South Asia economic report: social sectors in transition

This second issue of the South Asia Economic Report (SAER) discusses social sectors in transition, with a particular focus on education and health. It looks at transformational trends and their impact on the education and health sectors and proposes measures to manage these social sectors through this transition.

While the report confirms that South Asia has made impressive progress in human development, it notes that the region lags behind other areas of the world, being the second poorest performer after Sub-Saharan Africa. The report concludes that the region faces significant challenges to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for education and health.

Key points raised include:

• accelerated economic growth and integration into the global economy have opened new opportunities and created new challenges for South Asia
•  these global and regional trends tend to aggravate inequalities, unless governments in the region implement policies and programs that will guarantee inclusive economic growth
• the region’s governments need to explore new modes of delivering social services to ensure that they work for the poor
• the region’s education systems must be transformed for the countries to be able to adapt to the new realities
•  by effective pro-poor targeting, and innovative public-private partnerships, governments in the region can make public expenditures work better for the poor, and reduce the divide between rich and poor
• integration of technology into social service delivery can also help target education and health services more effectively to the poor.