Population And Development Meeting The Challenge

NEPAL is an agricultural country which majority of the population live in rural areas and rely significantly on subsistence agriculture. Despite significant advancement in science and technology the people especially in the poor developing countries have to face, many problems and challenges of poverty, illiteracy, unemployment, food security and public health.

One of the key obstacles to sustainable human development is rapid population growth. And its wider negative socio-economic impacts are potentially large. The increasing pressure on natural resources has been threatening environment and causing loss of bio-diversity.

In a country like ours where agriculture is key to growth of rural economy, the difficult topography and lack of easy physical access to external markets still limits development potential. However, the Government’s Agricultural Perspectives Plan has been focusing on improved farming, system, irrigation and increased access to markets.

According to the recent report to UNFPA, Nepal’s population is increasing at the rate of 2.27 per cent and it has reached 23,214,681. Largely, the lack of education and primary health care including reproductive health services are key reasons responsible for the rapid growth of population. The issues of gender inequality and poverty are also critical in population and development.

In this way, the rapidly growing population is bringing significant challenges to policy makers and planners. The costs associated with health care, education and employment for such an increasing population will be clearly larger. And the meager resources on development yield minimal impact.

Nepal, like many other developing countries, is trying hard to combat the rapidly increasing population growth by introducing family planning programmes. Family planning is a direct measure intended to influence fertility behaviour and it has been a key faction for slowing the population growth.

Within the context of reproductive health, the key objectives of family planning programme are to assist individuals and couples to space their children, prevent unwanted pregnancy, manage fertility and improve their overall reproductive health.

In one hand the population growth is very rapid and on the other, there are emerging problems of alarming spread of HIV/AIDS including other public health issues. If this trend is to continue, the development efforts yield minimal impact on the livelihoods of people. And this is one of the greatest threats to human development.

According to annual report of Department of Health Services—1999/2000; the target is to reduce Total Fertility Rate (TFR) from 4.64 per women in 1996 to 4 per women by the end of the Ninth Five Year Plan. The report explicitly mentions that the total demand for family planning is 59,9 per cent, of which only 28.5 per cent is met.

In a country like ours where maternal mortality rate is one of the highest in the world, family planning is most urgent. This requires not only expansion of the comprehensive family planning services but also innovative ways to raise public awareness of the benefits of delayed marriage, birth spacing and a small family norm across the country.

The increasing trend of urbanisation has contributed to growth of slums, overcrowding, unemployment and inadequacy of water, electricity, sewerage, transports, housing and other vital facilities in the city. As this goes on increasing, it strains government’s ability to provide adequate housing, water supply and sanitation, and other essential infrastructure requirements.

Many countries in the world are undergoing rapid urbanisation process. The migration from rural to urban area is high and the flow is expected to increase in the coming years. And undoubtedly, this leads to an accelerated phase of urban transition. Despite significant development in industrial sectors, the urban population most often suffers from poverty, unemployment and environmental pollution.

Today, many developing countries have to face dual challenge of poverty reduction and conserving the
environment. In spite of several attempts of checking environmental problems, the progress is still minimal. The only
problems related to loss of natural resources and environment are due to rapid population growth, deforestation and the shrinking of wild life and the age-old land use practices.

There are still rays of hope to move with a progress. the modernisation and globalisation have tremendous impacts on socio-economic development in the society—as the new technology in natural resource sectors has been a major breakthrough in the livelihoods of the majority of the poor.

If the present trend of increasing population is not checked effectively, the negative implications on socio-economic development would be enormous. Decentralisation is key to good local governance and development. With a view to offer opportunities at village level, the local self-governance act is a major landmark. Village population planning should therefore be an integral part of local development initiatives.

After all, population is not only number, but is also about people. Concerted efforts are therefore needed to raise a massive awareness on the benefits of small family and need of reproductive health services including family planning. And most importantly, in order to meet needs of water supply, sanitation, food security, and environmental conservation mostly in poor developing countries, there must be a balance between population and development.

Expert System In Agriculture

By Anoj Chhetri

This is the age of information technology. And the IT has made tremendous impact in every dimension of human beings in the world. The world has changed into a global village. Information has become a powerful commodity and has become invaluable resource to people in both the developed and developing countries. With the operation of information super highway, the world has witnessed a significant economic growth owning to this development.

In this situation Nepal cannot remain isolated from the world’s state of affairs. Sandwiched between the two giants and regional powerful nations, China and India, Nepal is also influenced a great deal by the development in these two rapidly growing countries. The widespread use of electronic mails and Internet resources in the urban areas has, however, not been able to reach to Nepalese rural areas. It has a great potential to influence livelihoods of Nepalese rural people if it is in the access of the villagers.

People suffer in economic terms every year due to lack of knowledge and skills. The agricultural production and productivity is declining whereas population is increasing over the years. Consequently, environment and biodiversity are degrading. In this context, it is high time to think of potential means to increase production and productivity to boost our economy.

The application of information technology in agricultural sector in the rural areas is a distant reality. It can be expected that people will definitely have access to information technologies if the government and policy makers can identify it as a prioritised sector. We know that we have dearth of qualified human resource in every sector including agriculture and livestock sectors. This situation is more severe in the livestock sector. It is an irony that poverty is alarmingly deep-rooted in the remote mountainous regions where people never receive technical service from competent technicians. It is also a fact that there is a tendency of government employees to work in urban areas because of opportunities and better facilities. With these reasons, a majority of farmers and other stakeholders do not have an access to updated information and technologies. They are deprived of even the basic technical services.

In this backdrop, the development of expert system in agriculture based on the indigenous knowledge of farmers and scientific knowledge of scientists can provide farmers with selective information service through field based staff. The expert system is a knowledge-based system (KBS). It can be developed by generating knowledge from farmers and researchers by using participatory tools and techniques. The System Learning Approach can be considered a potential approach for developing KBS. The use of participatory rural appraisal, ZOPP can not be ruled out for this purpose. There are many software to engineer expert system in agriculture. There is a Crystal which is user friendly and easy to use.

This is not one-time investment. It should be regularly updated with fresh information and technologies. The Nepal Agriculture Research Council (NARC) may view it a potential area for time and resource investment. In the longer term it can join the information super highway which will come true to Nepalese farmers if the government and donors give it due emphasis. The NARC may also benefit itself if it translates information into commodity.

During the Second World War the developed countries had used expert system in the medical sector in African nations. They had used MYCIN for immediate relief of war victims. The advanced technology such as Robotics is also based on artificial intelligence, which is in fact knowledge-based system.

The expert system can then be used by personnel involved in research and development. In Nepal agriculture has received top priority, thus extension workers can use it as technical advisor at remote villages as per needs and demands of people. It can be used for primary treatment to animals. However, the effectiveness and impact of this system to the extension workers needs necessarily be evaluated. The benefit of this technology to farmers should be measured. The research findings certainly guide to planners and policy makers involved in agriculture development.