Information system for safety net implementation

Abstract

Economic liberalization, which is essential for accelerated growth of the national economy, can succeed in the long run only if appropriate safety nets are designed to safeguard the well-being of the people who are affected in the short term including the people below the poverty line and the people displaced from their jobs due to increasing modernization. In the case of food security, the variability in food supplies and transportation bottlenecks aggravate and compound the insecurity caused by liberalization. To make liberalization sustainable, the Government in particular and the social and economic functionaries in general have to carefully design and implement a food security system with local, state-wise, national and international linkages. The Public Distribution System, especially, should be fast reactive to remedy the insecure food supplies for segments of the population. The reaction time constants can be minimised by working out a computer-communication network based information system spread throughout the country. A design of such an information system has been evolved. The NICNET based online database supporting the Public Distribution System implemented throughout the country has given a Management Information System. As a support to the Food Corporation of India, NIC and FCI have together grown a Grain Management Information System concerning storage, quality control, transportation, stocks/offtake monitoring, etc. New features are being added for orienting the system for developing a Management Information System for decision support at the national level, State level and local level. A Food Grain Movement Operations Research Model has been developed along with a Multi-objective Decision Support System for PDS and RPDS. As the food security relief management problem is spacial in nature, a Distributed Control System Theoretic Model for Relief Management is suggested for maximising food security of a population affected by variability in food supplies. The associated geographic information system in transportation planning is also highlighted.