Inadequate Physical Infrastructure Research Articles

Information and communication technologies and health in low income countries: the potential and the constraints.

This paper outlines the potential offered by technological progress in the information and communication technologies (ICTs) industries for the health sector in developing countries, presents some examples of positive experiences in India, and considers the difficulties in achieving this potential. The development of ICTs can bring about improvements in health in developing countries in at least three ways: as an instrument for continuing education they enable health workers to be informed of and trained in advances in knowledge; they can improve the delivery of health and disaster management services to poor and remote locations; and they can increase the transparency and efficiency of governance, which should, in turn, improve the availability and delivery of publicly provided health services. These potential benefits of ICTs do not necessarily require all the final beneficiaries to be reached directly, thus the cost of a given quantum of effect is reduced. Some current experiments in India, such as the use of Personal Digital Assistants by rural health workers in Rajasthan, the disaster management project in Maharashtra and the computerized village offices in Andhra Pradesh and Pondicherry, suggest creative ways of using ICTs to improve the health conditions of local people. However, the basic difficulties encountered in using ICTs for such purposes are: an inadequate physical infrastructure; insufficient access by the majority of the population to the hardware; and a lack of the requisite skills for using them. We highlight the substantial cost involved in providing wider access, and the problem of resource allocation in poor countries where basic infrastructure for health and education is still lacking. Educating health professionals in the possible uses of ICTs, and providing them with access and "connectivity", would in turn spread the benefits to a much wider set of final beneficiaries and might help reduce the digital divide.

Japanese competition in high technology: Advancing or retreating?

This article considers whether recent economic and political crises and scandals in Japan have weakened its previous competitive strength. Strengths and weaknesses in the Japanese economy are discussed. Its strengths are revealed in those sectors exposed to international competition, where restructuring of production, research and development and changes in international strategies are in progress. Weaknesses will be harder to correct, such as inadequate physical infrastructure and industrial over-supply.

The rocky road from a command economy to a market economy: Comparisons, analyses, addenda, and outlook

The concluding section of this issue of TF&SC attempts to summarize and supplement the findings reported in the articles regarding the type, qualities, and dimensions of the problems encountered when, after 40 or more years of command economy rule, there is a striving to introduce market economies. The primary difficulties are as follows: 1. The old system was living from substance, wearing it out, leaving deep scars behind: severe environmental decay, reduced human life expectancies, a worn-out and inadequate physical, economic, and administrative infrastructure. 2. Industrial structures are highly bureaucratized, inefficient, and monopolized, operating at very low productivities; there is underemployment and a lack of understanding of markets and market requirements and needs. 3. The countries were ruled by political, bureaucratized superstructures, controlled by secret police forces, some of which are still felt to be active. The difficulties to be overcome in transition to both democracy and a market economy are the following: 1. Privatization issues: ownership questions, time- and resource-consuming procedures in settling ownership rights, establishing opening balance sheets/values of assets, debts, and obligations to be assigned for firms to be privatized. 2. Reconstruction /rehabilitation of firms, industries, regions and infrastructures in decay; improving productivity, establishing/developing markets, and so forth. 3. Problems of both structural and transitional unemployment, often in monostructured regions; retraining, upgrading, motivating, and, in some cases, moving people. 4. Finding competent managers and people for industry, trade, and commerce, leading personnel for public administration and infrastructural organizations and institutions (for example, lawyers), as well as entrepreneur- minded people at large. 5. Finding competent buyers for many thousands of enterprises, to start or continue to run firms under new conditions. 6. Finding access to financial resources to cover needs in industry, trade, commerce, and infrastructure; to finance urgently needed rehabilitation of the environment. The summary uses the German-German case as a catalyst and point of departure, for both comparisons, analyses, and approaches proposed as well as malfunctions and blind alleys to be avoided. The difficulties encountered in the German-German case not only shed light on those (to be) faced in the other reform countries' transformation, under much less conducive conditions, but also illustrate why the Soviet perestroika attempts are doomed to failure. An analysis of value and behavior differences over time and in the countries discussed concludes the summary.

Finance and Development: the Case of Botswana

It is still frequently asserted that the economic sluggishness plaguing most Third-World countries stems from a general lack of resources. The scarcity of capital in both the public and private sectors, it is claimed, prevents the investment needed to achieve development. On the other hand, a fewdeveloping countries with highly profitable exports – notably those that export oil – reap large financial surpluses, including foreign exchange, but do not invest them locally in productive activities. The problem here is supposed to be insufficient ‘absorptive capacity’ due to the absence of skilled personnel and inadequate physical and social infrastructure, restricting the translation of financial resources into real investment. The situation in Botswana provides a test for both these hypotheses, making possible a deeper understanding of the potential rôle of financial resources in the development process.