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Invasion of the Inclusive Idea
By Professor
Gnanaharan
June 2006
"An invasion of armies can be resisted. But not an idea whose time
has come". So declared Victor Hugo. Now the time for an
"inclusive"growth strategy has really arrived. The Confederation of
Indian Industry(CII) has announced the four missions for this year.
R.Seshasayee, its President has made a clarion call for an" inclusive
and sustainable" strategy. They represent two of its missions for the
year. They can infact be considered as two sides of one broad development
strategy.
While one side concerns with the inclusivity in terms of 'people', the other
side focuses on the concerns of the 'planet'. The people side has two
different dimensions. They refer to: promoting inclusiveness in consumption
and production. The former is a business imperative now. To put it in the
words of Seshasayee, "we are talking about inclusive growth not because
it is politically fashionable, but because unless we have inclusive growth we
are not going to be able to expand the market".
Ford Motor Company is an excellent example of a company which expanded the
size of its market by pursuing an inclusive growth strategy. Henry Ford
famously stated once that he wanted to put a Ford car in each and every
garage in American homes. One more company which immensly benefited both by
penetration of cars in America and through an inclusive strategy is ofcourse
is Wal-Mart.
Every one knows what an inclusive approach to market can do to determine the
fortunes of a company. But what is not fully understood is how far that
strategy can be taken forward without affecting the concerns of the other
"P" i.e. Planet. Sometime ago, a scientist of repute made a
revealing statement. That is, if every Chinese and Indian starts owning a car
the world will become unlivable. That is the measure and magnitude of the
problem a foretaste of which is already in evidence.
That does not however diminish the value of having an inclusive strategy at
the corporate or national level. Right here in India, the shampoo market has
witnessed astounding growth rate in penetration mainly through such a
strategy. By spreading the "single serve" revolution - to use the
celebrated phrase of CK Prahalad, who popularised the now famous Bottom of
the Pyramid approach- the shampoo industry has seen its penetration in the
rural areas jump from just 13% in 2000 to a third of the population in 2005.
Its penetration in states like Andhra Pradesh and Tamilnadu are as high as
50%.
The other aspect of the inclusive growth strategy concerns with how a
particular economic activity is carried out. It has implication for both
people and planet. The idea here is to adopt a pocess which involves
employment of more people and/or protection of the planet. As pointed out
rightly by Seshasayee "how we grow is even more important than how much
we grow". Sustainable development therefore is all about
"inclusiveness".
Jairam Ramesh, the Minister of State for Commerce announced a Cluster
Development Approach which for 100 Handloom Clusters in the country. This
could well be one of the promising inclusive development schemes being
introduced by the Government. As the second largest employer in the country
with 6.5 million people at the bottom of the pyramid, the programme will
promote inclusive growth. Already it generates Rs.2500 crore export turnover
with prospects for greater achievement. However the ultimate success of this
programme will depend on the size and quality of investment on soft side of
the cluster intervention.
It is worth remembering what Arnold Toynbee said on this vital issue with
conviction. "The twentieth century will be chiefly remembered in future
centuries not as an age of political conflicts or technical inventions, but
as an age in which human society dared to think of the welfare of the whole
human race as a practical objective".
The 21st century could well make this objective a reachable or achievable
one.
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