Independent Economies [Archives:2002/38/Business & Economy]
The Road Ahead
BY RAIDAN A. AL-SAQQAF
[email protected]
Iceland is a geologically hyperactive island nation. It is famous for its glaciers and volcanoes and underground hot springs. Two-thirds of the country’s energy consumption comes from a clean, renewable hydroelectric and geothermal source of energy which is hydrogen power. And so, Icelanders have a dream of creating the world’s first hydrogen society.
So Iceland’s next energy revolution will be based on converting its own renewable energy into a form that can power its own transport system, slashing those emissions and ending its dependence on fossil fuels completely and in turn gain its economic independence. The pioneer of the hydrogen society concept Professor Bragi Arnason says: “It’s about being independent and relying on ourselves to continue the way we live”.
We in Yemen have much more resources than the Icelanders. In fact, 70% of the national income of Iceland is from their fishing fleet. Although we have comparatively good resources; we are still stuck with issues such as basic illiteracy in Arabic, about one third of our population can’t even sign their names in Arabic. This is quite a sad fact but the good part is that we are not the only ones who are left behind; about 30% of the world’s population live in similar circumstances as we do.
Mind you, I am not interested in the left 30% of the world, but we as part of that. Some critical turnaround strategies have to be adopted in order to help us catch up with the rest of the world. And education is probably the best way to catch up with the rest of the world.
But, once again, the major problem with our educational system is that it’s outdated. It has to adopt some serious changes in order to reach better long-term results. On the other hand, short-term training can adopt changes and improvements faster and provide high value education for several disciplines, for example as technology is the lifeline of the future, institutions such as Aptech & NIIT offer quality computer education which is essential in this new millennium.
Back to what Professor Arnason said; it’s all about being independent, not necessarily political independence but economical independence matter also. Educating future generations is our ticket for catching up with the rest of the world. Knowledge & knowledge management are the optimal sources of power nowadays; the Icelanders make a good example for us to learn from. In a few more years they would gain their economic independence from importing energy.
Endnote: Knowledge and knowledge management would help us in gaining our economic independence only if we give it enough attention. It’s a long process but it is critical for us.
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