 |
Kathmandu,Wednesday January 12, 2000 Paush 28th, 2056.
|
Don’t be dependent
Since decades, governments have apparently
taken foreign assistance so much for granted they have refused to recognise that such
assistance are actually a means for putting the country on the track to economic
prosperity and that they are not the end in themselves. It is only natural that with such
an attitude the burden of foreign assistance should grow, and over the years it has grown
into a dependency syndrome in which the country finds itself hopelessly mired. Other
reasons that have further contributed to this state of affairs are: improper investment of
foreign assistance and lack of explicit policies and programmes while investing. More
importantly, what has cast a cloud over the prospects of the country’s development is
the failure to mobilise internal resources.
World
Bank (WB) has contributed more than US 1.31 billion dollars to assist over 70 projects
since 1969. Other multilateral donor agencies and countries have also not been far behind
with their help. Despite such massive foreign assistance, the relative position of
the country in terms of development remains unchanged. The reason: the fiscal
deficit has been widening due to ineffective policies and programmes to mobilise internal
resources. This has mainly resulted in failure to meet the expected target. This apart,
the present efforts of the government to mobilise revenue have made things worse. For
example, the customs department which contributes about 50 percent to government revenue
has not been able to meet its target because a chunk of the revenue leaks out through
smuggling and customs manipulation. Leakage is also a problem with development work
in other sectors.
As
expenditure increases dependence on foreign assistance will also increase because of
failure to mobilise internal resources, lack of clear thinking, transparency and ability
to execute development projects. The gravity of this situation can be understood from the
fact that the ratio of debt service to external assistance has rapidly increased over the
past one decade. Now, the problem as it stands is that the increasing burden of debt
servicing is greatly reducing the room for manoeuvring in the development front as well as
in the choice of development projects. This apart, investment in the form of loan
assistance to unproductive sectors has become excessive due to persistent borrowing from
multilateral agencies, that too, at relatively higher rates of interest. Another factor
that has compelled the country to depend on foreign assistance is the failure of public
enterprises to generate a fair amount of surplus.
It is unfortunately true that
successive governments have never thought seriously about various development models and
approaches. Neither has any political leader seen to it that foreign loan assistance is
utilised properly. Instead, they have diverted loan assistance and abused their authority
for personal benefit. The government cannot allow this to continue. It has to develop
policies and programmes to mobilise internal resources, reduce the burden of external
assistance and invest in the productive sector only. But most of all, it has to see to it
that the money is utilised properly.
Other Stories
|
