Fiinovation - Meeting the country's Millennium Development Goal targets on health indicators - The clock is ticking.

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are eight international development goals that were officially established following the Millennium Summit of the United Nations in 2000, following the adoption of the United Nations Millennium Declaration. All 189 United Nations member states and at least 23 international organizations have agreed to achieve these goals by the year 2015. The goals are:

1.      Eradicating extreme poverty and hunger

2.      Achieving universal primary education

3.      Promoting gender equality and empowering women

4.      Reducing child mortality rates

5.      Improving maternal health

6.      Combating HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases

7.      Ensuring environmental sustainability

8.      Developing a global partnership for development

According to WHO, India will fail to achieve some of the most important Millennium Development Goal (MDG) targets like reduction in maternal and child deaths, and increase in child immunization rates by 2015. There is a major possibility that India will miss its targets, some by a big margin. WHO admits that India has been effectively reducing its infant and maternal mortality figures, largely due to National Rural Health Mission (NRHM). But still the pace hasn't been satisfactory enough, especially when it comes to infant and maternal deaths.

One of the MDG goals is to reduce under-five mortality rate to 42 per 1,000 live births by 2015. India will reach 52 by that year missing the target by 10 percentage points. The national level estimate of infant mortality rate is likely to be 44 against the MDG target of 27 in 2015. Some of the largest states like Madhya Pradesh (62), Odisha (61), Uttar Pradesh (61), Assam (58), Meghalaya (55), Rajasthan (55), Chhattisgarh (51), Bihar (48) and Haryana (48) still have IMR above the national estimates.

India is, however, expected to cover about 89% children in the age group 12-23 months for immunization against measles by 2015 — short of universal immunization of one-year olds against measles by about 11 percentage points. India will reach maternal mortality rate (MMR) of 139 per 100,000 live births by 2015, falling short by 30 percentage points.

Goal 4: Reducing child mortality rates

Over the last few decades, good Nutrition, healthcare and better standards to living have almost halved the number of child deaths. In 1990, more than 12 million children died before the age of 5, in developing countries, because of diseases such as diarrhea, malnutrition, pneumonia, AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis. By 2012, this number dropped to 6.6 million. Still Under-5 mortality rates are very high because of considering that most of these deaths are due to preventable or treatable causes.

We can still reduce child mortality by taking initiatives and strengthening the national health systems. We need to expand our immunization programs which will further enhance growth monitoring of children. By ensuring the survival and improved health indicators of mothers by supporting better nutrition for the child and mother will be the first step in this direction. The country needs to better the available infrastructure so that enhanced reproductive health status can be achieved.

Goal 5: Improving maternal health

Out of all the MDGs, maternal health has been the least progressive goal. Nearly 800 women all  over the world die every day due to complications during pregnancy or child birth. Among those, 99 percent of the deaths occur in developing countries. Every country's priority should be to better the women's health status.

We can promote women health by improving maternal nutrition and by advocating for spacing and empowering them to choose family size. We need to educate young boys and girls on the importance of contraception so as to reduce teenage pregnancies. This will also help in combating the evil effects of early marriage. There is an emergence need of ensuring trained attendants to conduct deliveries and to better the access to emergency and comprehensive obstetric, ante-natal and post-partum care

Goal 6: Combating HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases

99% of people who die from AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis (TB) are living in the developing countries. Though new cases of HIV infections are declining and the number of people receiving antiretroviral treatment is growing, still 34 million people are living with HIV/AIDS.

For effective prevention, care, and sustainable treatment of various diseases various effective steps need to be taken. For HIV infections, measures like promotion of safe sexual behavior, male circumcision, and providing treatment for HIV prevention are the first step. To combat malaria, promotion of use of long-lasting, insecticide-treated nets and increasing access to efficacious anti-malaria medicines are the best bet. Improving housing conditions of TB patients, TB screening of HIV-positive persons, and Directly Observed Treatment Short Course (DOTS) therapy for TB needs to done.

Fiinovation - World Teachers' Day

The world needs a huge number of teachers to provide quality education in this world. Teachers' professional knowledge and skills are the most important factor for quality education. By 2015, 5.4 million teachers are required including 1.58 new posts and 3.66 million replacements to achieve Universal Primary Education.

World Teachers' Day is observed every year on 5th October is observed in more than 100 countries. The needs of the future generations can only be met by teachers for that there is a need to mobilize support for teachers. It is a day to appreciate, create awareness, understanding the vital contribution that teachers make the field of education and development. 

57 million children of primary school age currently out of school, 54 percent of them are girls. Annual teacher gap in Nigeria could be closed by recruiting the equivalent of 1.2% of the population aged 20 years, 0.5% for the United States and 1% for China. India’s 1.5 million village schools are 90% state-run, unionized to the teeth, and handle 220 million children. 

This year's slogan is "A Call for Teachers!". To achieve education for all it is necessary to call for teachers, as they are the most powerful force for quality and access to education. This year's International Peace Day had the slogan "Education for Peace". There is no stronger foundation of lasting peace and sustainable development.

Why a call for teachers?

There is a huge shortage of professional, well-trained and well-supported teachers to achieve better quality education. The challenge of recruiting teachers does not lie just in the numbers, but in the provision of quality teachers. Far too often teachers remain under-qualified, poorly paid and with low status.

At UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, the focus of the 2013 World Teachers’ Day celebration on 4 October will be on tackling the teacher gap, barriers to better quality education and teachers’ role in developing globally-minded citizens.

Partners are also urged to organize events around the world in order to make the day a truly international celebration.

Innovative Financial Advisors Pvt .ltd - Sustainable Development: The need of the hour

According to a native American proverb, 'We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors. We borrow it from our children'. This quote conceptualizes the essence of sustainable development. Development which is eco-friendly, long-lasting and not emergent of mindless exploitation of natural resources but which is the resultant out of their effective and efficient use.

Why is the need of the hour? Why is it that it has gained this importance? Sustainable development is not only about the importance of the environment but about economic and social gain too. For example, burning of fossil fuels and deforestation are undoubtedly harming the environment but the effects of rising carbon dioxide which could have been stored in the forests by tress as a 'sink' is simply absent and (as was calculated by the World Bank) costs about 3.7 lakh crore or 5.7% of India's GDP. Further, when thousands of lives are lost because of the same pollution, it is not just a shocking demographic statistic but an enormous loss of human capital/resource. The Climate Vulnerable Forum estimates that "the cost of climate change and air pollution combined will rise to 3.2% of global GDP, with the world's least developed countries forecast to bear the brunt, suffering losses of up to 11% of their GDP". Clearly the development pattern which most countries have been following is a damaging one. It is a vicious cycle which starts will ill practices which lead to ill effects which cost us greatly. This is why sustainable development is the need of the hour.

Sustainable development is about human development. Development which is in the best interests of the present generation but does not compromise the interests of the future generations. So how can sustainable development address the fundamental challenges which we face? The foremost step which would have to be taken is to build eco-friendly technology for energy use. India's energy requirements for example are still heavily dependent on fossil fuels. There must be a shift to less harmful but stable energy sources such as nuclear technology and investment required and market built for renewable energy such as solar, wind and hydro-electric power. This is the future energy scenario which countries must strive for. It may be argued that the energy harnessed from them is not enough but this shortcoming is only limited to the technological ability we possess. Therefore investment in these technologies is imperative. These are the practices of the 'future'. Sustainable development also means empowering people to make smart decisions. In a country where there is mass scale

 ignorance, this becomes a challenge. Therefore making people aware and environmentally conscious and impart livelihood practices (such as those displaced by big projects) is not only important in itself but has long term economic and social ramifications. Sustainable development cannot just be a governance idea but has to be an individual decision too. Individually we can say no to plastic, spread awareness; collectively we can plant more trees, develop rain water harvesting techniques. At the government level it can build smaller dams, invest in public transport, use CNG for vehicles and develop more efficient waste disposal/management techniques. These are all viable practices for now.

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Fiinovation - Wastage of grains revealed at a time when Parliament wants to pass food security bill

It is not unknown to people that food grains rot in the godowns or farms in India due to inadequate storage facilities for food items. At a crucial time when Parliament wishes to pass the food security bill which will benefit crores of Indians, a RTI reply has reveled at least 17,546 tonnes of foodgrains was damaged between 2009-10 and July 2012 in Food Corporation of India godowns. 

Every year more than 25 lakh people die in India due to hunger, so many people are malnourished in the country but still there have been no measures to built infrastructure facilities to safeguard food items. On 23rd August, the food processing minister Sharad Pawar told the Parliament that inadequate storage infrastructure resulted in wastage of fruits, grains and vegetables worth Rs 44,000 crore every year. 

Food Corporation of India in a RTI reply to a activist on details of damaged foodgrains in its godowns in 23 states and Union Territories. The data reveals that government has a tough task at hand, though there is a decline year-wise in damage of foodgrains. During the said period the maximum loss was of wheat at around 7,185 tonnes while rice damaged was 6,905 tonnes. According to World Health Organization, minimum of 250 gm foodgrains is required per person per day to survive. The damaged food grains could have fed at least seven crore people. Suggesting no loss of grains the activist said government should provide 3 months grains at a time to each family so that each family can store grains at home rather than storing them at FCI godowns where they often get damaged. 

Wastage in West Bengal was the highest in the same period with a loss of around 2,300 tonnes of damaged rice. However, Punjab have reduced the loss drastically from 2,223 tonnes in 2009-10 to only 37 tonnes during 2011-12. The opposition in the Parliament cornered the government by pointing out that till June 12.5 million tonnes of foodgrains was lying in the outside with another 6 million tonnes lying open in Haryana. In Punjab, 2.5 million tonnes of this was lying in the fields. If the nation wants to feed its people there has to be appropriate storage facilities. Countering the reply of the food minister's reply that 6 million tonnes storage capacity will be added this year, the opposition said that its illogical when 18.5 million tonnes of wheat was lying in the open in just two states. 

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