Daily Times

There can be no two opinions as to the role of education in the building of a nation. A nation of illiterate people would eventually end up as a vassal of one or the other state. And in modern times it is not land but moneys borrowed by feudal tenure that demands allegiance. But in our case, if the federal government is spending Rs 85 billion out of a total budgeted expenditure in 2016-2017 of Rs 4.89 trillion, we don’t seem to be on the right track.

Perhaps the federal government has a point that after devolution, education is a provincial subject, so why is there a federal budget for education in the first place. Notwithstanding, if you try to figure out what the provinces are actually spending on core education, you will see that isn’t exactly a very rosy picture either. Yes the claims about percentage increases are correct, but when the base is proportionately miniscule, it would take years to make a dent in illiteracy. All of this brings to fore the conspiracy theories of yesteryears, mostly about how the feudal elite would resort to all and every extent to block any efforts to educate the masses in their domains. If you think about it, even in a democracy, the ruling elite should be wary about educating the masses. Why? Well, the likelihood of educated voters forming pressure groups to force government in doing the right thing — like taxing the rich to spend on the poor –increases, but then again, American experience generally disproves that particular theory.

To clarify what is being asserted, let’s take the case of individuals. Rational parents will, above all, invest in their children’s education, if not out of love alone, for the sake of their own future. Cutting the current expenditure to the extent of leading a painfully frugal life while investing in children’s education for a better future is the norm. Investment in property or a better quality of life would always take a back seat to education for the child. So if this works for a common Pakistani, why does it not work for the nation as a whole? Why shouldn’t investing in education be the largest outlay in the budget; perhaps even before defence (shudder). More to the point, why should our generation not curtail expenditure, force austerity, and invest in Pakistan’s future, educate the younger generations?

Admittedly, this is a rhetorical if not purely ideological way of putting it. The realities of running a government are definitely more complicated than simply allocating more funds for education. But then a valid question is why bother discussing something if all that you can do about it is nothing. To answer that, it is all about keeping the pressure on the decision makers and building perspective. As a hypothetical question: should public money be spent on culture or is it better spent on education? If culture was important enough to be saved, surely the market forces will intervene.

Another reason for keeping the pressure on is to shake the private sector into action. A few decades ago, the private sector was investing heavily in education, again not purely out of patriotic reasons but for their own interest. An educated populace is a skilled work force, which invariably opens a host of opportunities for enterprisers, as well as, by default, increasing the size of the market. Why and when the private sector lost interest in investing in national education is perhaps a futile debate, and what is more relevant is how to reengage business in education related philanthropy. Perhaps to nudge the private sector, the government can devise, as suggested earlier, tax incentives linked to spending on education.

An earlier article of mine flirted with what exactly should be the top priority of the government. Defence, considering the volatile geographic location of Pakistan; load shedding because it impacts industry as well as the common man; infrastructure without which growth objectives would remain a fantasy; corruption that is a constant drain on resources; or education. Beyond the basic necessary costs related to all other initiatives, and after detailed personal ratiocination, invariably the answer is education. The future of Pakistan is deeply linked with how quickly we can educate Pakistanis. To venture a guess, the economic advances of the next door “unfriendly” nation — admittedly that hint is confusing as of today with so many unfriendly neighbours, so let’s say the eastern neighbour — can primarily be linked with education.

Even today, with all their advances in education, the west continues to debate on how to improve teaching; that is the level of priority accorded to teaching by developed nations with literacy rates well above 90 percent. A recent article in The Economist on “Teaching the Teachers” asserts that high quality teachers in primary schools substantially offset the influence of poverty on school test scores. While inequality of education between the rich and the poor is a fact of life, quality teachers can at least address the inequality of opportunity amongst classes. “All of the 20 most powerful ways to improve school-time learning identified by the study depended on what a teacher did in the classroom,” according to the University of Melbourne study as quoted by The Economist.

While the west fights to disprove the myth that good teachers are born, not made, Pakistan is struggling to put its children through primary education, let alone train quality teachers. Frankly, the first step, as far as we are concerned, is to offer respect and better salaries to our teachers before we can get around to teaching them to be better teachers. Perhaps the first question to tackle might even be who should be the most highly paid public servants within district administration.

On the other hand, things have moved way beyond primary education in the global village. The argument is that within a few years time, perhaps less than a decade even, the world will be automated to the extent that job opportunities will be directly linked with the knowledge of working with computers. Most other opportunities are expected to be in the hospitality sector. This is why economic pundits are contemplating policies like “Basic Income.” If disposable income of the masses gets marginalised, demand will fall, as touched upon last week.

As far as opportunities go, that is already an issue for Pakistan. Irrespective of the efficacy of government claim that unemployment has been brought down to 5.8 percent, if, hypothetically, education had been at the desired level today, where are the opportunities? Even in America, there are views that the state plays around with unemployment numbers to project a better situation compared with the ground realities. Equality of opportunities can be debated whence there are opportunities.

And all of the above is not an exhaustive list of complications related to education initiatives that need to be factored in while devising an education policy for Pakistan. And if that was not enough, dearth of resources is another and an even bigger challenge. Undoubtedly, the technocrats related to education need to be engaged by the government to devise a long-term strategy that addresses all these challenges, and at all costs. If Pakistan is to join the ranks of top economies, irrespective of all the rankings floating around to the effect, teaching Pakistan must come first.

The writer is a chartered accountant based in Islamabad, and can be reached at syed.bakhtiyarkazmi@gmail.com