Why We Should Fund Science More
A professor of biochemistry at Boston University Isaac Asimov (yes, the same guy you are thinking about) was once asked about his views on scientists being pulled into raising money for their research. He replied that every hour a scientist spends trying to raise funds is an hour lost from important thought and research. This is especially true of topics that can become politically charged. Sustainable development, for instance.
This year, on National Science Day (February 28), the theme was just that — Science for Sustainable Development. If India has to ever achieve its Net Zero goals, then what should we do to get this into fifth gear? The answer is not that easy. As Takshashila’s head of research, Dr Shambhavi Naik, writes,
“Funding for fundamental research in India is amongst the world’s lowest, particularly for a country with high science and technology ambitions. In the recent past, India’s R&D expense has dropped to the current 0.64% of GDP from 0.8% in 2008-2009 and 0.7% in 2017-2018. This reduced expenditure is worrying considering government agencies themselves have issued several calls to double this spending.”
No one really knows why there is a drop, and it could well be that this issue often falls between the stools of bureaucracy and political ambition. Most developed countries spend between 2% and 4% of their GDPs on R&D. In 2021, member-countries of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) on average spent 2.7% of GDP on R&D. The U.S. and the U.K. have consistently spent more than 2% of their GDPs on R&D for the past decade. Dr Naik writes that many experts have called for India to spend at least 1%, but ideally, 3%, of its GDP every year until 2047 on R&D for science to have a meaningful impact on development.
This is a no-brainer, to be honest. The question, then, is, how can we get this done? In her Op-Ed for The Hindu, Dr Naik writes:
“For India to reach ‘developed nation’ status, it needs to spend more to scale R&D than developed countries spend to maintain that status. This is the foundation of the demand to spend at least 3% of the GDP on R&D annually until 2047. And beyond the current spending being inadequate, its primary dependence on public money signals an immature financing system and weak domestic market. In 2020-2021, private sector industry contributed 36.4% of the GERD whereas the Union government’s share was 43.7%. State governments (6.7%), higher education (8.8%), and public sector industry (4.4%) were the other major contributors. In economically developed countries, a major share – 70% on average – of R&D investment comes from the private sector. The hesitancy of private-sector funding may be because of the poor capacity to evaluate R&D in India, ambiguous regulatory roadmaps that can deter investors, lack of clear exit options for investors in sectors such as biotechnology, and fears of intellectual property rights theft.”
You can read her full op-ed here.
You can also watch her quick take on this as part of the ‘Attention Span’ series here.
By the way, if you have not joined OpenTakshashila, what are you waiting for? Just this exchange on whether we should bring the woolly mammoth back on National Science Day should get you interested.
No alternatives to Biden and Trump? Really?
On the morning of Wednesday, March 6, it became clear that US President Joe Biden and former US President Donald Trump will slug it out in a rematch of the 2020 election. What does America think of an 80-year-old fighting a 78-year-old? Apparently, not much because both won their Super Tuesday with ease. Though there are murmurs about their age, it is really the issues they are platforming that are taking up the American mindspace.
Despite their wins, will it be an easy road ahead? Perhaps not, says Sachin Kalbag. Because it is the “Uncommitted” voter who is going to play an important role in the November polls. There is a growing “Uncommitted” movement nationwide in the US to oppose Biden’s Israel policies, and there is some opposition to Trump’s views on immigration as well.
Sachin writes in his fortnightly column for The Free Press Journal:
“Biden will win all the Democratic primaries by default, but his biggest challenge will be on the first Tuesday of November when Trump — whose conservative base has consolidated its support in spite of his legal troubles and the party’s backlash — will hold the advantage with the undecideds and independents. Therefore, if Biden thinks he has any chance of winning November, then he has no option but to force Israel into a ceasefire that goes beyond the holy month of Ramzan, which begins on March 10 this year. If he cannot, he might as well say goodbye to the Arab American and Muslim vote on the back of the ‘Abandon Biden’ movement that is gaining momentum across the country.”
He adds:
“Trump, too, has to smell the coffee. The “Uncommitted” numbers will likely grow because of the intensity of his hard right-wing approach to issues such as immigration and unemployment. His campaign has focused on what the Democrats have not been able to do or perceived as being not able to rather than push his own policies. This is a no-brainer tactic in the case of his support base, which anyway does not look for policy positions; instead, they are happy when the former President reinforces their conservative views on gun control, abortion, immigration, Islamophobia, minority hate, and street crime.”
Read his full op-ed here.
India’s crewed mission foray and what it means to us
For the first time in 40 years, a small group of Indians is set to venture into the perilous and untamed wilderness that lies beyond our atmosphere. On February 27, Prime Minister Narendra Modi feted four test pilots – Prasanth Nair, Ajit Krishnan, Angad Pratap and Shubhanshu Shukla – who are to become the first Indians in outer space since Rakesh Sharma’s historic journey on Soyuz T-11 in 1984.
More important, they will be part of Gaganyaan, India’s first indigenous crewed space mission. Takshashila’s Aditya Ramanathan has a take on what it means for India in his blog post for The Times of India.
Read it here.
Well, China Keeps Us Busy
In the first of our many China pieces this week, Takshashila’s co-founder Narayan Ramachandran has a perceptive piece in Mint on the deflationary trends in the Chinese economy and why it is important to take note of this development. In January this year, Chinese consumer prices fell at the fastest rate in 15 years. For the first time since the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) of 2008-09, China’s CPI fell 0.8% year-on-year. The Chinese economy is in the midst of a long and significant property sector implosion and a dramatic decline in stock prices. It has been over six months since China lapsed into consumer-price deflation, and producer prices have been in decline for sixteen straight months.
Narayan says,
“These indicators point to a significant risk of prolonged deflation in China. In addition to the property sector slump and stock market downturn, there is a dramatic loss of investor confidence, a decline in consumer demand and weak exports. This economic situation, characterized by excess supply, insufficient demand, debt-induced financial stress, and politics-based economic decision-making does not augur well for any easy solutions.”
You can read his full Mint column here.
Researcher Anushka Saxena’s piece for First Post looks at the implications of Chinese fishing boats in Taiwan’s ‘prohibited’ waters.
“Illicit fishing by Chinese fishing vessels,” writes Anushka, “has deep humanitarian and environmental impacts in the waters around the three Taiwan-governed off-shore islands, namely Kinmen, Matsu and Penghu. Of these, the Kinmen and Matsu groups of islands are much closer to the territory of mainland China than Taiwan proper, and this has made them virtually indefensible against the activities of Chinese fishermen’s boats, the Coast Guard, and the People’s Liberation Army Navy.”
She adds,
“China argues that these waters have been open to fishing and tourism for people on both sides of the Straits historically, and any demarcation of waters as “prohibited” or “restricted” is incompatible with the fundamentals of cross-Straits relations. As a result, even though Chinese Coast Guard vessels have largely complied with the demarcations, steering rarely into “restricted” waters, fishermen boats, such as one that recently capsized near Kinmen, have regularly strayed into what Taiwan refers to as “prohibited” waters.”
You can read her op-ed here.
Rakshith Shetty’s piece on China tackles its shuttle diplomacy with Ukraine and Russia and why it is only symbolic with little or no substance. In a piece for The Diplomat, Rakshith writes,
“Despite China’s assertions of neutrality, doubts lingered among some parties regarding its impartiality, with concerns raised by Ukraine about a potential pro-Russian bias due to China’s “no-limits” friendship with Russia. Efforts by China to bridge differences with Europe on its role in the conflict were met with continued skepticism, with certain quarters viewing China’s position as aligning with Russia’s interests. Controversial statements by Lu Shaye, China’s ambassador to France, who said that former Soviet countries like Ukraine have no “effective status” in international law, only increased doubts about China’s stance on the conflict resolution process.”
Read his full op-ed here.
An Interview with Anupam Manur
Takshashila’s economics honcho Anupam Manur recently gave a wide-ranging interview to the Hong Kong-headquartered Kalavinka Advisors on India as the next frontier for the global economy. Onerous as the task may seem, he made the process look so easy that it reminded us of his weekend classes on relatively tough topics in economics.
For example, to the question on what has changed to that has raised India’s profile, he replied,
“Nothing happens overnight in India and the same applies to its economic transformation. Since the liberalization of its economy in 1991, it has been on an upward trajectory, with each additional wave of liberalization giving additional returns. The growth story gets a boost during favourable global conditions. During the great liquidity in the 2000s due to the Fed’s easy money policy, India was a benefactor of foreign funds and grew at an incredible ~9%+ growth rate for a few years. Today, given China is slowing down and there exists both a trade war and geopolitical tension between the US and China, the world is looking at alternatives and India happens to be one among them.”
Smooth, we say. For more, read the full interview on Kalavinka here.
Talking of Anupam, it is not that he is serious all the time (actually, he is serious only some of the time). To overcome the ennui of writing yet another serious column, Anupam wrote this tongue-in-cheek piece on the capping of taxi fares in Karnataka. You can read his snarky take here. Do you think he has a career as humour columnist?
Why can’t India make chip fabs?
Why can India design chips with the best of them but has completely failed to develop fabs, much less a broader electronics industry? To discuss this, Takshashila deputy director Pranay Kotasthane (who is also a former chip designer at TI and Qualcomm) and the author of the new book When the Chips are Down sat down with Jordan Schneider of China Talk and Chris Miller of Chip War to discuss one of the most important topics of our time.
Listen to their fascinating discussion here on how the political economy of technology in India led to world-class software and services but underwhelming manufacturing; why India was slower to the uptake than China that socialism really sucks at getting your country rich; and, of course, what it takes to design a chip.
The US Consul General at the Takshashila HQ
On February 28, Chistopher Hodges came to the Takshashila HQ in Bengaluru to sit down for an insightful chat with Takshashila co-founder Narayan Ramachandran on India-US trade, technology & strategic relations. We will be hosting many such chats with important diplomats on wide-ranging issues.
On The All-Important Indian Elections and AI
Takshashila’s Sachin Kalbag hosted an All Things Policy episode with Pradyuman Maheshwari, noted media watcher and the CEO of MXMIndia, one of the country’s leading media websites on an issue that consume India over the next few months — Elections, and the impact of AI on them. Listen to their chat here.
Wait, There’s More
The deployment of population-scale digital public infrastructure (DPI) is gaining traction worldwide and is acknowledged as a necessary and cost-effective intervention to fast-track sustainable development. The G20 also endorsed the ‘Framework for Systems of Digital Public Infrastructure’, a voluntary plan for the development, deployment, and governance of DPI. India has developed state-of-the-art DPI for various purposes, and Australia is the biggest development partner for Pacific Island countries. Together, they are well positioned to make state-of-the-art DPI accessible to small island developing states (PSIDS) there to help fast-track developmental outcomes.
Takshashila’s Bharath Reddy and Saurabh Todi write on this topic in The Strategist. You can read their op-ed here.
Bharat Sharma of Takshashila writes about how the Quad is increasingly gaining traction, and why this is a good thing. In his piece for the Lowy Institute, Bharat writes,
“The disbandment of Quad 1.0 offers some lessons for Quad 2.0, particularly if doubters remain unclear about what the Quad offers. The Quad’s success will be substantially determined by whether it can deliver on its commitments to regional partners. In this, the present iteration differs substantially from its earlier incarnation in at least two ways.”
Read his op-ed on what binds Quad here.
The Australian Consulate General in Bengaluru collaborated with Takshashila to have a spirited discussion on women in sports. Also participating were international cricketer Mel Jones; Global Victoria, the Victorian Government's trade facilitation agency; and the GoSports Foundation.
What are we at Takshashila if not cheerleaders of fellow authors? And so it was that we colleagues landed up at bookstores to help Khyati Pathak, Anupam Manur and Pranay Kotasthane to sell more copies of their superb new book, ‘We, The Citizens’. If you have not yet purchased the book, you can order it here.
That’s all from us this week. Take care.