Feedback: Daft MID Strategy

Overview

MID was launched in 2008 in Paris and 2009 in Mauritius, promising to fundamentally change Mauritian society and its impact on Nature in four major spheres: economic, social, political and environmental. A visioning exercise was conducted in 2010 to capture the population’s dreams for the future of the Republic. However, the output has been ignored and this has been rightly criticised by the Truth and Justice Commission. Instead of a co-created, inspiring blue-print for the future, the MID Vision is a bland statement of a few generic elements of sustainable development within a framework that is far from comprehensive. There is little in the MID Vision that permits one to visualise the future and indeed there is nothing in it that is specific to Mauritius – it could just as easily apply to France.

MID – Maurice Ile Dépendante

The Empires Strike Back

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…

A tiger-class merchant ship was making its way with the rest of the fleet towards the Golden Dawn of the New Age. Without the added weight of weaponry, it was one of the fastest craft around, it’s path illuminated by a state-of-the-art 4-sight navigation system which resembled a balanced tripod supporting a bright spark. All would have been perfect, except that three officers coveted the captain’s chair and the fickle crew regularly mutinied in favour of one or the other.

The first was an old Jedi Knight, who had turned completely to the Dark Side. The second was a short-sighted son of a former captain, who had lied about his lineage, assassinated his rivals and betrayed the most vulnerable members of the crew to get the post. The third was a rejected member of a race of condescending albinos, who had deceived the crew into believing that the ship could not operate without them, even though they did little work themselves. They had been the first to board the ship and, though few in number, still controlled most of the trade. Somehow they had managed to convince everyone that they had a divine right to occupy the best quarters and live in luxury while others lived in squalor.

Shortly after an unusually traumatic upheaval, the Dark Knight was reinstated as Captain. Once in control, he ripped the tripod apart, giving each leg as a prize to his key supporters and jettisoned the bright spark. The merchant ship meandered aimlessly. Half-hearted attempts were made to copy the trading strategies of others and unprofitable sectors were subsidised, mostly in the interests of the albinos and their fratres, whom many suspected of secretly manipulating the ship’s controls. Caring less about the lack of progress, the wannabe captains continued their feud for the captain’s chair.

A Hidden Message from the Governor of the Bank of Mauritius?

[Extract of his speech at the annual dinner for economic actors - see last sentence]

Now let me turn to our economic prospects and our high aspirations.

We are living in troubled and testing times. Several questions arise. Will we be agile enough to meet the severe tests ahead? What kind of growth should we seek? Should it not be more inclusive? And more equitable? We are trying hard to move into niche markets but is this enough? What else must we do to escape the middle-income trap, to be amongst the best small economies, not just in Africa, but in the wider world where our main competitors are to be found?

We have seen the likes of Malta, Singapore, Hong Kong, Ireland and others raising the bar to achieve GDP per capita, adjusted for purchasing power, more than twice the levels we have achieved despite our continued economic growth. Can we make the breakthrough? Are we prepared to do what it takes to do so?

Re-Branding Maurice Ile Durable

OPEN LETTER TO THE MINISTER OF ENVIRONMENT AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Dear Mr Virahsawmy

This is the first time I have written to you but I sense a connection because of our common Dravidian heritage. Unlike your namesake who I consider a traitor to both the Dravidian and African communities.

Anyway, I am a bit concerned about the status of the “Maurice Ile Durable” project or rather “Maurice Iles Durables” as I and the whole island of Rodrigues prefer to write. So I have had an idea. Think back to when your esteemed colleague Xavier Luc Picard, now Captain of INS Enterprise Mauritius was Minister for “Giving Away Islet Nature Reserves to his Friends and Agents of the Prime Minister”. Following his amazingly successful re-branding of our island from “The Model for Heaven” to “Mauritius – c’est un plaisir” (infinitely better than my own suggestions of “The Divine Island” and “The Island of Eden”), I humbly suggest you do the same thing with MID. I think it is possible with just a minor change in the last word. Permit me to offer some suggestions.

But first let us reflect on some notable MID events of last week.

The Island of Eden

Dear Mr President

Imagine a charity from Mauritius being awarded the Nobel Peace prize. Imagine you being the Patron of that charity and receiving one of the most prestigious awards ever made in the history of mankind? Ludicrous? YES! And yet while it is extremely unlikely, it is just possible…

You see an international news organisation that publishes reader-sourced news has just published this joke story which we released to promote our Divine Island:

Honda’s stepping stones to sustainability

Quite intriguingly, Honda chose the redundant sugar factory –  l’Aventure du Sucre – as the venue to launch three hybrid cars in Mauritius. This excellent museum portrays, in graphic detail, the inhuman exploitation of good people of colour by the “then” racist Franco-Mauritian elite. We attended to publicly ridicule the hybrid green-wash propaganda but were pleasantly surprised…

First, because our sparring partner from Yale, and arch supporter of the hybrid deception, Vedant Seeam was guest of honour. Second, because Mr Yoshiaki Nakamura had the perfect repost to our katana-like critique. In his presentation, the President of Honda Motor Southern Africa declared that Honda is committed to an avergage 50% reduction in CO2 emissions from its vehicles by 2020. How on earth did he expect hybrids to achieve that? we asked. He replied that hybrids are but a stepping stone to fossil-fuel free transport, whether it be all electric or hydrogen. Respect sir!

Leaky-Leaks: The Hidden Agenda

Forget the comatose “Maurice Iles Durables” project, is this a secret strategy for “Sustainable Mauritius” you haven’t heard about (until now;) ?

***START***

Subject: PROJECT “SUSTAINABLE MAURITIUS”

Classification: UK TOP SECRET

Origin: PORT W

Destination: GCHQ

Please identify Cabinet members who may oppose the high level strategy for Sustainable Mauritius as negotiated with Minster of Finance and Economic Development (Xavier Luc Duval):

1. Replace government bureaucracy with a smart computer system named e-gov 2.0. This will virtually eliminate corruption, massively reduce the budgetary requirements but have negative impacts on unemployment rate.

Feedback on MID reports

To the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development.

We are delighted to provide feedback on the reports of the Working Groups for the MID policy development and indeed privileged to be part of the one on energy. Overall, we are happy with much of the work done so far and the comments below focus on exceptions to this. We also attempt to address some of the important issues we feel are missing from the reports and try to synthesise conflicting recommendations. After suggesting improvements to the MID process, we will turn to the security of the economy, nutrition, electricity and transport and then land use conflicts and nutrient recycling. Finally, we comment on individual recommendations that we consider notable.

Is the MID process the right way forward?

By Karim Jaufeerally

The Green Paper: Towards a National Policy for a Sustainable Mauritius has been published by Government after a year of public consultation. It makes interesting reading and begins well for the first point of the executive summary (P xii) states:

“Never before has it been as necessary and as urgent for Mauritius to review the directions in which the country is moving. Profound and far-reaching changes are sweeping across the globe, some of them forerunners of future shocks that will dramatically impact on the quality of life…Resource depletion, climate change, overpopulation, diminishing conventional energy source, deforestation, pollution on land and sea, rising poverty world-wide, and political instability, are only some of the factors that we now need to confront, and hopefully can overcome.”

Energy self-sufficiency

At the second meeting of the MID Energy working group last week, we presented our major project of 2011: how Mauritius can be entirely self-sufficient in energy. The need to drastically reduce our dependence on fossil fuels is best illustrated by the graph showing them as a percentage of our total merchandise imports. From 1970 to 2000 they were in the range of 5-10% then, from 2000 to 2008, they rocketed up to over 20% and only fell back again as a consequence of the global financial crisis. If we get back to the “business as usual” trajectory, within a decade or two, our fuel bill will be unaffordable unless we are prepared to do without other imports like computers, refrigerators, clothes or food.