India should increase health investment: Sachs

In the stream of endorsements that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh appears to have attracted, here’s another. Noted economist Jeffrey Sachs, special adviser to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and director of Columbia University’s Earth Institute, calls himself ‘‘a long-term fan of Singh’’ and is ‘‘delighted with the new government.’’ Sachs was speaking at a Columbia alumni meet in Delhi’s Claridges Hotel. In his meeting with the Prime Minister later this afternoon, perhaps, he has conveyed some of that appreciation.

Sachs, internationally renowned for his work as economic advisor to governments in Latin America, eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, Asia and Africa, has also been advisor to the IMF, the World Bank, WHO and UNDP. Named as one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time magazine this April, Sachs remembers being around in India and meeting Manmohan Singh when the first whiff of reforms had just begun in 1994. ‘‘There was a lot of scepticism in the academia, especially in JNU. They said you will only create more misery. Seeing India’s economic growth now, I feel vindicated. Basic economics and reforms have worked but in such a complex country, it can’t be straightforward. The great intellectual challenge is how to be part of the world economy and do it in an environmentally sustainable way,’’ says Sachs, who spent about 30 years at Harvard — first as student and then professor — before shifting to the Earth Institute in 2002.

If Sachs calls Singh the ‘‘personification of reforms’’, the Common Minimum Programme comes in for much praise, too. ‘‘I don’t like all of it but it’s not something I cringe on seeing. And I think increasing investment in health and education is not a concession to the Left but it is what is needed.’’

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But Sachs warns India of the danger of underinvesting in health — even the CMP’s promise of increasing it from 1 per cent of the GDP to 2-3 per cent is not enough for him. ‘‘That’s not enough. Most poor countries invest at least 4-5 per cent of their GDP in health,’’ says Sachs.

And if there is anything he would want to change in the CMP, it would be its take on labour laws. ‘‘I want to rephrase that. India’s labour laws are the most restrictive and are not creating employment either. But the coalition partners are not keen to change it. The previous government was more open to it but didn’t accomplish it either,’’ said Sachs. A common explanation for the BJP-led government’s electoral loss was that reforms helped only the rich, not the poor, and that they were over-sold.

Says Sachs: ‘‘That’s not true. It is because aspirations and expectations of people have risen, standards are rising. The 21st century will be an Asia century.’’