Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made a crucial intervention for what was termed as the “social development strategy for IBSA” at the second trilateral summit of the IBSA (India, Brazil and South Africa) countries, hosted by President Mbeki of South Africa on Wednesday and attended by President Lula d’ Silva of Brazil.Calling upon all three countries to “bring to the table (what they can) based on their real life experiences” as “pluralistic democracies, developing economies and aspiration for rapid economic growth,” Singh unfolded his government's elaborate aam aadmi policy programme. Succinctly put across as an eight-point proposal, which could go a distance if adopted by the other two countries, he said it was relevant for both Brazil and South Africa as they were facing similar challenges in a globalising world.Predictably, “rapid economic growth” topped his list as a priority, so it can “generate the necessary resources for investing in social development”. He spent some time elucidating how “inclusivity” was an imperative to assist economic growth. Emphasising “human resource development”, “focus on equitable infrastructure”, “short-term distress mitigation”, “grassroots institution building”, “environmentally sound strategies”, and finally “integrating into the knowledge economy”, with “conscious efforts to ensure that all sections are in a position to participate in this transition”, Singh was almost recapping the UPA’s economic agenda, and how he hopes to weld high growth rates to feasible politics, that makes growth rate figures relevant to the aam aadmi.The PM urged IBSA countries to increase the intra-country trade to $30 billion by 2012, upping the initial “modest” target of $10 billion by 2012. Calling for more public-private partnerships to help governments to shoulder the burden of achieving the goals, he urged all seven working groups set up by IBSA to “complete at least one cycle of meetings in each of our countries”. So far, only the groups on ICT and Trade and Investment have met thrice.Another important set of discussions going on are India’s discussions for Free Trade Agreements with regional trading groups in Africa (SACU) and Mercosur in South America, something that is believed can give a huge push to trading ties between all three countries. The next IBSA Summit is scheduled to be held in India next year.What Brazil, SA do for their aam aadmi• Bolsa Familia: The “cash transfer” programme was initiated in 2003 by President Lula d' Silva for eight million poor families. The poor families are given money for sending their children to school as well as to support their health needs. While Brazil may not be able to boast about its growth rates, Lula has been commended for his success in reducing inequalities.
