Asia's rise -- how and when | Hans Rosling

415,266 views ・ 2009-11-25

TED


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

00:17
Once upon a time,
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at the age of 24,
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I was a student at St. John's Medical College in Bangalore.
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I was a guest student during one month
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of a public health course.
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And that changed my mindset forever.
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The course was good, but it was not the course content
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in itself that changed the mindset.
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It was the brutal realization,
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the first morning,
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that the Indian students were better than me.
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(Laughter)
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You see, I was a study nerd.
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I loved statistics from a young age.
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And I studied very much in Sweden.
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I used to be in the upper quarter of all courses I attended.
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But in St. John's, I was in the lower quarter.
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And the fact was that Indian students
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studied harder than we did in Sweden.
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They read the textbook twice,
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or three times or four times.
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In Sweden we read it once and then we went partying.
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(Laugher)
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And that, to me,
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that personal experience
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was the first time in my life
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that the mindset I grew up with
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was changed.
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And I realized that perhaps
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the Western world will not continue
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to dominate the world forever.
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And I think many of you have the same sort of personal experience.
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It's that realization of someone you meet
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that really made you change your ideas about the world.
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It's not the statistics, although I tried to make it funny.
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And I will now,
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here, onstage,
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try to predict when that will happen --
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that Asia will regain
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its dominant position
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as the leading part of the world,
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as it used to be, over thousands of years.
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And I will do that
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by trying to predict precisely
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at what year
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the average income per person
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in India, in China, will reach that of the West.
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And I don't mean the whole economy,
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because to grow an economy
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of India to the size of U.K. --
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that's a piece of cake, with one billion people.
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But I want to see when will the average pay, the money
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for each person, per month,
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in India and China,
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when will that have reached that of U.K. and the United States?
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But I will start with a historical background.
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And you can see my map if I get it up here. You know?
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I will start at 1858.
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1858 was a year of great technological
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advancement in the West.
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That was the year when Queen Victoria
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was able, for the first time, to communicate
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with President Buchanan,
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through the Transatlantic Telegraphic Cable.
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And they were the first to "Twitter" transatlantically.
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(Laughter)
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(Applause)
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And I've been able, through this wonderful Google and Internet,
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to find the text of the telegram
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sent back from President Buchanan to Queen Victoria.
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And it ends like this: "This telegraph
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is a fantastic instrument to diffuse religion,
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civilization, liberty and law throughout the world."
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Those are nice words. But I got sort of curious
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of what he meant with liberty, and liberty for whom.
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And we will think about that
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when we look at the wider picture of the world in 1858.
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Because 1858
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was also watershed year
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in the history of Asia.
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1858 was the year
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when the courageous uprising
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against the foreign occupation of India
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was defeated by the British forces.
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And India was up to 89 years more of foreign domination.
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1858 in China
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was the victory in the Opium War by the British forces.
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And that meant that foreigners, as it said in the treaty,
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were allowed to trade freely in China.
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It meant paying with opium for Chinese goods.
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And 1858 in Japan
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was the year when Japan had to sign the Harris Treaty
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and accept trade on favorable condition for the U.S.
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And they were threatened by those black ships there,
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that had been in Tokyo harbor over the last year.
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But, Japan, in contrast to India and China,
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maintained its national sovereignty.
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And let's see how much difference that can make.
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And I will do that by bringing these bubbles
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back to a Gapminder graph here,
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where you can see each bubble is a country.
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The size of the bubble here is the population.
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On this axis, as I used to have income per person in comparable dollar.
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And on that axis I have life expectancy, the health of people.
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And I also bring an innovation here.
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I have transformed the laser beam
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into an ecological, recyclable version here, in green India.
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(Applause)
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And we will see, you know.
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Look here, 1858, India was here,
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China was here, Japan was there,
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United States and United Kingdom
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was richer over there.
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And I will start the world like this.
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India was not always like this level.
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Actually if we go back into the historical record,
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there was a time hundreds of years ago
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when the income per person in India and China
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was even above that of Europe.
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But 1850 had already been many, many years of foreign domination,
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and India had been de-industrialized.
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And you can see that the countries who were growing
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their economy was United States and United Kingdom.
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And they were also, by the end of the century, getting healthy,
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and Japan was starting to catch up.
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India was trying down here.
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Can you see how it starts to move there?
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But really, really natural sovereignty was good for Japan.
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And Japan is trying to move up there.
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And it's the new century now. Health is getting better,
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United Kingdom, United States.
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But careful now -- we are approaching the First World War.
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And the First World War, you know,
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we'll see a lot of deaths and economical problems here.
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United Kingdom is going down.
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And now comes the Spanish flu also.
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And then after the First World War, they continue up.
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Still under foreign domination, and without sovereignty,
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India and China are down in the corner.
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Not much has happened.
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They have grown their population but not much more.
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In the 1930's now, you can see
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that Japan is going to a period of war,
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with lower life expectancy.
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And the Second World War was really a terrible event,
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also economically for Japan.
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But they did recover quite fast afterwards.
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And we are moving into the new world.
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In 1947 India finally
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gained its independence.
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And they could raise the Indian flag and become a sovereign nation,
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but in very big difficulties down there.
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(Applause)
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In 1949 we saw the emergence of the modern China
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in a way which surprised the world.
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And what happened?
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What happens in the after independence?
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You can see that the health started to improve.
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Children started to go to school.
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Health services were provided.
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This is the Great Leap Forward, when China fell down.
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It was central planning by Mao Tse Tung.
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China recovered. Then they said,
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"Nevermore, stupid central planning."
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But they went up here, and India was trying to follow.
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And they were catching up indeed.
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And both countries had the better health, but still
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a very low economy.
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And we came to 1978, and Mao Tse Tung died,
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and a new guy turned up from the left.
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And it was Deng Xiaoping coming out here.
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And he said, "Doesn't matter
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if a cat is white or black,
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as long as it catches mice."
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Because catching mice
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is what the two cats wanted to do.
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And you can see the two cats being here,
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China and India, wanting to catch the mices over there, you know.
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And they decided to go not only for health and education,
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but also starting to grow their economy.
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And the market reformer was successful there.
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In '92 India follows with a market reform.
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And they go quite closely together,
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and you can see that the similarity with India and China,
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in many ways, are greater than the differences with them.
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And here they march on. And will they catch up?
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This is the big question today.
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There they are today.
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Now what does it mean that the --
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(Applause)
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the averages there -- this is the average of China.
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If I would split China, look here,
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Shanghai has already catched up.
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Shanghai is already there.
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And it's healthier than the United States.
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But on the other hand, Guizhou, one of the poorest
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inland provinces of China, is there.
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And if I split Guizhou into urban and rural,
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the rural part of Guizhou goes down there.
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You see this enormous inequity in China,
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in the midst of fast economic growth.
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And if I would also look at India,
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you have another type of inequity, actually, in India.
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The geographical, macro-geographical difference is not so big.
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Uttar Pradesh, the biggest of the states here,
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is poorer and has a lower health than the rest of India.
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Kerala is flying on top there,
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matching United States in health,
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but not in economy.
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And here, Maharashtra, with Mumbai,
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is forging forward.
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Now in India, the big inequities are within the state,
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rather than between the states.
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And that is not a bad thing, in itself.
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If you have a lot inequity, macro-geographical inequities
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can be more difficult in the long term to deal with,
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than if it is in the same area where you have a growth center
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relatively close to where poor people are living.
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No, there is one more inequity. Look there, United States.
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(Laughter)
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Oh, they broke my frame.
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Washington, D.C. went out here.
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My friends at Gapminder wanted me to show this
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because there is a new leader in Washington
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who is really concerned about the health system.
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And I can understand him, because Washington, D.C.
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is so rich over there
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but they are not as healthy as Kerala.
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It's quite interesting, isn't it?
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(Applause)
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I can see a business opportunity for Kerala,
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helping fix the health system in the United States.
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(Laughter)
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(Applause)
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Now here we have the whole world. You have the legend down there.
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And when you see the two giant cats here, pushing forward,
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you see that in between them
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and ahead of them,
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is the whole emerging economies of the world,
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which Thomas Friedman so correctly called the "flat world."
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You can see that in health and education,
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a large part of the world population is putting forward,
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but in Africa, and other parts,
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as in rural Guizhou in China,
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there is still people with low health and very low economy.
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We have an enormous disparity in the world.
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But most of the world in the middle are pushing forwards very fast.
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Now, back to my projections.
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When will it catch up? I have to go back to very conventional graph.
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I will show income per person on this axis instead,
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poor down here, rich up there.
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And then time here, from 1858
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I start the world.
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And we shall see what will happen with these countries.
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You see, China under foreign domination
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actually lowered their income and came down to the Indian level here.
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Whereas U.K. and United States is getting richer and richer.
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And after Second World War, United States is richer than U.K.
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But independence is coming here.
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Growth is starting, economic reform.
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Growth is faster, and with projection from IMF
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you can see where you expect them to be in 2014.
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Now, the question is, "When will the catch up take place?"
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Look at, look at the United States.
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Can you see the bubble?
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The bubbles, not my bubbles,
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but the financial bubbles.
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That's the dot com bubble. This is the Lehman Brothers doorstep there.
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You see it came down there.
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And it seems this is another rock coming down there, you know.
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So they doesn't seem to go this way, these countries.
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They seem to go in a more humble growth way, you know.
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And people interested in growth
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are turning their eyes towards Asia.
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I can compare to Japan. This is Japan coming up.
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You see, Japan did it like that.
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We add Japan to it.
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And there is no doubt that fast catch up
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can take place.
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Can you see here what Japan did?
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Japan did it like this, until full catch up,
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and then they follow with the other high-income economies.
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But the real projections for those ones,
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I would like to give it like this.
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Can be worse, can be better.
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It's always difficult to predict, especially about the future.
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Now, a historian tells me it's even more difficult to predict about the past.
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(Laughter)
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I think I'm in a difficult position here.
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Inequalities in China and India
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I consider really the big obstacle
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because to bring the entire population into growth and prosperity
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is what will create a domestic market,
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what will avoid social instability,
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and which will make use of the entire capacity
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of the population.
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So, social investments in health, education and infrastructure,
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and electricity is really what is needed in India and China.
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You know the climate. We have great international experts
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within India telling us that the climate is changing,
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and actions has to be taken,
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otherwise China and India would be the countries
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most to suffer from climate change.
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And I consider India and China the best partners in the world
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in a good global climate policy.
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But they ain't going to pay
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for what others, who have more money,
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have largely created, and I can agree on that.
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But what I'm really worried about is war.
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Will the former rich countries really accept
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a completely changed world economy,
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and a shift of power away from where it has been
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the last 50 to 100 to 150 years,
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back to Asia?
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And will Asia be able to handle that
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new position of being in charge
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of being the most mighty, and the governors of the world?
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So, always avoid war,
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because that always pushes human beings backward.
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Now if these inequalities, climate and war can be avoided,
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get ready for a world in equity,
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because this is what seems to be happening.
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And that vision that I got as a young student,
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1972, that Indians can be much better than Swedes,
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is just about to happen.
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And it will happen precisely
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the year 2048
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in the later part of the summer, in July,
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more precisely, the 27th of July.
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(Applause)
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The 27th of July, 2048
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is my 100th birthday.
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(Laughter)
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And I expect to speak
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in the first session of the 39th TED India.
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Get your bookings in time. Thank you very much.
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(Applause)
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About this website

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