Physical Quality of Life Index (PQLI)
Physical Quality of Life Index (P.Q.L.I) was developed by famous economist Morris David in 1979 for 23 developed and developing countries. Morris David used the following three indicators to prepare a composite index known as Physical Quality of Life Index:
- Life Expectant Rate (L.E.I)
- Infant Mortality Rate (I.M.I)
- Basic Literacy Rate (B.L.I)
Life Expectant Rate (L.E.I)
Life expectancy means average number of year a person is expected to live. As per census of 2011, it is 66.8 years in India.
Infant Mortality Rate (I.M.I)
It refers to the number of infants dying within one year of their birth out of every 1000 births. As per census report of 2011, it is 47 per 1000. Higher infant mortality is harmful for economic development.
Basic Literacy Rate (B.L.I)
Any person above the age of 7 year who can read and write in any one language with an ability to understand it is considered as literate. As per census 2011, it is 74.04% in India.
For each of the above indicator, the performance of individual country is rated on a scale of 1 to 100 where 1 represents the worst performance and 100 represent the best performance. P.Q.L.I is then constructed by averaging these three indicators giving equal weight to each of them.
Morris David has given following formula to obtain P.Q.L.I
P.Q.L.I = L.E.I.+ I.M.I.+ B.L.I. / 3
Advantage of P.Q.L.I
- P.Q.L.I helps to government to understand the overall welfare in the economy and how well its welfare policies are being implemented. This helps the government to take corrective action.
- The method followed to measure P.Q.L.I is standard for all the countries. Therefore, it can be used to make comparison between countries and this helps the relatively underdeveloped countries to take corrective measure.
- The three indicator i.e. life expectancy rate, infant mortality rate and literacy rate very well represent the welfare of the people of the country. A country wherein all the three indicators are good can be said to be a developed economy.
- The P.Q.L.I considers the distribution of welfare in the country. A country cannot have a high average of literacy rate, life expectancy and low infant mortality rate unless a large part of the population is covered by the benefits of economic development.
Limitations of P.Q.L.I.
- P.Q.L.I ignores many factors which influence the quality of life such as employment, housing, justice, social security as well as human rights.
- P.Q.L.I is a simple average of literacy rate, infant mortality rate and life expectancy rate i.e. all the factors have been giving equal weightage. However, it is difficult to understand the rationale behind giving equal importance to all factors.
- P.Q.L.I. does not explain the structural change in the economy of a country. Moreover, it does not at all consider economic or monetary concept. Hence, it is a poor measure of economic development as well as economic growth.
Inspite of these drawbacks, P.Q.L.I. is considered as an improvement over traditional measure of economic welfare. However, recently developed Human Development Index (HDI) is a better and more refined version of PQLI.
National mission for sustainable agriculture
Sustaining agricultural productivity depends on quality and availability of natural resources like soil and water. Agricultural growth can be sustained by promoting conservation and sustainable use of these scarce natural resources through appropriate location specific measures. Indian agriculture remains predominantly rainfed covering about 60% of the country’s net sown area and accounts for 40% of the total food production. Thus, conservation of natural resources in conjunction with development of rainfed agriculture holds the key to meet burgeoning demands for food grain in the country. Towards this end, National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA) has been formulated for enhancing agricultural productivity especially in rainfed areas focusing on integrated farming, water use efficiency, soil health management and synergizing resource conservation.
NMSA derives its mandate from Sustainable Agriculture Mission which is one of the eight Missions outlined under National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPCC). The strategies and programmers of actions (POA) outlined in the Mission Document, that was accorded ‘in principle’ approval by Prime Minister’s Council on Climate Change (PMCCC) on 23.09.2010,aim at promoting sustainable agriculture through a series of adaptation measures focusing on ten key dimensions encompassing Indian agriculture namely; ‘Improved crop seeds, livestock and fish cultures’, ‘Water Use Efficiency’, ‘Pest Management’, ‘Improved Farm Practices’, ‘Nutrient Management’, ‘Agricultural insurance’, ‘Credit support’, ‘Markets’, ‘Access to Information’ and ‘Livelihood diversification’. During XII Five Year Plan, these measures are being embedded and mainstreamed onto ongoing/proposed Missions/ programmes / Schemes of Dept. of Agriculture & Cooperation (DAC&FW) through a process of restructuring and convergence. NMSA architecture has been designed by converging, consolidating and subsuming all ongoing as well as newly proposed activities/programmes related to sustainable agriculture with a special emphasis on soil & water conservation, water use efficiency, soil health management and rainfed area development. The focus of NMSA will be to infuse the judicious utilization of resources of commons through community based approach.
NMSA will cater to key dimensions of ‘Water use efficiency’, ‘Nutrient Management’ and ‘Livelihood diversification’ through adoption of sustainable development pathway by progressively shifting to environmental friendly technologies, adoption of energy efficient equipments, conservation of natural resources, integrated farming, etc. Besides, NMSA aims at promoting location specific improved agronomic practices through soil health management, enhanced water use efficiency, judicious use of chemicals, crop diversification, progressive adoption of crop-livestock farming systems and integrated approaches like crop-sericulture, agro-forestry, fish farming, etc.