Essay on Knowledge Based Economy in India for UPSC : A key concept of the knowledge economy is that knowledge and education (often referred to as "human capital") can he treated as one of the following two: A productive asset can be defined as -Production and services based on knowledge-intensive activities that contribute to an accelerated pace of technical and scientific advance, as well as rapid obsolescence. The key component of a knowledge economy is a greater reliance on intellectual capabilities than on physical inputs or natural resources.
Essay on Knowledge Based Economy in India for UPSC
A key concept of the knowledge economy is that knowledge and education (often referred to as "human capital") can he treated as one of the following two:
A business product, as educational and innovative intellectual products and services can be exported for a high value return.
A productive asset can be defined as:
Production and services based on knowledge-intensive activities that contribute to an accelerated pace of technical and scientific advance, as well as rapid obsolescence. The key component of a knowledge economy is a greater reliance on intellectual capabilities than on physical inputs or natural resources.
The initial foundation for the knowledge economy was introduced in 1966 in the book, "The Effective Executive" by Peter Drucker. Peter Drucker described the difference between the manual worker and the knowledge worker. The manual worker, according to him, works with his or her hands and produces goods or services. In contrast, a knowledge worker works with his or her head, not hands, and produces ideas, knowledge, and information.
The key problem in the formalization and modeling of knowledge economy is a vague definition of knowledge, which is a rather relative concept. For example, it is not proper to consider information society as interchangeable with knowledge society. Information is usually not equivalent to knowledge. Their use, as well, depends on individual and group preferences which are "economy-dependent.”
India is a country where 65 % of the population is 21 yrs to 35 yrs, and we are may be less on literacy but we have far superior on educational and technological advancement at a common platform. Each year we have 1.5 million engineers graduating, where 80% of them are not employable due to various reasons but they do have basic knowledge and skill sets.
Similarly 23,000 M. Tech and 1000 Ph. D passes out each year. When these brains are available to us, we should always look forward to make them self sufficient and try to create a culture of entrepreneurship than a culture of worker or prevent brain drain.
The most important aspect of people with knowledge and degree is getting a respectable and well paid job, but the industry has not been able to give such a job to people.
Govt. of India is very focused on these intellectuals and wants them to play important role in skill development and has created different platforms. Also, we have to understand that there is a difference between skill and knowledge development and BPOs which were rampant, from 2000 to 2010, where any English speaking undergraduate got a job, made money, bought expensive items, but after 5 yrs found himself replaced by a younger recruit and not much career to talk about. This is not a brain drain but a misuse of the potential.
To give career, job respect and valued earning, it’s important that we develop and utilize our core strength to form knowledge based industry.
The knowledge economy is also seen as the latest stage of development in global economic restructuring. Thus far, the developed world has transitioned from an agricultural economy (pre-Industrial Age, largely the agrarian sector) to industrial economy (with the Industrial Age, largely the manufacturing sector) to post-industrial/mass production economy (mid- 1900s, largely the service sector) to knowledge economy (late 1900s — 2000s, largely the technology/human capital sector). This latest stage has been marked by the upheavals in technological innovations and the globally competitive need for innovation with new products and processes that develop from the research community (i.e., R&D factors, universities, labs, educational institutes).
In the knowledge economy, the specialized labor force is characterized as computer literate and well-trained in handling data, developing algorithms and simulated models, and innovating on processes and systems. Harvard Business School Professor, Michael Porter asserts that today's economy is far more dynamic and that comparative advantage is less relevant than competitive advantage which rests on "making more productive use of inputs, which requires continual innovation". Consequently, the technical, STEM careers including computer scientists, engineers, chemists, biologists, mathematicians, and scientific inventors will see continuous demand in years to come. Additionally, well-situated clusters, which Michael Porter argues is vital in global economies, connect locally with linked industries, manufacturers, and other entities that are related by skills, technologies, and other common inputs. Hence, knowledge is the catalyst and connective tissue in modern economies.
Thus, we can see that we have the raw material to develop one of the biggest industries in abundance as we not only have highly skilled people but Computer and English literacy rate is very high in our part of the world, then by not to give it a direction to create an atmosphere where we ran empower people. This echo system is important to develop knowledge based industry, as if we see some of ours tuition based institute where knowledge transfer takes place are doing very well , this gives us hope and tells us we are ignoring something which is in our face and can be scalable.
The knowledge based industry can be creating teaching and tuition, reading and learning, creating logistic supply, there can be sharing of knowledge for farmers, better prediction of monsoon, using abandoned resources for natural fertilizers, water recycling and water storage.
Segments have to be divided for people with knowledge and then with the help of technology they can develop best possible solutions, rather than working in a profile which is stifling their knowledge, growth and natural ability.
We can conclude with advent of social networking sites, technology, internet, the world has become a small market place, where people can share, exchange and benefit from each other, only when they have the financial and organizational backing and this will lead to their growth and prosperity. Take example of Facebook; even a common man is aware of it, people are getting connected and people are also using it as a socio marketing tool; this Facebook was made for a set of students of a college to interact with each other, hence understand the power and reach of technology, we Indians are none less as we are heading Google and many other prestigious Tech company, hence we should work towards it to build a New Prosperous India.
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