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EDITOR IN CHIEF- ABDULLAH BIN SALIM AL SHUEILI

Call to give the young a chance

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Muscat, Jan 28 - The Oman Vision 2040 Conference has called for the need to “give young people a greater chance to participate in realising the vision”. It called for development and modernisation of legislation and market structure, working with skilled manpower, linking scientific research systems, innovation in national economy and strengthening internal/ external economic partnerships and enhancing technical skills.
The conference called for the need to ensure availability of funding and necessary enablers for implementation of vision programmes, in addition to the importance of clarity in future roles of all sectors, specifically the government sector.
This was part of the final statement of the two-day meet, delivered by Dr Hamad bin Saeed al Aufi, Under-Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries and Head of the National Priorities and Strategies Committee, Oman Vision 2040.
“Vision indicators look ambitious and reflect the aspirations of society,” he said at the conference, which concluded on Monday.
Dr Al Aufi said the conference saw more than two million views on social networking platforms. The number of speakers reached 53, of which 73 per cent were Omanis. It saw 3,372 participants.
Talal al Rahbi, Head of the Technical Committee of Oman Vision 2040, said the implementation of the vision was a shared responsibility, and the “observations and views received on the initial vision document will be taken very seriously”.
The conference was aimed at giving society a chance to help prepare a vision document based on the Royal orders of His Majesty Sultan Qaboos.
Four main sessions on the second day discussed the role of the private sector in achieving the vision, economic cooperation and integration and its importance in achieving the vision as well as the best international practices for achieving national visions.
Vicki Hollub, President and CEO of Occidental Petroleum, in the first session, said that in order to realise the vision, it was essential to support small and medium businesses (SMEs) and change to renewables for power generation.




While Dr Julio C Saavedra, Senior Policy Adviser at the Office of the Advisor for Studies and Research at the Diwan of Royal Court, said: “Government is the largest investor in infrastructure and services and the private sector is the executor which builds the infrastructure as a contractor to the government. However, this has had some unhelpful side-effects as it creates a private sector that is dependent on the government, makes public sector too engaged in business, and results in a good dose of mutual incomprehension.” Saavedra said there are two main things to be focused on: youth and technological revolution.


“The 30,000 to 50,000 young people entering the labour market every year must be employed chiefly in the private sector. The technological revolution will impose big changes inn labour market. These challenges cannot be solved by either the private sector or the government on their own.” Dr Julio suggested raising the level of preparedness of both the public sector and private sector leaders. He called for increasing openness to outside ideas/ inputs and equipping the youth with the right attitude, skill and knowledge.


Michael Kouly, Author, Adviser and Former Chairman, founding board member of the Middle East Leadership Academy (MELA), in second session, called for “unfreezing the minds”.


“Development is not an end in itself, it is a means for building up people,” he said, quoting His Majesty.


Dr Fadi Makkim, a member of the Council of Behavioural Sciences at the World Economic Forum and Economic Development Specialist, spoke about the application of ‘nudge and behavioural insights’ to public policy. He said nudge and behavioral insights have been recognised as a major complementary tool for policy interventions.


The Arab region, according to him, has started adopting behavioral insights (BI) initiatives and most of them have visions and strategy documents that seek to address complex policy challenges.


He said many of Oman’s education policy challenges could be tackled using BIs and experimentation.


In the third panel, Dr Kishore Mahbubani, Senior Advisor and Professor in the Practice of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, said: “Export-led industrialisation in Singapore is similar to Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Unlike the Northeast Asian economies, Singapore industrialised on the back of foreign direct investment and multinational corporations.” He said industrialisation is necessary for economic development because machines allow manufacturing sector to scale up the production.


Dr Mahbubani said this can be applied in the vision through qualitative and high value-added investments in economic sectors, renewable energy, manufacturing, agriculture, marine wealth and tourism, establishing clear regulations for foreign investment, being more open to investors for encouraging long-term investment and strengthening and expanding the different existing economic sectors, and creating new sectors.


In the last session, Ricardo Hausmann, Director of Harvard’s Center for International Development and Professor of the Practice of Economic Development at the Kennedy School of Government, pointed out the need to focus on defining problems and solving them, not defining solutions and copying them.


“Many countries have tried to increase competitiveness by focusing on improving their ranking in the WEF Global Competitiveness Index or the WB Doing Business Index. Many have succeeded in improving their ranking on the index, but not their growth or competitiveness because indexes do not really capture where the shoe hurts,” he said.


“Indexes make governments decide on priorities. Disciplined interaction between government and firms can help identify problems and solutions. Besides, we need to discuss productivity, not profitability.” Tarmo Juristo, Head of Managemnt Board (PRAIS), in his presentation, took the example of Estonia. “Estonia took a strategic aim to close the gap with EU as fast as possible. Its 2020 strategy adopted three horizontal development pillars: national security, competitiveness and sustainable growth.”


Photo by Khalfan al Toobi



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