34pc Pakistanis think 2011 difficult for economy: Gallup Survey

ISLAMABAD: Gallup Survey Pakistan has claimed that 34 percent Pakistanis expect 2011 would bring more economic difficulties with a shift of power and prosperity from the West to the East.

“This year, the public opinion in Pakistan is not hopeful as only 13 percent think that 2011 will be a year of economic prosperity while 34 percent expect it to be a year of difficulty thus giving a negative score of –21 percent on Net Hope,” said Chairman Gallup Pakistan Dr Ejaz Shafi Gilani.

“The devastation caused by floods during the middle of the year created a mood of economic pessimism among the public, despite the fact that the country fought this calamity with courage and showed extraordinary resilience,” Dr Ejaz added.

As the new century enters its second decade, both economic data and perception data suggest that while wealth is still concentrated in Europe and North America, while there is a shift of power and prosperity from the West of the 20th Century to the East, he added.

He said these findings have been derived from one of the largest global surveys covering 53 countries across all continents including all the G7 countries, the four countries of emerging BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) and another 45 countries from Asia, Africa, Latin America, Australasia and including Pakistan. Together, a sample of over 64,000 scientifically selected men and women were interviewed by leading pollsters associated with Gallup International.

This is the second global survey, which the Group has conducted and released during this month. The key question in the global survey was: “Would you say that 2011 will be a year of Economic Prosperity, Economic Difficulty or remain the same.” At a global level 30 percent of the world expects that 2011 will be the year of prosperity and 28 percent expect it to be the year of economic difficulty, while 42 percent think the economic situation will remain unchanged. The hopefuls outscore the pessimists by 2 percent. That is the net Global Hope Score.

The data shows that global hope is highly concentrated among the rising economic powers, the so-called BRIC. The Hope Score for this Group is 35 percent.

In sharp contrast, the Hope Score for the rich countries of the world, known as the G7 (USA, Canada, Germany, France, UK, Italy, and Japan) is in the negative: -19 percent.

Among them, the Pessimists (36 percent) outscore the Hopefuls (17 percent) by 19 percent points.

Briefing the journalists about the survey here Wednesday, Dr Ejaz Shafi Gilani chairman Gallup Pakistan claimed that comparing the survey data with India, it must be noted that Hope Score are volatile and can make sharp jumps in short years.

“This would be true of the mood in India. In the latest survey popular opinion in India shows a Net Hope of 24 percent.

In previous years, India generally scored lower than Pakistan on such measures. Even now the per capita income in the two countries is not far apart $3260 in India compared with $2710 in Pakistan,” he said adding that our civil society and the government seem to have a tough task ahead of them in 2011. app

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