Kerala and Keralites: The Promise and Challenges

Kerala has a unique socio-economic condition: high literacy, good healthcare and welfare programs. Yet, high unemployment, dependance on migrant worker income, and budget deficits. These are among the issues examined in this book, which ought to interest researchers and students of economic and social development as well as policy makers. Also, should be of interest to Keralites and those curious about Kerala and Keralites. Keralites have made their mark around the globe. This volume profiles twenty-one of them: globally accomplished professionals, scientists, economists, business founders, chief executives, and cricketer Sanju Samson. Their education choices, career paths, and overcoming obstacles offer practical solutions, including to professionals as well as young readers exploring education and career options. There are more than an estimated four million Keralites working outside India, mainly in the Persian Gulf countries. Their remittances boost consumer demand as well as home and land prices and labor wage rates in Kerala. If crude oil prices start declining around 2035, as some analysts forecast, will it reduce demand for foreign labor in the Gulf? As contributors in this book ask: can Kerala create millions of new jobs, to replace those which may be cut in the Gulf, as well as generate new sources of income if remittances drop sharply? Meanwhile, demand for land and higher labor wage rates impacts the farming of coconut, rubber, spices, and other cash crops, which continue to play a major role in Kerala's economy, as essays in this book note. Labor wages in Kerala are among the highest in India, even with an influx of an estimated four million migrant laborers from Bihar and other poorer regions of India. A major achievement, resulting from Kerala's long-established focus on education, is that Keralite women are a major beneficiary of the rising global demand for nurses. As nursing education shows, thousands more Keralites can find work, in India and abroad, if the state sets up training programs, which meet global standards, for emergency medical staff, electricians, plumbers, welders, and other skilled, physical jobs. Perhaps, due to historical, caste-based choices of work, the goal of most high school students in India is to earn a liberal arts degree, find a white-collar job, and rise up in the social hierarchy. Some of them will change their attitude once they see friends and neighbors working in high-paying, physical jobs. Meanwhile, such an attitude leaves relatively more job and business opportunities for Keralites who are willing to dirty their hands. PC Musthafa, a laborer and son of a laborer profiled in this volume, founded id Fresh Foods in 2005. He employs more than 2,400, some of whom are millionaires. In Kerala, unlike in many other Indian states, there is more religious tolerance between Hindus, Muslims, and Christians. In fact, a chapter in the book profiles Abraham Barak Salem, a Jewish lawyer and politician, known as the Jewish Gandhi of Kochi, Kerala. The Kerala Question is no longer whether human development matters, as Paul Kattuman, Professor, Cambridge Judge Business School, Cambridge University, notes in the book's Foreword. It is whether Kerala can turn human development into secure livelihoods, greater autonomy for women, environmental security, and a future that more people can imagine within Kerala itself. Read more