"Bridge implementation gaps to achieve MDGs"

A PhD in Economics from the University of Virginia, U.S.A., Nisha Agrawal has been extensively working on poverty, inequality and social development issues for more than two decades. She has also worked with the World Bank on development issues, and has extensive experience working in countries in the East Asia Region (Cambodia, Vietnam and Indonesia) and in the East Africa Region (Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda). Nisha Agrawal is currently the CEO of Oxfam, India.

Nisha Agrawal CEO, Oxfam India/ Photo credit: OWSA

OWSA: What was the goal of the recent meeting with Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh? What were some of the issues raised during the meeting?

Nisha Agrawal: We went to see the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, on the issue of the Millennium Development Goals because this year, 2010, marks ten years after India made a commitment, along with all the other countries in the world, to do certain things to improve the lives of poor people.

India for the first time has actually produced a monitoring report on the MDGs that is going to be presented at the upcoming meeting in September at the UN General Assembly, and we had expected that the Prime Minister would be leading the delegation, so we went to talk to him about some of the issues.

There were two kinds of issues; one was on process; to say that there should have been wider consultation with civil society on the interpretation of some of the data that was being presented in the report. Secondly, that in many countries civil society members go as part of the official delegation to the UN and we requested him to take some members of civil society along. So that was on process, on substance we had a list of issues that we presented to him, saying what kinds of policies we think should be enacted in India that would lead to a truly inclusive development path.

One of them of course is where poor people get their livelihoods from, so it was about access and control over natural resources, it was about agriculture and replicating the success of the green revolution in Eastern India.

Then very specifically on each of the MDGs; on education, of course we have a wonderful Right to Education law; how to enact it, so that it truly becomes a reality on the ground; on healthcare, we don’t have such a Right to Health law, so we are lobbying for that, it would be very good to enshrine basic healthcare as a right.

Then on women’s empowerment, which we believe is the underlying cross-cutting issue for attaining MDGs in India and elsewhere; to get the passage of the Women’s Reservation Bill as a sign of commitment right at the top on women empowerment. These were some of the issues that we presented to him.

OWSA: Do you think that the government’s use of Public-Private Partnerships is compatible with achieving Millennium Development Goals?

Nisha Agrawal: Well it depends on what you mean by Public-Private Partnerships. We believe that every sector has a very important role to play in getting India on to the truly inclusive growth path that will lead to an attainment of the MDGs. We are not seeing inclusive growth yet, I think that we are today talking about mining, and Vedanta; corporates like that play a very important role.

If they were all working in a manner that was environmentally-friendly and socially responsible, that would make a huge impact on India. So, we believe they have a very important role to play by undertaking appropriate projects that really benefit poor people.

We believe really, that certain areas are fundamental rights of poor people, like basic healthcare, basic education, and there we might see less of a role for the private sector, and we really believe it’s the government’s responsibility to deliver on those basic rights.

OWSA: What have been the biggest challenges that Oxfam has faced over the last five years in relation to the Millennium Development Goals?

Nisha Agrawal: We believe is that we have been very successful, now, in lobbying and getting pro-poor legislation, so we have a very good policy framework in India. We have good laws like the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, the Right to Information, the Right to Education, and the Domestic Violence Law.

But when you look at implementation on the ground, and in particular implementation from the perspective of the most marginalised communities in India, you see that there’s a big gap between what is on paper and what is actually being delivered to poor people. So, that is the bridge, if you like, that we try and fill, which is to raise awareness amongst poor people about their rights.

So it’s really about information, it’s about organisation, and then it’s really about demanding those rights, but doing it community by community takes a huge effort. And if the government could be playing a more pro-active role in disseminating information, as they are doing now on the Right to Education, for example - there is a huge campaign on trying to inform people about this law. If they were that serious about at least, spreading awareness, that would be a good thing.

Secondly, lobby for budgets to back actual implementation of these laws. We have been asking for a long time for increased healthcare expenditures, to go up from 1% of GDP to 3% of GDP and we have not really seen any progress at all. On education we are asking for an increase from 3% of GDP to 6%. We believe that these social sectors that are so critical for poor people remain severely under-funded in India.

We are really not seeing much of a will to actually implement these programs so that they deliver high quality programs on the ground. There is the same thing with the Domestic Violence law; there is hardly any budget behind it so it remains a really good law. So I think the biggest challenge is implementation; how to really get things moving on the ground.

OWSA: What role do you think the Non-Governmental Sector should play in achieving the Millennium Development Goals?

Nisha Agrawal: I think that, in achieving the Millennium Development Goals along with a pro-poor development path in India, we have a basic role to play, which is firstly, to get governments to make the kind of promises that they are making like the MDGs or like different policies and programs that are promised in various plans, but then constantly to remind them about the promises (that are usually made and then not ever implemented) and their implementation.

So, I think that is the role of civil society - holding government accountable to deliver their promises. Secondly, then, really working with the disempowered and marginalised communities to make them aware of their rights and demand accountability from the government on their behalf.

OWSA: You’ve mentioned the role of information. What’s Oxfam India’s strategy to spread awareness of the Millennium Development Goals to all levels of society?

Nisha Agrawal: Well we are part of a large number of networks and we fund about 170 NGOs, we take part very actively and our partners take part in these Stand Up Campaigns. Last year many of our partners organised all kinds of events to raise awareness about the MDGs. We participated in meetings like the one we had with the Prime Minister and with other policy-makers. We have a website on which we talk about these issues, we write about them in our newsletters. So we really make a huge effort to keep it on the front-burner. We use brand ambassadors, we do everything we can really to be keeping this issue alive all the time.