Fairly distribute productive assets, develop skills

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Fairly distribute productive assets, develop skills

Friday, 29 May 2020 | MANAS JENA

The returning of the migrant workers due to COVID-19 has added more distress to the continual unemployment situation in the State which is going to be more acute in the current scenario. The NCRB data on suicide for 2018 says that every day minimum ten people kill themselves due to joblessness. This number has increased further by 3.6 per cent.

The problem of unemployment is alarming in Odisha. In spite of its advantage like natural resources and a stable Government of  two decades , the State continues to remain a backward rural agrarian economy and  has been facing the challenge of joblessness and huge distress migration problem for its one third of  workable population. In order to counter the issues of economy, the move of the Government has been towards more privatisation and State charity which has not yet contributed much to resolve issues.

The nature of unemployment varies from region to region and also different among economic classes and social groups within the State because of huge local, social, caste and gender based disparities subject to their economic, social and educational status. The State Finance Minister in 2019 had informed to the  Assembly that 1,31,000 Government posts were lying vacant in the State. The total job seekers registered in State employment exchange above matric was more than 10 lakh in 2013. It has been increasing each year. There has been huge distress migration of unskilled youth and very few skilled professionals having advantageous migration.

In the agriculture sector of Odisha, there has been huge under employment and more than 60 per cent of the work forces of the State depend on agriculture for seasonal employment whereas  agriculture continues to be seasonal in nature and has been prone to a host of natural calamities. This sector is already over populated with presence of 42 lakh cultivators and 68 lakh agriculture workers. Mechanisation in agriculture has been slowly evicting many of the traditional work by labour force. The agriculture workers are mostly seasonally employed and often migrate in lean period.

The State Government has made residential hostel facility for about 7,000 children of migrant workers in the State as part of distress migration mitigation programme. There were about 47 lakh operational holding out of which 92 per cent are small and marginal holdings which is in between 0.57 ha to 1.63 ha. This may not be viable for a family to survive with such small holdings. The distress condition in agriculture remains a permanent feature with farmers suicide and distress sale of agriculture produces in the absence of input subsidy and lack of  basic infrastructure such as irrigation ,cold storage ,transportation and marketing facilities. There has been very little growth in the areas of forestry, animal husbandry and fishery in spite of natural advantage of forest coverage, coast line, rivers, ponds, lagoon and fresh water and huge availability of waste land in many parts of the State. The  dependency on subsidised paddy production has dominated the agriculture scenario rather than the cultivation of fruits,  vegetables, fish, milk, meat, egg and other cash crops  though the State has the  advantage of  ten varieties of agro climatic zones and less development of agro-based industries.There is  ample scope in the areas of mineral and  manufacturingsector. It is a fact that the major public sector industries in the State such as NTPC, Nalco, MCL, SAIL, RSP, OMC and many more have created much scope of employment and making  major input in the growth of the State's economy through socially inclusive employment. The industrial and mining areas have emerged as mini economic hubs. But the emerging issues out of industrialisation and mining have not been so far addressed properly by Government, private industries and other stakeholders.

Odisha remains a consumer State of industrial products. Even many agricultural produces are also imported from other States. The welfare economic model through limited micro schemes such as Mission Sakti and KALIA for rural poor  are not economically viable even to survive and to meet the growing financial needs of a family.

The cost of production of these small units is very high and also they confront marketing issues. A family in rural areas cannot depend on such miniature   schemes to feed themselves unless there is a minimum regular income.

The State should distribute productive assets, land, knowledge, and invest more on human resources development to make more people skilled and employable. The Government along with private organisations must set up manufacturing units such as garments, leather, cotton, household articles in every blocks and plan mass production of consumer goods.

The number of unskilled unemployed youth is very high in the State because lack of quality education in primary level and absence of modern skill development training centers. So there should be universal free quality English medium common school system and universal primary healthcare centres in every panchayat. The State should invest more on universal  healthcare and education, banking and insurance , communication and connectivity, basic amenities, infrastructure such as road, railway, coastal highway, and other means of transport, electricity, telephone. The connectivity helps in networking globally and reach the larger employment market. While planning for manufacturing industry and service sector, the non-economic issues must be looked into in the State.

(Email-manasbbsr15@gmail.com)

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