Cement, Energy and Environment

include all of their IT and all of their customer service. That includes front and back office and ca ll centre functions . To really transform an enterprise it is also worth looking a t financial accounting, human resources, supply chain p roc urem ent an d fi eld-fo rce m anagement. Wha t should not be ou tsourced? Strategic areas s u ch as cus tom e r s tra tegy sh ould no t be outsourced as well as developing new products and services and the marketing of them. Accenture p rojects th at in 2 to 3 years mos t cement companies will have d eve loped o u tsourcing s tra tegies th a t sh ed the more complex, expensive or non-core areas, such as me tering and legal services. Th~s will bring compelling benefits in terms of ga ining access to world -class cap abilities, whil e freeing up interna l resources for o ther purposes . Ultimately, cement p roducers have to decide wha t, in an increasingly compe titive marke t, they are best a t, w hat sort of business they want to be in, and what they would ra ther hand ove r to specialists to do for them . Trying to do it all in-house, right across the value chain, is no longer an opti on. Courtesy : World Cement Mar. 2002, Pp45-46, Enquiry no. 4 Fax :+44(0)1252718992 E-mail: mail@ worldccment.com Web: www. worldcem cn t.com PRODUCTIVITY IN THE AGE OF GLOBALIZATION S. A. K11ader (Deputy Director Genera! National Productivity Council) India being the fast and rapidly growing market can provide a sustained domestic market only w hen the fas t ch an ging aspi ra tion s o f the domes tic cu s tomer a re effecti vely me t, les t countries like China should take over the Indian m a rke t on ce WTO regime comes up full y. Howeve r, the dynamic ma nagemen t of the enterprise has to focus on contin uous renewa l o f its skill s, introd uce competi ti ve compensa tion-cum-remunerations to the work force and promotion of innova tion whichwould not only ensure success in the domestic market but also in the global environment. As per a recent study undertaken by NPC, the labour productivity growth is found to hover around less than 3°/r, annum (2.88'X,) w hereas capital p roductivity is around 0.80% with a total fac tor producti vi ty growth o f 1.85% d uring the p e ri od 1990-99 . Asian P roductiv i ty Organisa tion in its latest report p laces India's labour productivity growth ra te (90-99) to be around 3%, w hile Korea, Taiwan, ranged around 5% with Malaysia and Thailand falling slightl y below at about 4.5%. In fac t, the report clearly established tha t high labour productivity of the Asian tigers had enabled them to s teer through the economic/ financial crisis of the recent past. On the other hand, the la test ILO report (2001) expla ins China's spectacu lar economic growth of 11% is due to the highest productivity growth rang ing around 5SYo p e r ann um, with an investment rate of 32.9% clearly demons trating the sound n ess of th e economy from th e productivity front. Further, the investment rate per one p ercentage GDP growth is the lowest with China at 3.00'Yo and Malaysia too is comparable to China in this regard . Bu t, Ind ia needs to invest 4.2% for getting 1 <fo growth in GDP, substantiating the oft quoted s tatemen t b y the Pl anni ng Commission t hat ICOR is highest in India . From a ll these we are in a position to clearly establish that productivity growth not only direc tly influence economic developmen t, but also investments needed for enhancing economic growth is aga in influenced by the p roduc tivity perfo rmance, thus s tren g theni ng a v irtu ous lin k between investments, produc tivi ty, economic growth and quali ty of li fe.