The CPEC project has courted a lot international attention. The minute details of the project have been kept tightly under wraps. Several observers are giving various reasons for China's keen interest in the project. With fundamentalism on the rise, being a hotbed of terror and with its economy and administration in shambles, Pakistan today is an investor's nightmare.
The $56 billion that China is 'investing' in CPEC is more than all the FDI that Pakistan has ever attracted, since '70. Moreover, this investment alone is around 20% of Pakistan's GDP. Despite Pakistan being an investor's nightmare, China has entered Pakistan in a big way. Why?
Several reasons have been cited by international experts. Some say China wants to encircle India. Some others opine that China wants to rapidly develop its isolated western part. It is also thought that China wants to secure its energy and communication lines in the event of a lock down of the Malacca Strait.
But amid all these, one vital question lingers. Why Pakistan?
If we analyse closely, keeping in view of China's internal politics and history, a different picture emerges as to why Pakistan was chosen to be the 'fulcrum' of its One Belt One Road(OBOR) policy. Simply put, it has been done to stabilise its demographic imbalance. Since the '70s, China has aggressively implemented a 'One Child Policy' whereby married couples had to bring up only one child and were provided with incentives. If anyone flouted the norm, they were punished economically. The additional child had to be brought up with the family's own resources and the government did not provide any subsidy for the 'extra' child's social costs. Moreover, Chinese society(like most Asian societies) is a male-offspring obsessed society. It is estimated that in the 35 years of its implementation, China prevented 400 million additional births and most of the prevented births were that of female offsprings.
Recently, China relaxed its policy and that too, for a reason. It now has 30 million men of marriageable age, who will never find a bride! Imagine the unprecedented havoc, law and order situation and societal catastrophe that they can cause. Studies have also pointed out that most of those 30 million men belong to the lower economic classes.
Now what if you can employ those 30 million men and keep them busy in building a life? It will be even better if you can send them outside your borders. In this way, you will bring down the demographic pressure. Better still, if most of those men who go outside China, marry non-Chinese girls. Enter Pakistan...China's problem solved. A demographic analysis shows that the number of Pakistani girls of reproductive age(15 - 39) is around 29 million, as per the latest publicly available census. And the numbers fit.
The answer to the riddle is solved. Through the projects CPEC and OBOR, China hopes to sort out the demographic imbalances brought about by its past unsound decisions!
The carefully crafted remedial measure can take an unexpected turn when many of those young men find the Pakistani girls, a distraction, to tide over their temporary loneliness but insist on marrying Chinese girls only, eventually!!
*Note. The article has been adapted from various sources on the subject.
Tailpiece.
It was a very wet day indeed. My sister, Rema, had come down from Palakkad to collect a bag of hers that we'd brought. After a visit to the temple, she was with us for lunch and I'd seen her off to Palakkad, from the nearby bus stop, soon after.
The $56 billion that China is 'investing' in CPEC is more than all the FDI that Pakistan has ever attracted, since '70. Moreover, this investment alone is around 20% of Pakistan's GDP. Despite Pakistan being an investor's nightmare, China has entered Pakistan in a big way. Why?
Several reasons have been cited by international experts. Some say China wants to encircle India. Some others opine that China wants to rapidly develop its isolated western part. It is also thought that China wants to secure its energy and communication lines in the event of a lock down of the Malacca Strait.
But amid all these, one vital question lingers. Why Pakistan?
If we analyse closely, keeping in view of China's internal politics and history, a different picture emerges as to why Pakistan was chosen to be the 'fulcrum' of its One Belt One Road(OBOR) policy. Simply put, it has been done to stabilise its demographic imbalance. Since the '70s, China has aggressively implemented a 'One Child Policy' whereby married couples had to bring up only one child and were provided with incentives. If anyone flouted the norm, they were punished economically. The additional child had to be brought up with the family's own resources and the government did not provide any subsidy for the 'extra' child's social costs. Moreover, Chinese society(like most Asian societies) is a male-offspring obsessed society. It is estimated that in the 35 years of its implementation, China prevented 400 million additional births and most of the prevented births were that of female offsprings.
Recently, China relaxed its policy and that too, for a reason. It now has 30 million men of marriageable age, who will never find a bride! Imagine the unprecedented havoc, law and order situation and societal catastrophe that they can cause. Studies have also pointed out that most of those 30 million men belong to the lower economic classes.
Now what if you can employ those 30 million men and keep them busy in building a life? It will be even better if you can send them outside your borders. In this way, you will bring down the demographic pressure. Better still, if most of those men who go outside China, marry non-Chinese girls. Enter Pakistan...China's problem solved. A demographic analysis shows that the number of Pakistani girls of reproductive age(15 - 39) is around 29 million, as per the latest publicly available census. And the numbers fit.
The answer to the riddle is solved. Through the projects CPEC and OBOR, China hopes to sort out the demographic imbalances brought about by its past unsound decisions!
The carefully crafted remedial measure can take an unexpected turn when many of those young men find the Pakistani girls, a distraction, to tide over their temporary loneliness but insist on marrying Chinese girls only, eventually!!
*Note. The article has been adapted from various sources on the subject.
Tailpiece.
It was a very wet day indeed. My sister, Rema, had come down from Palakkad to collect a bag of hers that we'd brought. After a visit to the temple, she was with us for lunch and I'd seen her off to Palakkad, from the nearby bus stop, soon after.
No comments:
Post a Comment