"...in order to accommodate the 300 million people that will join India's workforce between 2010 and 2040, India needs to create roughly 10 million jobs a year."
As China, Japan and many other nations face an aging demographic profile, the youth segment of India’s population is growing rapidly, and is projected to continue to do so for the next 30 years. Provided India can act quickly on health, education and employment, this demographic dividend has the potential to inject new dynamism into its flagging economy. Failure to do so, however, will result in demographic disaster.
Today, more than half of India’s population is under the age of 25, with 65 percent of the population under 35. By 2020, India’s average age will be just 29 years, in comparison with 37 in China and the United States, 45 in Western Europe and 48 in Japan.This demographic trend will confer a significant competitive advantage upon India. About a quarter of the global increase in the working age population (ages 15-64) between 2010 and 2040 is projected to occur in India, during which time this segment is set to rise by 5 percent to 69 percent of its total population. Roughly a million people are expected to enter the labor market every month, peaking at 653 million people in 2031. As a result the IMF projects that India’s demographic dividend has the potential to produce an additional 2 percent per capita GDP growth each year for the next twenty years.
However, India’s ability to reap the rewards of its huge demographic advantage is far from guaranteed.The failure of a number of Latin American countries with the same demographic profile as Southeast Asia to achieve similarly impressive economic outcomes is a cautionary tale for India. The key to transforming the demographic dividend into economic growth lies not just in having more people, but having greater numbers of better trained, healthier and more productive people. The relationship here is mutually reinforcing; India must harness the advantage of its youth to fulfill its economic potential, and in turn must generate growth in order to continue to support its growing population. As noted by India's former Minister of Human Resource Development, Kapil Sibal, “it will be a dividend if we empower our young. It will be a disaster if we fail to put in place a policy and framework where they can be empowered.”
At the most basic level, India must focus on improving the overall health and well-being of its children in order to make the most of their immense potential. The Asian Development Bank estimated that 32.7 percent of India's population lives below the poverty line of $1.25 a day (PPP), and India is home to one-third of the world's poor. At 44 deaths per 1,000 live births, India's mortality rate is high. The World Bank notes a direct link between undernourishment and impaired cognitive development, so should India fail to ensure the health and well-being of its children, its future productivity and development will be severely curtailed. With a Human Development Indicators ranking of 134 out of 187 countries, India has a long way to go, and must swiftly invest in developing the potential of its enormous human capital.
Perhaps the most crucial task India faces is equipping its burgeoning youth with education and skills training. According to India’s 2011 Census, India’s literacy rate sits around 74%, with significant variation according to state and gender. In this regard, India’s 2009 Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act is a big step towards guaranteeing a basic education for every child. Since its launch in 2010 India has witnessed some positive results, with 94 percent of children between the ages of 6 and 14 enrolled in school, and steady improvements in terms of facilities such as toilets and drinking water.
Nevertheless, concerns regarding the implementation of the Act persist, with teacher absenteeism and large class sizes in many government schools fuelling the popularity of private institutions. Basic educational indicators across the country have actually deteriorated since the implementation of the Act in 2001, with the proportion of children in Standard V reading at a Standard II level and unable to complete basic arithmetic rising.
Photo Credit: Flickr Creative Commons (Rakumar1220)
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Siddharth
These are big challenges to overcome – I feel optimistic on the whole since the private sector will both create jobs and the supply of trained personnel. This has been going on for a while now.
Kanes
Resource crunch is severe in India. Economic growth avenues are also short for such a large number of youth. Defence imports, highest in the world. Gap between the rich and the poor is widening. All are ripe for a big bang. Richer states will seek nationhood. Human Development Indiax 134 among 187 times a billion people is a very bad omen. A human time bomb.
Irony
Richer states for nationhood has never been heard of in India. No state in India is like the Texas of US whose people requested a seccession bid on racial terms( racial of course….we know they didnt like to be leaded by a black president for a 2nd time). Dont make up ur own stuff
Alpha roger
In case you didn’t notice india’s bin on a steady course of economic development since 1991 despite aggressive provocations of Pakistan sponsored terrorism. Hostility notwithstanding, it has pursued huge trade with China. It’s trade and infrastructure pursuits with Japan are encouraging. It’s defense buying has introduced a competitive edge to serious solicitations of defense industries of the US. Russia and France. Most of all it carries the onerous burdens of a functioning democracy that rest of the world envies because citizen freedoms look good only in a far away India. Closer home, they don’t make as much sense. India is heavily invested in south and east Africa and doing relatively better than china because of cultural relations going back to gandhi’s days in SA. And that’s the story for now. What say
Akhtar
India is a special case, which needs attention!
All that glitters is not gold; ever heard of this!
If the US infrastructure is shabby and it is the super power; what chance can India afford to bid for a democratic superiority given a billion people and even ill planned, outdated infrastructure!
Again, all that glitters is not gold!
Alpha roger
Gold that glitters is never traded or sold
With little thought you could be bold
And move away from cliche’d gold
That you know not how to hold
Tim Hurley
Interesting article, but the writer's ideological bias shows. How do you write about this subject mentioning one governmental program after another and never acknowledging the crucial role of getting government out of the way of the free market? Economic freedom is essential if the poverty is to be reduced.
Alpha roger
Tim. It’s good Adam Smith lasted as long as he did. But economics gods have taken a transfer of residence and adapted to the native milieu. I think you need to update your role model from Wall Street to Main Street. Ciao
Peter Karyu
This country managed and is doing well since 1950 as against expected to breakdown right after it gained independence..
It will prove it yet again..
Good Luck India!
Bilal Yousaf
Their atrocities in Kashmir will not go unanswered God almighty is watching
Alpha roger
God is your only hope. You don’t have much hope left in yourself. You are lucky to be in India or else you’d be a member of an internationally networked gang of criminals known as terrorists. Kashmir Muslims have never worked all their lives because a kind, hunger pinched Indian gives you free food to eat.
Bilal Yousaf
India will tear itself apart from inside
Alan Kottommannil Thomson
Dear Bilal Yousaf
If India has to tear appart from Inside it would had happened when she was a young nation. India as a nation though many kingdom has been here for more that 3000 thousand years, and its very unlikely it happen now. Yes we have internal problems, but but I believe as a nation we have the will and resourses to confront them and find a lasting solution to it, which will accommodate the aspiration of her people. There is a sence of oneness amongst its people. Every nation goes through challenges in its life and I belive India will also find a way to positevely exploite this issue.
But this notion of India breaking up internally is not valid at all.
Sri
Keep day dreaming.
Alpha roger
Forget inside outside focus on free food.
Alpha roger
Forget inside and outside yousaf. Keep your focus on free food.
Charles Oltorf
Historically, these demographics usually portend a violent revolution followed by a period of aggressive military expansion. Good luck, India. Poor south Asia.
t_co
Aggressive military expansion versus neighbors armed with nuclear weapons is probably not the best idea.
Alpha roger
Charles. Your ponderous ‘historically’ opening is abysmally incompatible with ‘historic’ French and Russian revolutions motivated by lack of food caused by these war obsessed nations. India is a large economy with world’s youngest and largest work force. Even your scandanavian salami would be coming from India.
nithish philip abraham
Thts am unlikely event to happen. Unlike the rest of the world where people would be happy to separate and turn against each other we indians need each other to exist. Our tradion is developed in such a way that a peace can only exist with the presence of more than three comunities. I myself being a christian dont celebrate christmas as much as the hindhu’s in my community.
Jai
Nithish… I am also a Christian from TamilNadu, India and we celebrate christmas as much as any other community… Please do not represent individuals like urself to be the face of India… India is much more than Individuals… :) cheers