Thank you for all the fish!

There is an old saying: Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach the man to fish and you feed him for the rest of his life.

Evidently, the present day executives and members in the current Indian parliament with an average age hovering around 60 do not believe in the wisdom of the old. The irony is telling!

However, I don’t write this to highlight the ageing executive of a young country like India, or even remotely allude, accidentally or otherwise, to the possibility of some of them being senile. Any such inference, should you bravely venture to explore, is entirely at your own risk. I shall offer no support – moral, legal, ethical, logical, or mathematical – to such a misadventure. I may be spared for my new found selfish zeal to protect my life, family, property, and career in the wake of the new IT act introduced by the present incumbent in the Government.

My intention to write this piece is only to highlight the apparent lack of scientific rigour in the process of policy formation in the country. I don’t mean any disrespect to renowned economists like Dr. Sen or Dr. Bhagwati, but I do demand in the spirit of scientific inquiry, and to ensure that every rupee that I pay to the Government of India is utilized with utmost discretion and efficiency, that there be a due diligence done before the government starts investing money in any scheme.

What’s that got to do with fish, you ask? A lot, in fact. Well, mostly indirectly.

Let’s take the example of a person who does not fish. There could be several reasons for this and I shall illustrate a few below:

1.       There is no fishing cord/net

2.       There is no pond/water source

3.       There is no fish in the pond

4.       The person does not know how to use the cord/net to fish

5.       The person cannot use or doesn't have access to the cord, or pond

6.       The person does not have the ability to fish

7.       The person does not have money to buy cord/net

8.       The person is too lazy to fish

9.       The person is a vegetarian (well, what can you do!)

Imagine if I were to take up a research on “How to feed fish to everyone?”

Imagine now that at the end of my research, I submit a report that has a single line solution to this problem – buy fish for everyone and then sell it to everyone at Rs. 1. But in order to prevent people from over-consuming fish at what I deem to be a cheap price, I also put a restriction on the number of fish available to each person to 4 fish per day.

I guarantee you that in any self-respecting institute, and that includes the likes of IIPM too, such a research will be tossed out of the window, fed to a shredder, or be donated to a friendly neighbourhood vegetable vendor to wrap his vegetables in.

The reason is simple. The solution is absurd. The objective was never to personally feed fish to people, but to enable them to fish to sufficiently fulfill their nutritional requirements. Moreover, the choice of the price – a rupee per fish, in this case – and the quantity – 4 fish per person per day – is absolutely arbitrary. What if someone has a higher or lower nutrient requirement or cannot afford fish even at the price of a rupee? Does our solution achieve the intended objective?

Here is a table that illustrates the different scenarios and their possible solutions. There is an additional column with a solution that the current incumbent may have proposed in the fish universe.

Factors whose absence may adversely affect fishing									Possible solution	Incumbent’s solution
Money	Tools (cord/ net)	Natural resource (ponds / water)	Produce (fish)	Skill	Physical Ability	Access	Desire	Prefer-ence
X									Easy finance/ loans/ employ-ment	4 fish per person per day
	X								Tool subsidies/ Tool rentals/ Tools sale/ distr. channels	4 fish per person per day
		X							Altern-ate sources / artificial ponds	4 fish per person per day
			X						Cultivation techniques / pisci-culture technologies / conservation	4 fish per person per day
				X					Training / educat-ion	4 fish per person per day
					X				Machine aided-fishing / employ-ment in auxiliary services	4 fish per person per day
						X			Better proprietary laws / better infrastructure / pond-ownership reforms	4 fish per person per day
							X		Provide incenti-ves to fish / social awareness	4 fish per person per day
								X	Awareness on benefits of fish	4 fish per person per day

Absence of multiple factors would require several combinations of solutions to be devised.

Ideally, a study on these lines would necessarily require a study of a large sample of the population to understand why some people fish and why some people don’t; draw up different factors and variables and their influence on people's fish eating behaviour; enumerate and rank solutions based on their effectiveness in improving fish consumption based after due market studies and pilot projects. The final recommendation would be implement a portfolio of solutions for maximum impact with a provision to monitor, review, and revise periodically.

This brings us to the reality of our world. The Food Security Bill (FSB) was passed in great hurry by the parliament in the current session of Lok Sabha, and there has been a lot of noise in favour or against the bill. But nowhere have I noticed the government presenting any study that outlines the factors for starvation or under-nourishment of people in the country. Nowhere were the causes outlined, nor a study on how the current FSB was the best possible solution to alleviate those causes was presented. Heck, I don't even know what the original problem is that the current incumbent is trying to solve through FSB.

Almost everyone has referred to one’s ‘gut-feel’ to support or oppose the bill. Some have touched upon the issues of money, funds, and inefficiency of government etc. in discussion the merits of the bill, but where is the study of the most important variable in this entire equation – the people?

Does the government claim that FSB guarantees to alleviate starvation and under-nourishment from the country? If so, then in how many years will it fulfill this promise? Does that mean the government hopes to not continue FSB after the guarantee period is over? Where is the study on how the prices that were arrived at are the best prices? What if someone cannot afford rice at a rupee a kilo? Will the government consider offering rice free of cost then? Does the government guarantee that every poor person will benefit from this scheme? If these promises are not fulfilled, then what are the penalties for the government? Is there a scope for review of this scheme at a specified time in future?

The sheer lack of scientific rigour in the formation of this policy is horrifying. Should the executives of the Government not be subject to scrutiny and trial under criminal law if the scheme that has such an enormous social, political, and financial impact turns out to be a dud?

Need a fish, you say? Go fish yourself!