Sri Lanka Reading List - part 1 (I hope)

I've been back in the U.S. for a few weeks and it's been great to reconnect with classmates and other friends, and I've been busily twisting arms and encouraging nascent plans to visit Sri Lanka sooner rather than later. Though I love painting word-pictures and treating myself as well as my friends to stories from home, I thought it would be a good idea to start a little list of recommended reading - books that I enjoyed and which have enough connection to Sri Lanka to give people a taste of what's to come. Remembering the books' highlights makes me want to bring forward my return date!

Life having been so busy for the last few years, I haven't been getting through many books, so I recruited my uncle Suren, who also studied in the U.S. (in the 80's) and as a pilot, gets a lot of downtime where he devours books (and yeah, he's the one Malcolm Gladwell mentions in Outliers). Other respected elders, you may be next for a list of books (I'm talking to you, Shaku Akki)

Diya Rakusa's contributions:

• Handbook for the Ceylon Traveller, a Studio Times publication (unfortunately not available in the U.S. last time I checked)
• Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatje
• Flower Boy by Karen Roberts
• An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon in the East Indies Together with an Account of the Detaining in Captivity the Author and Divers other Englishmen ... There, and of the Author's Miraculous Escape by Robert Knox (give the guy a break, this was the 18th century)

Suren Ratwatte's contributions

(notes from Suren to Diya Rakusa: "Haven't read the last one yet" and "Not necessarily positive. Don't censor the reading lists!"):

• Reef by Romesh Gunasekera **
• The sweet and simple kind by Yasmine Gooneratne
• The Hamilton Case by Michelle De Kretser *
• A Disobedient Girl by Ru(wani) Freeman

Letter to the Editor of The Sunday Leader

Re: "Vegetable Crates May Increase Prices"


Madam,

I write in relation to the article with the above title, published on the 3rd of October 2010. Some of the assertions quoted therein about the possible increase in prices appeared inflated and unscientific. I am in the process of putting together a basic comparative calculation to prove - or scientifically disprove - the benefits of using crates. This however is a spare-time activity and I have therefore been unable to complete the exercise ahead of the print deadlines for Sunday the 10th. I hope to be able to share something simple but indicative as soon as possible nevertheless.

In the meantime, the simplest counterfactual evidence I can point to is the fact that leading, profitable public and private companies such as CIC, Nidro etc, who are directly accountable to their shareholders, would never voluntarily use crates exclusively, as they do now, unless there is a clear overall profit advantage in doing so. My only reservation is that more short-term or closed-minded thinkers may not have the same ability to see the bigger, long-term picture that truly justifies switching to the use of crates, an action that should benefit every link in the chain between the farmer and the consumer. This is the local consumer's and the national economy's loss.

IT and Education in the 21st Century - Response to Say It, Look @ Episode 1

I've been avoiding the blogosphere for a while now, despite lots of blog-worthy items piling up. I do however want to get this post out, inspired by the World Bank-sponsored Say it, Look @ TV+Social Media convergence/mashup play. Great first effort, some great commentary in there (ok, the presenter could tone it down a little but I'll keep quiet about that - for now).

The show makes the point (17:26) we all know and manage to do little about - that the "quality and economic contribution of the Higher Education system" need to be improved.

I do want to reflect a little however on Mr. Harsha Aturupane's comment at 17:34 - that Sri Lanka should focus away from expanding access and concentrate on increasing quality and labour-market relevance in public higher education. Provocative stuff, particularly coming from an institution all-too-easily targeted by the entrenched JVP student union types in the state universities.

Answer First
Here's my basic thesis: Yes we need to improve the quality of the higher education system, but we can't afford to shut out the massive numbers that still never make it through because of economic reasons. Hopefully as we increase quality, the payoff and demand for more quantity will be more visible and immediate. Oh, and this little thing called SL2College is the perfect solution to to bridge the gap in the short term, and to maintain quality competitiveness in the long term.

The Education Funnel
Sri Lanka has a funnel of staggering proportions that keeps hundreds of thousands of qualified students out of the state higher education system. The following are 2007 figures.

Of 450,000 students (mostly 15-16 years or age, at grade 11) who sat for the GCE (General Certificate of Education) Ordinary Level ("O/L") exam, around 200,000 qualified for the GCE Advanced Level ("A/L") another two years down the road. Of the 230,000 students who sat for the A/L exam in 2007, over 104,000 passed, i.e. they essentially qualified for state university.

Only 17,196 (16.5%) were fortunate enough to gain a seat at a state university.

Multiple Failings
Yes, the state higher education system is broken far beyond just the point at which people get in. In the worst years, once had to wait several years between getting one's results (many months after the exam) and actually making it to classes  - because of the strikes, riots and other closures that tied up resources, used by the classes before you still waiting to graduate. One can still expect to take longer to graduate than the theoretical 3-4 years it should take, thanks to the assorted strikes, closures and other high-jinks that occur from time to time - usually timed just ahead of the more important exams that the less serious students have not gotten around to preparing for.

Yes, the system produces more "eternal students" (not quite of the Chekovian variety) and trained paper-pushers considering themselves fully entitled for a government pension and the least possible non-over-time work. State university graduates can mostly only dream of the new equipment and exposure they'd need to access to be really ready for the labour market. The regionally distorted labour market and economic center of gravity in Colombo mean that many do not want to go to the newer, perfectly good regional universities.

Not All Doom and Gloom
But look at those who really do put their noses to the grindstone. Our state universities have created some great academics, artists, doctors, engineers, lawyers and other professionals. Whether they go abroad as undergrads, postgrads or academics, Sri Lankan students and academics regularly excel elsewhere in the world. Pitifully few come back, but that must change. Our CEO at the IT company I worked for always states we are capable of producing the best engineers in the world, worthy of the heritage that created the mighty irrigation works and rock fortresses of our past.

I would say that Sri Lankan students, at least that subset who know why they are in university and are ready to make the most of the opportunity, have proven that we can shine through all the challenges they face in the state higher education system.

Walking the Tightrope
Yes, we need to improve the quality and labour-market orientation of our higher education system. That need has not changed. If we succeed, in doing so we will also change the nature of the average student who enters that system. They will be more cognizant of the tremendous responsibilities before them, to not waste the opportunities before them and the resources placed at their disposal, paid for by millions of taxpayers.

But we also need to widen the funnel. Private universities - another sector with all kinds of distortions and peculiarities introduced for political expediency and narrow interests - at least give some sort of outlet for those who can afford their costs. But for every student who can afford that option, there are hundreds, if not thousands, languishing in the provinces or in the urban slums, whose worldview is further distorted by the inequality in what might be one of the most vital Public Goods.

Until we do both, we will fall off the tightrope between a sea of "unemployed graduates" on the one hand, with no marketable skills or motivations to contribute to society; and, on the other hand, a self-perpetuating system of elitism where the gap between the Higher Education Haves and Have-Nots breeds resentment and unrest. We have experienced both, in some form, and at some point in the recent past. We need to make sure we stay on the tightrope this time.

SL2College - Short-Term Relief, Long-Term Relevance
Particularly in the interim, where we simply cannot afford to go putting up the "lecture halls, laboratories and canteens" that the program speaks about, SL2College is a service that could ease some of the pressure on the physical constraints - while also taking Sri Lankan students out into the world and impressing upon them the need to come back (and give back) with a wider world view and the vision and experience to not just accept the status quo in Sri Lanka.

Sri Lankan students are world-class. SL2College helps them explore the higher education opportunities that best fit their academic aspirations, whether locally or abroad - but always with a gentle reminder that they should also think about bringing back their skills and knowledge to the country that nurtured them and educated them, usually for free, in their early lives.

Parting Words from JFK
Education has a massive impact upon individual earning capacities. To me, the quote below pretty much sums up why education is both a Human Right and a Public Good, which can help us all find our way out of the hole we have dug ourselves into.

“Let us think of education as the means of developing our greatest abilities, because in each  of us there is a private hope and dream which, fulfilled, can be translated into benefit for everyone and greater strength for our nation.”

-- John F. Kennedy.

Bad policy: short-term handouts trumping long-term growth

How would you go about entrenching poverty in a primarily rural, formerly agriculture-dominated tropical island economy?

Your land is blessed with two monsoons that almost split the year perfectly in two, interspersed with inter-monsoonal rains. You have diverse agro-ecological zones, and what's more those two monsoons approach your island from diametrically opposite compass points, spreading the water wealth. Your people are inheritors of centuries of vast public irrigation works that have conquered any imbalance in water availability, bringing liquid gold to the most fertile and agriculture-friendly parts of the island.

Let's assume you already have highly fragmented landholdings due to weak land markets, previous cock-eyed land reforms and a lot of inertia around more meaningful reforms. People with handkerchief sized sub-scale plots can't sell their lands due to unclear title or worse, arcane regulations. Rational land allocation is distorted by regulations that forbid any use but agriculture, sometimes of specific crops (ref. self-sufficiency) - you can't even  grow something the market might actually want.

Coddle local producers to the point of inefficiency with populist import protections, price controls and astronomical, unsustainable input subsidies (which by one of my calculations almost completely wipe out the GDP contribution from paddy); then cut them loose and bring in cheap imports when prices spike just ahead of the local harvests (or near elections) - depressing prices for everyone and killing incentives in local agriculture. Once in a while try to bring in a guaranteed-price centralized purchase scheme to repeat dramatic failures of the past. Big farmers want to cut their losses, small farmers just revert to subsistence, turning away from the vagaries of the market. Value-adders lock up their expensive (imported) machines whose output cannot be sold at a fair price thanks to the controls.

Self-sufficiency is one double-edged sword to swing around too much. The food shocks of 2008 provide an easy stalking horse for all kinds of protectionism taken too far. All kinds of marginal lands start coming back under cultivation, some of it just for subsistence, all competing with the "high-potential" zones that should be left to cultivate commodities efficiently - and cheaply - without specializing into higher-value crops or away from agriculture altogether.

There's no easy fix of course. Most of today's marginal lands were the agricultural heartlands of yore, sometimes by accident, sometimes reflecting the changing state of the art in technology. Like in Japan, agriculture, particularly rice, is embedded deep in our souls, and can't be turned away from easily. Few other alternatives exist - development in held back by isolation in its many forms; roads, technology and education have taken the longest to penetrate - and make an impression - in those same areas.

With an end to conflict, the clock is winding down on inefficient land allocations - if we don't get smarter about what we grow, where, farmers around the island will be faced with harvests they can't sell. Can we get markets working in time to keep the right farmers growing the crops best suited to their lands (and all the handicaps we can't dispense with overnight) - and to the market opportunities out there?

Don't like your score? Change the rules (again)

Sri Lanka's rejiggering the main price index less than two years after the last blatant wool-pulling exercise. This time they're even dropping alcohol and tobacco from the basket, clearly choosing to believe their own fairytale that temperance can be enforced - and apparently has been achieved - with the help of a few TV spots and millions of posters.

I heard that an old journalist (maybe too old to care anymore) had interrupted a Buddhist monk trotted out to sing the government's praises in decidedly non-secular areas, asking what exactly the reverend was celebrating, given that the reporter had just been to one of the lavish vote-buying parties at the Palace where the drinks flow freely.

Another little birdie tells me His Highness had nudged and winked away the concerns of a delegation from the meat industry about the similar blanket ban on slaughtering with "don't worry about all that, we also must have something to eat no!"

Finally, an unintended consequence of a blanket ban on animal slaughter (keeping in mind that I am personally against the taking of lives but also willing to step back and think of wider consequences): Apparently a commercially viable dairy operation needs to cull 20% of its herd annually, something one large operator has already had problems doing thanks to enthusiastic preemptive rent-seeking despite the anti-slaughter bill only being in proposal stage. So, overnight blanket ban on slaughter --> further reduced local milk production --> more imports --> less foreign exchange, and more reasons for the propagandists to squeal about foreign conspiracies - except in this case too, the problem is local, not foreign.

Dud bridges? Check. Private Presidential Palaces? Check.

I saw some TV coverage of this talk a while back - which also shows how long my backlog is(!)

Small groups pushing policy without evidence - sound familiar? Where are our median voters? How come they don't push for the kind of sensible reforms for which "a fair amount of consensus" apparently already exists, in "education, labour markets, land markets, and achieving macro-economic stability and better public spending?"

I suspect the median voter has had to rush wholesale to hang on to the Satakaya-tails just to survive, maybe angling for whatever infrastructure contracts the Chinese didn't bother with, or hoping for scraps from such long-term empire-building as the Deniyaya Raja-pasa-plex (new definition for PPP: Private Presidential Palace?)

A friend on holiday from the original home of the Land Rover observed over the weekend that one has to come to Sri Lanka to see tricked-out Land Rovers of every flavour hammering around - mostly on Colombo's streets of course, rather than the moonscapes all the ostentatious accessorizing implies they're meant for. I even saw an LR3 sporting a snorkel and winch - and the requisite garage plates - the other day. The cheap-and-cheerful Mahindras and Tatas seem long forgotten - good thing Land Rover is nominally Indian now - more than enough for Comrade Vimal to spin another set of rationalizations (wait - didn't he hate the Indians? Or was that last week?). Even the bald-headed, aisle-crossing Minister who pretentiously went around in a Hindustan Ambassador when he was in the last government came away from launching his own political party (better than admit defeat and go back whence he came) dispensing Justice in a shiny silver Jaguar.

Has the median voter evolved, throwing in the towel and joining the mad scramble to feed on the carcass? If the median voter has in fact had to become a opportunistic, carrion-feeding pragmatist in a ridiculously politicized society, what hope does that hold out for a "brighter future" that we all apparently still hope for, the past four years apparently not having been bright enough?

Do we really have a silent majority that might, juuust might, this time actually make the trip to the voting booth and send the Scamtastic Four and their friends and family back to their upgraded or brand-new homes to try and get by on the fortunes built up over the last four years? Tough ask, I would say, given the stranglehold on the state machinery and the scale on which it is being mis-used - why risk one's neck to put pen to paper when there are many goons happy to do it for you?

If we as voters do in fact come out of our stupor and topple the four-headed beast (wrong part of the anatomy? Many-pocketed, for sure) it's not like the journey's over. Better almost anyone than this clan, the past four years should tell us that. But we voters must keep the pressure up for the vital promises to be followed-through, for once. We must get up off our welfare-softened backsides and maintain a firmer hold on our elected servants (with less prostrating before them for a start) with clearer causality between good or bad policies and the political outcomes we voters alone should be able to decide.

It's time to step up to the plate.

New music video business model?

Has the music industry stumbled upon a new model to finance music video productions?

Over the last few months (hey, I don't watch much TV) I've noticed some pretty sly product placements in Sri Lankan music videos, to the extent that there is clearly some money changing hands here. Not a bad thing, considering how small the local market is, and that most of the music is pretty good, and pretty creative too. Here are just a couple; check out the related ones too:

Ashanthi:

• a womens' health supplement (? the pills in the purple box)
• a new fizzy drink being heavily promoted
• Mercedes might be a long shot, and Hummer an even longer one - I'll chalk those up to de rigeur rap-video props [later update - turns out the Hummer may have been a product placement too; I love how Sri Lankan companies brashly crown themselves "#1," "world's leading," etc with doubtless no evidence whatsoever]
• just to editorialize, I thought the little laptop face-off between Ashanthi and the rapper (DeLon?) was cleverly done

Iraj

• An European three-wheeler competing with the Indian brand
• another fizzy drink promoted as an essential accompaniment to any meal (perfect as this song is about food!)
• Other videos by Iraj have featured cellphone operators, fizzy drinks from the same manufacturer, and, not sure about this one, match manufacturers?

A while after I'd started on and forgotten this post, I noticed quite a bit of product placement in a Pussy Cat Dolls video too, and, in the interest of science, watched a few more to turn up some more such as

• Nokia, HP, and Campari in Hush Hush; Hush Hush
• Gratuitous Nokia in Jai Ho
• and now, when I look back, in most of their videos I guess