Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Geldof's Guilt

Following on from the previous post and to give more substance to it we read that the United Nations Children’s Fund warned that one million children are at risk of dying of malnutrition in the central-western part of Africa’s Sahel region. There are currently 15 million people facing food insecurity in the Sahel, which stretches from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea. The nutrition crisis is affecting people throughout Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, and the northern regions of Cameroon, Nigeria and Senegal. Our companion blog Socialist Banner quoted aid agencies reporting mounting hunger in resources-rich Niger yet informing us at the same time that food was available in the markets, but people do not have the money to purchase it. And in oil-wealthy Angola millions of families are facing critical food insecurity and up to 500,000 children are now thought to be suffering from severe malnutrition. Yet Koen Vanormelingen, UNICEF's  representative in Angola, explained "There is food available...they cannot afford to buy food".

Let Sir Bob Geldof try to explain while he is visiting Ethiopia how its economy can expand more quickly than China in the five years to 2009 yet peoples needs are still not being met. Or let him inquire why the people of Ethiopia are being asked to believe such absurdities as "we export food in order to import food" to be a viable policy for the country, given Ethiopia's dwindling currency exchange. What sense is there in purchasing grain from the international market, while exporting domestic grain? Can exported grain used as a cash-crop generate enough capital to be able to import food affordably and sustainably? Of course, not.

The Ethiopian government is forcing people off their land so it can lease it to foreign investors, leaving people destitute and in some cases starving. Human Rights Watch has said 1.5 million Ethiopians would eventually be forced from their land.

Ethiopia is one of the world’s largest recipients of humanitarian food and development assistance, and in 2011, received more than 700,000 tonnes of food and £1.8bn in aid; at the same time, it has offered three million hectares (7.4 million acres) of virgin land to foreign corporations, such as Karuturi Global.

Karuturi Global calls the agreement it has with Ethiopia as“the deal of the century: £150 a week to lease more than 2,500 sq. km (1,000 sq. miles) of virgin, fertile land – for 50 years”. The lowest prices are in Africa. “It’s very good land. It’s quite cheap. In fact it is very cheap. We have no land like this in India,” says Karmjeet Sekhon, Karuturi Global Project Manager of what is expected to be one of Africa’s largest farms. “There you are lucky to get 1% of organic matter in the soil. Here, it is more than 5%. We don’t need fertiliser or herbicides. There is absolutely nothing that will not grow on it. To start with, there will be 20,000 hectares of oil palm, 15,000 hectares of sugar cane and 40,000 hectares of rice, edible oils, and maize and cotton. We are building reservoirs, dykes, roads, towns of 15,000 people. This is phase one. In three years’ time, we will have 300,000 hectares cultivated and maybe 60,000 workers. We could feed a nation here.” 

While the prospects that they can feed a nation is undoubtedly real, the harsh reality is that Ethiopia will not be that nation. And Geldof's solution is to be - a band-aid!

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