& çâÌæÚUæð´ ·¤è ¥ôÚU Îð¹Ùæ ÁæÚUè ÚU¹ð´ ¥ÍæüÌ ¥ÂÙð ÜÿØ ÂÚU ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´Ð ãæÚU Ù ×æÙð´, €UØô´ç·¤ ·¤æ× ·¤ÚUÙð âð ¥æÂ·¤ô ©gðàØ ·¤è Âýæç# ãôÌè ãñ ¥õÚU ÁèßÙ ·¤æ ¹æÜèÂÙ ÎêÚU ãôÌæ ãñÐ ÖÜð ãè ÁèßÙ ×ð´ ç·¤ÌÙè Öè ·¤çÆÙæ§ü €UØô´ Ù ¥æ°, çÁ™ææâæ ¥õÚU ©ˆâæã ÕÙæ° ÚU¹ð´Ð ŠØæÙ ÚU¹ð´, ÜÿØ ã×ðàææ ¥æÂ·Ô¤ Âæâ ãôÌð ãñ´ çÁ‹ãð´ ÂæÙð ·Ô¤ çÜ° ÂýØæâ ¥æÂ ·¤Öè Öè àæéM¤ ·¤ÚU â·¤Ìð ãñ´Ð

A tale of moon and mountains

Curtis S. Chin
AS Asia looks skyward to the tremendous success to date of China's 20-year-old, multi-billion dollar space program, much more needs to be done here on earth, including in Bangladesh, to bring business growth to some of the highest parts of Asia and the Pacific, a region which is still home to the vast majority of the world's poor.
That was a clear message in Nepal at a conference on poverty reduction, which helped mark the 30th anniversary of the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development. Headquartered in Kathmandu, ICIMOD is an intergovernmental knowledge and learning center founded on Dec. 5, 1983 to serve the eight member nations of the Hindu Kush-Himalayan region - Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Myanmar, Nepal and Pakistan.
But it need not be a tale of moon vs. mountains, or in Bangladesh's case of highlands vs. the nation's many low-lying areas and delta regions, particularly if greater efforts are made to target and to increase the effectiveness of development efforts and of policies to foster a better enabling environment for business.
Poverty remains a persistent challenge among the people who continue to make their lives in some of the world's most remote mountain regions in Asia. Limited economic opportunities still characterize sparsely populated communities on the Tibetan plateau as well as Himalayan villages that Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay Sherpa once passed through 60 years ago this year en route to the first successful ascent of Mount Everest.
Here and elsewhere in Asia, however, the reality remains that while government has been the key driver in putting a lunar lander, or man, on the moon, it is the private sector
that is key to sustainable economic growth, job creation and poverty reduction. That is as true in the plains and lowlands of Asia, as it will be in its remotest mountain regions, typically home to indigenous peoples and characterized by inaccessibility and fragile agricultural ecosystems.
To address this, business, government and civil society must come together and move beyond the politics, stereotypes and animosity that have for too long divided the Hindu Kush Himalayan region - home by some estimates to more than 180 million people, as well as vast water, forest and other resources at risk of unsustainable exploitation - and focus instead on partnering for sustainable economic growth. Steps must also be taken to address the "little brie" constraints to growth of bureaucracy, regulation, interventionism and corruption.
At the recent IGIMOD conference, I joined with several business and chamber of commerce counterparts on a panel moderated by GSR Asia. Together, we outlined three important areas that must be addressed to spur private sector engagement in Asia's remote mountain regions.
The first is innovation. The private sector is often ready to explore partnerships, but joint activities and plans for engagement must be innovative, with a business model that is not purely philanthropic, but structured to ensure both end beneficiaries in the community and the private sector can benefit.
This will include an assessment of risk and
return, something that the private sector is long accustomed to, and which government and civil society should also integrate into their own efforts in increasing accountability for time and money spent.
The second is involvement. Too often, the business community is invited to "participate" in a project or asked to fund a piece of research that already has been outlined and decided. The message is in essence, we want your money, but any other involvement is not welcome lest it "taint" the effort.
Instead, the private sector must be engaged early on. An innovative partnership would go beyond business as usual, and involve the private sector in fashioning programs that also leverage a commercial partner's market experience and knowledge. Such innovative, involved and engaged partnerships can be to the long-term benefit of both mountain communities and the bottom line. This is critical to success and sustainability of any private sector involvement.
One spotlighted example of private sector intervention discussed in Kathmandu was a pilot effort to work with marginalized farmers in South Asia, helping catalyze linkages -just as other programs have facilitated cooperatives - to share information, improve agricultural products and yields, and ultimately build better supply chains and profits.
The third is impact. For the business community, impact assessment is critical. Unlike government, business depends on past success to fund future successes. Results must be measured to ensure there is rationale for
sustained or expanded business involvement.
The remoteness of mountain communities cannot be an excuse for the lack of financial returns on a business investment. When a pilot program is brought to the business community for assessment and possible expansion, its impact and scalability must be clear and transparent.
Pilot projects help demonstrate that something is possible, but impact assessment is necessary for the business community to decide on scaling up an engagement. Don't throw good money after bad, as it were.
While governments typically drive basic infrastructure investments such as rural electrification and farm-to-market roads, the private sector is well positioned to help mountain communities by providing financing, market linkages, knowledge and other services.
The innovation, involvement and impact of government in a nation's initial journeys into space are clear and unquestionable in the United States, in Europe and now in Asia. As China sends forth a rover onto the lunar surface, an Indian spacecraft is en route to Mars, and Japan has long launched satellites from a space center in Kagoshima.
But here on earth, and even in space where the private sector has become increasingly involved in commercial satellite launches, it is clear that business can be a powerful partner in any endeavor. This must include the fight against poverty in Hindu Kush-Hi malayas.
Even as Asia reaches for the stars, let's not forget the poorest of the poor still at home, in the shadows of Asia's tallest mountains.
Curtis S. Chin served as US Ambassador to the Asian Development Bank under Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush, and is managing director of advisory firm RiverPeak Group, LLC.