Who SEZ what

Posted online: Thursday, September 28, 2006 at 0000 hrs Print
EmailDebate over special economic zones is good. Better would be an
informed debate
The Global Competitiveness Report identifying institutional maturity as
India’s medium-term advantage over China is a good context in which to
analyse the gathering controversy over special economic zones (SEZs) and
the related but broader issue of land acquisition and farming as an
occupation. Because India is a robust democracy, major public policy
attracts vigorous, sometimes vitriolic, debate. China lacks that and
will perhaps reap one day what it has sowed by making policy through
diktat. Would that India’s political debate over economics were more
informed, though. The Congress in Bengal has joined Mamata Banerjee in
agitating against efforts to secure land for industry. Farmers in Punjab
have started protesting. The commerce ministry has issued a long list of
do’s and don’ts . The Left wants a ceiling on SEZ land to ensure “food
security”. Raghuvansh Prasad, the rural development minister, has called
SEZs a “scam”. Some basic issues are being forgotten.

First, SEZs need to be regulated as everything else but the whole idea
about fast-tracking the creation of world-class infrastructure will be
defeated if an inspector raj is also created. The commerce ministry
saying only barren land should be acquired for SEZs assumes that every
agricultural plot is of vital importance to this country. This is
plainly wrong and it leads to the second misconception. Farming, as our
columnist today explains while looking at farmers’ suicides, is a risky
business. There are far too many agriculturists in this country and
India can’t hope to buck history and develop by holding urbanisation/
industrialisation at bay. SEZs are one of the many solutions we need to
speed up urbanisation, create new jobs and take people out of farming.
So it benefits no one if politicians keep on saying SEZs won’t affect
farmers.

Third, the issue of “proper” compensation comes up because there isn’t a
proper market for land in most areas SEZs are being proposed. Auctions,
as we have argued, is one solution. Another is to encourage land-owners
to form commercial collectives. Fourth, to argue SEZs will threaten food
security is absurd. Then what about encouraging manufacturing on a huge
scale, which will require more land? Lastly, Indian politicians should
wonder whether they will end up being more disruptive than the Taliban.
While they agonise over SEZs, Bush, Musharraf and Karzai are planning to
use a variant of the idea to create economic dynamism in the troubled
Afghan-Pak border. THE Global Competitiveness Report identifying
institutional maturity as India’s medium-term advantage over China is a
good context in which to analyse the gathering controversy over special
economic zones (SEZs) and the related but broader issue of land
acquisition and farming as an occupation. Because India is a robust
democracy, major public policy attracts vigorous, sometimes vitriolic,
debate. China lacks that and will perhaps reap one day what it has sowed
by making policy through diktat. Would that India’s political debate
over economics were more informed, though. The Congress in Bengal has
joined Mamata Banerjee in agitating against efforts to secure land for
industry. Farmers in Punjab have started protesting. The commerce
ministry has issued a long list of do’s and don’ts . The Left wants a
ceiling on SEZ land to ensure “food security”. Raghuvansh Prasad, the
rural development minister, has called SEZs a “scam”. Some basic issues
are being forgotten.

First, SEZs need to be regulated as everything else but the whole idea
about fast-tracking the creation of world-class infrastructure will be
defeated if an inspector raj is also created. The commerce ministry
saying only barren land should be acquired for SEZs assumes that every
agricultural plot is of vital importance to this country. This is
plainly wrong and it leads to the second misconception. Farming, as our
columnist today explains while looking at farmers’ suicides, is a risky
business. There are far too many agriculturists in this country and
India can’t hope to buck history and develop by holding urbanisation/
industrialisation at bay. SEZs are one of the many solutions we need to
speed up urbanisation, create new jobs and take people out of farming.
So it benefits no one if politicians keep on saying SEZs won’t affect
farmers.

Third, the issue of “proper” compensation comes up because there isn’t a
proper market for land in most areas SEZs are being proposed. Auctions,
as we have argued, is one solution. Another is to encourage land-owners
to form commercial collectives. Fourth, to argue SEZs will threaten food
security is absurd. Then what about encouraging manufacturing on a huge
scale, which will require more land? Lastly, Indian politicians should
wonder whether they will end up being more disruptive than the Taliban.
While they agonise over SEZs, Bush, Musharraf and Karzai are planning to
use a variant of the idea to create economic dynamism in the troubled
Afghan-Pak border.

http://www.indianexpress.com/story/13513.html