beautiful PWD guest house, but if you don't have the permission letter to stay there, don't bother with it.

The details of the private guest house:
Mr Narotlam Singh Dogra
VOP Baga Sarahan, Bagipul, Tehsil Nirmand,District Kullu, Himachal Pradesh 172002.
You can contact Mr Dogra on 9459748873, 9816048741 or 9418478104.

This place is also very close to the Great Himalayan National Park, which in June 2014 was listed as a UNESCO world heritage site. A trek up the mountain on the meadow would bring one to Gushaini which is one of the entrances to the park. A road connecting Gushaini to Sarahan is on the cards. 

From the Jharani matha temple in the meadow, past huge trees that dwarfed everything except the mountain around, through fields of wheat, garlic and onions and the houses huddled together at the other end brought us to another lovely temple in the village.

We left the place with a heavy heart to spend a day in Shimla, a long journey via Rampur. The road from Rampur to Shimla is much wider being the national highway No. 22, which connects all the way to Tibet, beyond Rampur. Still a distance of just 125 Kms took over 5 hours. Every turn, brought us upon a different view, of valleys with rivers, farms on the slopes, towering mountains blanketed by deciduous trees, each demanding a photo to be taken. Having spent so many days on the mountains in no way curtailed the temptation of clicking another photo and then yet another. Mid way, we passed Narkhonda pass at 8,885 Ft ASL which reminded me of my missed tryst with another pass. Surrounded by the Shivalik range and in the middle of Apple territory, which reaps in a total income of Rs 30,000 Million today all thanks to an American, Mr Satyananda Stokes who in 1916 brought in a variety of apple suitable for the climate of the region from US and thereby brought economic independence to a whole region long before the country gained independence, the cause for which he threw his weight behind. Do google up Mr. Stokes' life story. There are many a cherry tree visible from the road as many Apple farmers are shifting to Cherry farming which brings in quick money.

To cut a long story short, We left the 7,200 Ft ASL situated Shimla the very next day, the excess crowd over the weekend was definitely a factor in the decision. Next day, we journeyed to Solan, a district headquarters at a height of 5,200 Ft ASL, a quaint town very close to the Punjab, Haryana border. The couple of standouts of this place for me were the Soolani matha temple and the market place which came alive in the evening. It was almost like the whole town was gathered there for the evening, buying and bargaining everything from pickles, sweaters to cloths. Being one among the local crowd felt nice unlike the tourist bustle of Shimla that I hated. Solan is the 'mushroom city' of India having a lot of mushroom farms around as well as the Directorate of Mushroom Research. This place is also associated with Pandawas who stayed here on their exile.  

The next day we boarded the Shimla-Kalka hill train and made our way out of the lovely Himachal Pradesh. There is even as of today only one thought in my mind as I recollect the beautiful place - this 'off the map' Himachal is far from over.

A Request: If you are the mineral water drinking, coke needing, comfort seeking holidaymaker, please strictly stay on the map.  

The entire holiday I drank the water from the rivers, filled my water bottle from taps in public places, drank the water being served at restaurants and did not fall sick. The places off the map are still unpolluted despite everything.  Let us not contribute to making it otherwise. 

Thursday, July 17, 2014

The beauty of small scale

The concepts of economies of large scale, fast food are not exactly fading away but slowly there seems to be a growing realisation at least amongst the saner lot, that those might after all not be the ideal and definitely not the only way of doing things.

Upping the scale of operation does pull down the overall costs, making it affordably available to more people but it also gives rise to evils that in the juncture we are at today, environmentally, we need to sit back and think.

Larger farms lead to ever increasing use of chemicals, pesticides, genetically modified seeds, and various other technologies that wrangles out all the good from the land,eventually making the land unfit for cultivation. Pick up an atlas today and it will have a map on 'desertification.' Argument supporting cultivation on large scale to support a growing population is incorrect as even with the larger farms there are still ever growing number of hungry tummies.  

The answer to this evil is going back to how it used to be done - small scale, owner-operated, organic farms. Grow what you need and just about as much as you need. Russia passed an act in 2003, The Bovine, Russia’s Private Garden Plot Act, which entitles individuals to a small piece of land free of cost to cultivate it for their own food needs, free of tax. This is working so effectively there that more than half the food need of the country is being met by this and this in a country where only 1/3rd of a year is available for agriculture. 

The economies of scale have made a horror story of the dairy, wool, meat, poultry, leather industries. PETA's July 2014 video shot in an Australian sheep farm will leave one nauseated and terror struck. Animals have been used by us through our evolution but never before have the animals become a piece of machinery. 

When good presentation skills, communication skills can be a necessity for getting into client & management facing jobs, why can't compassion be a requirement for another species handling job? In a large scale operation, amidst all the operational costs, marginal costs and profits how will one plot in compassion into the equation? Anyway common sense is not a requirement for any job and that explains why the rest does not fall in place.

It is imperative now with all the havoc our ruthlessness has caused all around to the environment that we reassess our priorities keeping in mind the long term continuity of our planet and of our species. So till someone comes up with a solution to favourably treating the excess greenhouse gases, till someone finds a genie who can give us another sustainable source of energy, can we not do the other small doable things that will buy us some time?

Small is beautiful, slow is lovely and I hope commonsense prevails on the law makers of the world, and on us the common people. 

Saturday, March 29, 2014

Horseshoe crab and the curse of the blue blood

Being blue blooded in the human world ensures a safe passage through life. But it is this blue blood which has put a creature more ancient than the crocodile at risk of being exterminated today.

Horseshoe crabs are not crabs but belong to the spider and scorpion family. They have been around since before the dinosaurs came on stage and would have outlived the Homo sapiens if not for their blue blood.

Horseshoes have this blue coloured copper based blood which has amazing properties of fighting off bacteria. Millions of years of evolution ensured that in the absence of an immune system (meaning, its body was not designed to be able to generate anti-bodies to fight off infections), any bacteria that came in contact with the horseshoe was dealt with by generating coagulating fluids around the bacteria, thereby inactivating it. This simple system of gelling around the bacteria, viruses and fungi formed a physical barrier against further entry and spread of infection, while the damage from initial infection recovers, thus ensuring the survival of the horseshoe in the bacterium rich waters that it resides in. This works even on endotoxin bacterium, the kind which survive even steralisation.

And this is the magical property that humans discovered in the 1960's and started using it to meet their own end. Today, the pharma and medical devices industry claim that using the horseshoe's blood for testing for contamination is the most reliable and easy way, meaning it is the cheapest way of ensuring contamination free products.

Horseshoes are caught from their habitats in millions and brought to labs, where a needle to the heart forces a donation of 30% of its blood. The horseshoes collected from all over the place is then released in one go at a place. As if the abduction and heart piercing were not traumatic enough, horseshoes released at a place other than where they were picked up plays havoc with their breeding pattern, as like turtles the horseshoes go back to the beaches where they were born to deposit their eggs. The mortality rate of this entire exercise is around 15%. Add to this, the further damage due to breeding disturbance and habitat loss and the risk is truly 'species threatening'. The survival rate of horseshoes in a 'non human interfering scenario' is just 30 hatchlings out of a million eggs making it into adulthood. How will the horseshoe recompense  this loss? How will they make up for the sudden fall in numbers when it took iterations over millions of years to get the survival rate to as high as 30 in a million? A species that lived since before the dinosaurs came along are at the brink of extinction today.

The Horseshoes are just one example of our selfish drive. Why does everything that we humans touch turn to dust?  When are we going to realise what irreversible, irreparable damage we are doing to nature all around us? There are indications everywhere of the imbalance that we have caused and yet we continue to look confounded with the cause and effect staring in our eyes. We are the only species that destroys the very surrounding on which our life depends. Everything in nature is linked to one another, what goes around comes around and our turn is coming.

We continue to bicker about and procrastinate decisions to address climate change. We are finding newer ways of laying the forests and mountains around us waste. We cannot seem to give up our 'comforts', no matter what the cost, (am thinking of the trend of picking up one polythene per vegetable at the departmental store). Just imagine, something so limited like petroleum being turned into polythene with no sight of an alternate energy source.

You just wait it out Horseshoes, the writing on the wall is pretty clear, we are going to self destruct very soon, it might take about a couple of centuries for earth to recover and then you can carry on with your lives with the homo sapiens gone the way of the dinosaurs.