Pameo banyak anak banyak rejeki belum tentu salah. Alangkah sayangnya jika kedua orang tua makan sekolahan dan masih ada rejeki tapi anaknya hanya satu seperti yours truly ini, coba bayangkan, padahal kami tidak ikut KB. Karena itu dibawah LKY, negara pulau Singapura malah memberi insentif bagi wanita graduate untuk nikah dan punya anak kalau bisa yang banyak. Soalnya LKY melihat betapa malangnya Perancis dan Jerman yang angka pertambahan kelahirannya kecil sekali mendekati nol sekalipun tidak ada kebijakan KB oleh negara -- mereka terpaksa mendatangkan tenaga kerja dari luar negara. Bagi LKY, penduduk yang berkwalitas adalah kata kunci kejayaan ekonomi Singapura.
Dibawah Indira Gandhi, India pernah melaksanakan KB secara ketat dan tidak manusiawi, tapi angka kelahiran tetap tinggi terutama dikalangan orang yang tidak berpunya. Disini jumlah orang buta huruf dan miskin besar sekali. Tapi jumlah orang yang makan sekolahan dan punya duit juga besar, 300 juta, atau lebih besar dari penduduk Indonesia seluruhnya. Seperti dimana-mana, di India sekolah merupakan kawah condrodimuka untuk vertical mobility. Dan vertical mobility disini tidak dilalui melalui jalur sospol tetapi melalui jalur IPA (dan commerce). Begitu kuatnya animo masyarakat, maka sebagai contoh ada 230 technological colleges di Madras (Chennai), 40 di Mumbai dan 40 di Pune belum terhitung di Calcutta, New Delhi, Ahmedabad serta kota-kota lain. Tak heran kalau tiap tahun India melahirkan 2.5 juta S-1 jurusan IPA (IT, engineering, kedokteran, dan ilmu murni) ditambah 650,000 post graduates (S-2 dan S-3). Melihat ada 2 juta orang India bermukim di Amerika dan mereka itu rata-rata $ 51,900 per jiwa pertahun (sedikit diatas orang Jepang disana), seorang anak SD pernah bertanya pada Kalam apakah sang presiden tidak takut dengan brain-drain, dia menjawab bahwa brain yang tersedia cukup banyak bagi dunia, jadi jangan kuatir katanya. Bagaimana soal demografi di Indonesia ? Sungguh sayang KB hanya dimengerti dan dijalankan oleh middle class. Apa jadinya secara agregat kalau orang seperti Anda punya anak satu dua sedangkan orang buta huruf anaknya selusin ? Mungkin yang benar adalah LKY. Salam, RM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- (Silicon India) India's population an asset not liability: Experts Monday, July 11, 2005 NEW DELHI: For long Indian population was considered a curse to the nation. But no longer. Experts say that the Indian population which is supposed to overtake China very soon, is asset rather than a liability. Government is stepping towards thinking India's population to be used to illustrate the country's huge potential, both economic and political, experts say. With just 2.4 percent of the global landmass housing 16 percent of the global population, successive Indian governments have been faced with the problem of how to reduce ever-increasing pressure on ever-dwindling resources. Now its massive workforce is being seen as the country's greatest resource. "This change has been aided by the revolution in India?s information technology sector," says demographer A.R. Nanda, who helped formulate the National Population Policy five years ago. "The corporates and some economists have been highlighting how India's working population can make up for deficient or sometimes expensive labor elsewhere for the past five to seven years. This has fuelled the rethink," he says. India has in the past decade emerged as a major back office to the world with global firms outsourcing work ranging from credit card processing to air ticketing to take advantage of the country's less expensive, educated, English-speaking workforce. India produces 2.5 million IT, engineering and life sciences graduates a year, besides about 650,000 post graduates in science and IT related subjects. The IT sector alone employs about 850,000 graduates and professionals while the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors are snapping up others. The government says 402 million Indians are aged between 15 and 59 - the working age - and that this number will grow to 820 million by 2020. N.R. Narayana Murthy, head of premier software export company Infosys, said that by 2020 the United States would be short of 17 million people of working age, China of 10 million, Japan of nine million and Russia of six million. Demographer Nanda agrees more investment is needed, pointing to the example of China, which he says, ploughed resources into the health, education and social sectors between 1950 and 1980. "In terms of its impact on the general masses, the number of births came down in the 1970s before the one child norm was introduced," Nanda says. "We should emulate China and invest in our social sector." GDP on social infrastructure - up from the 0.9 percent at present," says one health ministry officer. "India will also need to improve the lot of the 20 or 30 percent of its population which is currently below the poverty line," says Nanda. "This is vital if India wants to convert its huge population into a demographic bonus or demographic dividend." Despite government efforts to cut growth rates, India?s population that was 238 million in 1947 touched 1.012 billion in March 2001 and is expected to be 1.263 billion by 2016, according to India?s health ministry. *************************************************************************** Berdikusi dg Santun & Elegan, dg Semangat Persahabatan. Menuju Indonesia yg Lebih Baik, in Commonality & Shared Destiny. http://www.ppi-india.org *************************************************************************** __________________________________________________________________________ Mohon Perhatian: 1. Harap tdk. memposting/reply yg menyinggung SARA (kecuali sbg otokritik) 2. Pesan yg akan direply harap dihapus, kecuali yg akan dikomentari. 3. Lihat arsip sebelumnya, http://dear.to/ppi 4. Satu email perhari: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 5. No-email/web only: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 6. kembali menerima email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yahoo! 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