As I shift my thoughts toward turkey and stuffing and gravy and green beans and pumpkin pie and cranberries and abundance, I cannot help but think of those that have none. The almost three billion people who live on less than $2 per day have a difficult time getting enough food.

I spent yesterday with a group of high schoolers who were just starting to understand human needs and global inequalities. As we discussed what we could do to help people in our neighborhood who had little, one of the girls piped up with, “I mean, I know my Mom said it to me growing up, but it’s true! We need to start sending food over to those starving kids in Africa!” I probably would have said the same thing in high school.

But then I learned about how dangerous food aid can be to local food markets. And I learned how this practice is disproportionately generous to American farmers who are able to sell their bumper crops and maintain a low supply to demand ratio. And I heard Roger Thurow and Scott Kilman talk about their new book Enough. And I read about the food market crisis in the Economist.

I realize now, as an adult, that the issue is at once more complex but also more simple than we think it is. More complex because there is more at fault than supply and demand and aid and public policy. But more simple because there IS enough food in the world to feed everyone.

This Thanksgiving, therefore, I am not thinking that I should pack up the mashed potatoes and send them over to Africa. I am wondering how I can encourage and support efforts to empower those living in poverty to feed themselves.

Daniel M. Kobei, an Ogiek leader, told New York Times reporter, “Tell Obama and his men to help us.  It’s not that we’re special, but this forest is our home.”

The Ogiek are Kenya’s traditional forest dwellers and honey hunters, living off the land in Mau Forest. Unfortunately, however, the Ogiek will now be in search of a new land as the government looks to remove settlers from the region, close to 25,000 people.

The hope is to conserve the delicate ecosystem of the forest.  The Environment News Service writes that the forest provides Kenya and the region with  ‘river flow regulation, flood mitigation, water storage, reduced soil erosion, biodiversity, carbon sequestration, carbon reservoir and microclimate regulation’.

But due to heavy deforestation and a regional water crisis, the government plans to clear the forest in order to plant millions of trees.

But at what cost to those living there?

The Standard writes,

“The possession of a parcel of land, even if tenuous or without legal backing, is the only access to capital for most. Losing it, as well as the harvest on it, will reduce many to destitution. Thus, it is imperative they get help from the Government and organizations like the Kenya Red Cross Society.”

According to the Daily Nation, the Kenyan government started delivering food aid last week for squatters evicted from the Mau Forest such as maize, beans and vegetable oil.

The sudden interest in environmentalism by the Kenyan politicians is breeding suspicious for those that once called the Mau Forest home.

“The government wants that forest for economic reasons, not conservation reasons,” said Towett Kimaiyo, an Ogiek leader. “The only people who are going to benefit are the saw-millers.”

Do you think that the settlers in the Mau Forest should be compensated, with or without a title deed?  What about the Ogiek who have lived on the land for centuries and have proven to take care of the region?

we can’t talk food, without talking water.

approximately five million people die each year due to poor drinking water, poor sanitation or other water shortage related issues. as the global water shortage worsens, the number will rise steeply. water, as a resource and as a commodity is much valued and even, much fought over. many conflicts boil down to control over resources- and water is one of the most important.

it isn’t just that there isn’t enough water for everyone as it’s being misused or polluted- it’s also that many, many, many people do not have access to clean water. in fact, it blows my mind to try to comprehend that some have never known safe water their entire lives- and probably never will

is poor infrastructure to blame? is it successively poor governments? is it a cultural inability to learn to keep water sources clean? is it poor education?

p.s: in the video, it states that a growing population would see a reduction in water availability… but, it also very subtly implies a more basic issue- that there is too much water in the hands of just a few people- the problem is that there is an unequal distribution of the resource..

“The quantities of meat our men devour is quite astounding. They boil as much as their pots will hold, and eat till it becomes physically impossible for them to stow away any more…”

In a previous post – ‘Cuisines and Crops of Africa, 19th Century – The Limits of Pastoralism as a Lifestyle’ – The explorer Speke described the eating and fasting habits of Somali pastoralists, whose ‘fast-feast’ style of eating was seen to be directly linked to their spartan lifestyle.

Similar extremes of eating are also described by Livingstone in the Zambezi river basin of south-central Africa, where he traveled in the mid-19th. Century, (Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa) – sections quoted below.

Such fast-feast eating patterns can still be found in Africa, either on a seasonal basis or directly linked to crop failures or other disasters. That is because subsistence farmers are generally so closely dependent upon their annual crop harvests for their daily food that crop failure or fighting can spell under- or malnutrition for part of the year.

As well, even during good years, family consumption during the dry season may be limited to starches such as yams, sweet potatoes, and manioc with a corresponding lack of fresh vegetables or fruits. Increasingly, too, because of war, displacement and other problems, mothers here feed their weaning infants porridge made of manioc, which is a recipe for nutritional problems. The results commonly lead to nutritional diseases, the two most common forms found throughout the third world being marasmus and kwashiorkor.

Marasmus is associated with moderate to severe protein-energy deficiency that leads to extreme muscle and tissue wasting; ‘Voracious eating’, of the type described below by Livingstone, is often associated with marasmus.

On the left, 3 cases of marasmus - and on the right, one case of apparent kwashiorkor. Source: George Grenfell and the Congo. a history and description of the Congo 1908

Kwashiorkor is a more complicated nutritional disease that includes deficiencies in micronutrients, in addition to protein and energy deficiencies. This is the form most commonly see here in Burundi, especially during the lean months and, in the 1990’s, during the war years in refugee and displacement camps:

Gir suffering from kwashiorkor in a health clinic where we have provided assistance

These are not recent problems. Colonial records mention the same symptoms, which were often confused with venereal diseases, because causes and symptoms of nutritional diseases can be similar and this was not well understood until the last few decades.

School children in Eastern Congo, early 20th. Century. Virtually all are apparently suffering from marasmus, and many also from parasites, for which swollen bellies are also an indicator. Source: searching

To help compensate for extremes of food availability, what we would call ‘binge eating’ has been commonly practiced during the period of ample food supplies, which can result in stored body fat to be used during the dry season ‘fasting’ period. Unfortunately, small children are unable to process and store body fat in the same way as adults and thus are most vulnerable to these nutritional diseases.

Binge eating, often associated with long periods of lean findings, was perhaps most noticeably seen amongst the Khoi hunter-gathers of southern Africa, where the stored fat in the buttocks and stomach area on women caused curiosity – and some alarm – amongst colonial explorers:

Khoisan women, Kalahari Desert - 1935-49 Source: Royal Geographic Society

It is within this context that the following eating practices in south-central Africa, described in 1864 by Livingston, can be best understood. In addition, as he is talking about the consumption of an elephant – as much as possible of the beast must be eaten, because in a tropical climate the meat will putrefy in a very short period of time:

The quantities of meat our men devour is quite astounding. They boil as much as their pots will hold, and eat till it becomes physically impossible for them to stow away any more.

An uproarious dance follows, accompanied with stentorian song; and as soon as they have shaken their first course down, and washed off the sweat and dust of the after performance, they go to work to roast more.

A short snatch of sleep succeeds, and they are up and at it again; all night long it is boil and eat, roast and devour, with a few brief interludes of sleep.

Like other carnivora, these men can endure hunger for a much longer period than the mere porridge-eating tribes.

Our men can cook meat as well as any reasonable traveller could desire; and, boiled in earthen pots, like Indian chatties, it tastes much better than when cooked in iron ones.

Cynthia Bertelsen has also put up an excellent blog touching on some of these issues and is well worth a read: Hunger, Starvation, Famine and the Sweep of Human History.

I would also like to mention that today’s blog was in part inspired by information received yesterday from IRIN (Integrated Regional Information Networks ) about recent breakthroughs in addressing these serious problems:

Fortified flour and chewing gum – new approaches to malnutrition

NAIROBI, 9 November (IRIN) – Some of the most widespread forms of malnutrition can best be reduced by delivering micronutrients and fortifying food in new, cost-effective ways, in combination with community outreach work, experts have said.

Approaches could range from the obvious – adding iron to flour – to the novel, such as vitamin-enriched chewing gum, a Nairobi conference heard.

Vitamin A, iron and iodine are the most important micronutrients in global public health terms, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), particularly for children and pregnant women in poor countries.

Vitamin A deficiency affects more than half of all countries, especially in Africa and Southeast Asia, and it is “especially important where under-five mortality is high,” Sue Horton, a malnutrition economist, told the conference.

The conference on nutrition, held in Nairobi on 3 November, was organized by Danish think-tank The Copenhagen Consensus Center (CCC).

CCC has ranked micronutrient supplements as a top development priority following findings of a study it commissioned in 2008 to identify the best ways to spend aid and development money.

Provision of Vitamin A, it added, to children aged six months to five years every four to six months could reduce mortality by 23 percent…

Nutritional deficiencies can be cured with proper food. Very simple and as these kids show, very achieveable.

Well, this Reuters report gives some empirical depth to recent media analysis that China is clearly eager to repair its ties with the DPRK.:

China has stopped publicly issuing trade data about North Korea, veiling the potentially sensitive numbers about its wary neighbour under another category while the two countries seek improved ties.

Destination and origin statistics on China’s imports and exports for September issued on Monday gave no separate numbers for second straight month for the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the formal name of the North, as they have long appeared in the tables.

The trade tables for coal, crude oil, oil products and cereals issued by China’s General Administration of Customs instead used another category, “other Asia not elsewhere specified”, which for those commodities at least appeared to cover exclusively trade flows between China and the North.

Analysts and officials have used Chinese statistics to gauge otherwise opaque ties between the two communist neighbours. But North Korea has stopped appearing in the Chinese data since last month, when statistics for August also avoided mention of it.

The change may help Beijing to obscure shifts in economic flows with the North, which relies on China for most of its trade and aid.

An official in charge of data services at the Customs Administration told Reuters that the change would last, but would not say why. Reuters and other companies buy the data.

“We’re no longer issuing trade data about North Korea,” said the official, who declined to give her name. “We’re not allowed to issue the data anymore.”

She declined to answer further questions, referring them to another data services official.

That official, Xu Xianghui, said the data could not be released because of a “technical fault”. But Xu said it was unclear if that fault would ever be fixed.

Last year, trade between China and North Korea reached $2.79 billion, up 41.3 percent on 2007. But in the first nine months of this year bilateral trade slipped to $1.85 billion, a fall of 2.9 percent compared with the same months last year.

The data provided suggested Chinese exports of crude oil to the North have fallen slightly this year, while Chinese exports of rice to the North reached 48,240 tonnes in the first nine months of the year, a jump of 140 percent from the same period of 2008.  (Editing by Ken Wills and Ron Popeski)

If you’re the type to keep track of such things, this story has yet to be picked up by One Free Korea or the Daily NK.  [Note: It did, however, show up on NK Economy Watch subsequent to a tip by yours truly.] The story was reprinted yesterday in the Hong Kong standout paper, the South China Morning Post on page A4  (you know, pages?  as in, leaves in the paper edition that some of us still read?) under the headline “Beijing hides North Korea trade statistics,” and next to a picture of a huge field of drying persimmons in Guangdong.  Incidentally, South China Morning Post is one of those sources that you can only access via subscription to its site, paper copies, or to PressDisplay.

Just for the record, I have had some issues before with translations and word choice of Chinese sources by the Reuters staff in Beijing, including Ken Wills, who edited the above piece (which nevertheless includes the massacred header “BID TO IMRPOVE TIES”), but I don’t see any reason to question the basic legitimacy of this particular report.   In fact, we’re fortunate to have the information, particularly the figures on oil and food aid.

And, although rice imports from China were way up, by no means is everyone being fed in North Korea.  Quite the contrary.  The Good Friends’ latest report gives some in-depth analysis of Chinese grain dispersal to the DPRK in 2008, showing China’s strategy of delivering only a third of the requested amount in the spring quarter, but then amping up deliveries later in the year.  While John Feffer argues convincingly that food is a basic human right, unfortunately, it has become a political weapon for all sides in the North Korean imbroligio.

Kim Jong Il in Pyongyang, KCNA via Mike Madden's insouciant post "Kim Jong Il's Love in an Elevator" -- click image for link to the incomparable NK Leadership Watch blog

South Korea offers first food aid in two years to North Korea.

It isn’t a lot of food aid, but it’s a step. An important step in an incredibly right direction. It’s the first time in two years that assistance is being offered. North Koreans have been greatly affected by the food crisis and hunger has reached frightening proportions.

Read more here.

This is one of those ‘food is a great linker’ times.

This morning I was awaken by the sounds of BBC news and heard some very heart wrenching news. Severe droughts in Ethiopia are damaging crops and leaving millions without food. Many of these are children. It has prompted the Ethiopian Government to request emergency food aid for 6.2 million people. Could you imagine what it would feel like to be in that situation? To be a farmer out there laboring in the blazing sun and no rains coming, therefore your crops are yielding nothing and you have your family to feed and cannot. Then you seek to borrow from someone else and they want to charge you interest on what you borrow. What king of world are we living in where people feel they always have to get over on someone. If a person can’t yield any crops, hoe are they supposed to make money to pay back anything? and then one wants to toss interest on top of that. How sickening to your stomach is that?

I bring this to your attention today, because many of us take for granted the blessings we do have. We complain about this or that and a lot of it is not even worth complaining about. Here is a country in the midst of some serious food shortages, the very thing you need to live and here we are complaining about material things and the extra shit we don’t have that we really don’t need and there are people out here dying because they lack the basics. We waste so much food here in America, never giving any thought to the fact that what we waste could feed many people in another country. We are blessed to be able to go to the grocery store and see the shelves full of options (although most of it may not be as good for us as we think) for us to choose from and on top of that have the funds to purchase it. I realize that there are many who struggle here as well but there are over a billion people in this world living off of less than one dollar a day, Yes less than one dollar a day. Could you imagine that one? Less than one dollar a day. We are all victims of this lack of appreciation, even I. We so caught up in our lifestyles that we forget how fortunate we really are sometimes. We rarely stop to think about how others around the world or even around are city, state are actually living. There are many who are suffering.  

We must stop from time to time and think about these things, thanking Jah for our blessings. I realize as my man Robert Nesta would say, “Every man thinks his burden is the heaviest” but to not have the very basic essentials that one needs to live is heartbreaking. The UN says that they are short on food relief as around the world there are many suffering from lack of food. This could be due to drought, war, and other circumstances. We have money to spend on nuclear weapons, war, space research and all this other jazz but we are always lacking when it comes to taking care of the people, and I mean all people. What goes on around the world, near or far has a affect on us all. These are are brothers and sisters rather we no them or not. Martin Luther King was quoted as saying, “What affects on directly, affects us all indirectly.”

It is appears as if we are living out prophetic times right now. Rather you are religious or not, it would be hare to argue against what is taking place. My eyes do not deceive me. I see what I see and feel what I feel and if you are watching then you see it to. Some things we don’t see unless it is brought to our attention for as we go through are daily lives we are not confronted with certain things so we do not think of them, so sometimes we need a little reminder. I seek not to strike a negative blow to your day, but to ask of you to pray for these families of not only Ethiopia but all around the world where there is suffering of this magnitude. Many of our future are malnourished and sick and need our assistance. Prayer is very powerful for we can call into being that which we want to happen. We must pray for a world where we look out for one another in time of need and this most certainly one of them. I thank you for your time today  and if you would like to read more about the situation in Ethiopia you can go to bbc.com.

I leave you today with this poem that was published in my debut poetry book, Steppin’ Out.

Imagine all the people

God’s children living in peace

Imagine all the people

none hungry enough 2 eat

Imagine all the people

asleep not on the street

Imagine all the people

havin’ dreamz helping em reach

Imagine all the people

feeling good happy 2 meet

Imagine all the people

Love and compassion when they meet

Imagine all the people

Lovin’ hip hip without the beef

Imagine all the people travelin’ deep joy when they weep

Imagine all the people learnin’ from him

learnin’ 2 teach

Imagine boy could he speak gifted with speece

Imagine all the people

practicin’ what he preached

that would be a beautiful scene

come true a dream

Imagine all the people

climbin’ a mountain reachin’ its peak

imagine all the people

takin’ a rest end of the week

Imagine all his people

His people takin’ a leap

imagine all his people

sharing their gifts not 2 compete

Imagine all his people

coming together system defeat

imagine all his people

stronger than ever helpin’ the weak

Imagine all his people

treated as equal mission complete

Imagine all his children bein’ themselves snowflake unique

Imagine all the people

findin’ in lif that which they seek

Imagine all the people seekin’ 2 find presence divine

Now Imagine this

sand on a beach a reggae beat

feelin’ no grief

singin’ one love i-rey retreat

Love is our relief

can u my friends imagine this

that would be a beautiful scence

come true a dream

now imagine people

far away from the concrete

Imagine all his people

eatin’ ital balck and we proud

Now imagine people

no fear saying it loud

now imagine people

on sacred grounds no guns allowed

now imagine people

under control not runnin’ wild

now imagine people

mother and father for every child

imagine all his children

willin’ 2 travel that extra mile

imagine all his people bathing themselves in River Nile

Imagine all his children

doing the things that make em smile

imagine all his children

humble with theirs do it w/ style

Imagine all his people

wailin’ no longer its been a while

imagine all the people

with the almighty have reconclied

now imagine this 100,000 in the crowd

that would be a beautiful scene

come true my dream

Copyright 2006/2008 Freedom Train International

]]> http://dewoflittlethings.wordpress.com/2009/10/18/more-donors-needed-to-fund-feeding-scheme-for-1-billion-hungry/ Sun, 18 Oct 2009 08:19:55 +0000 gdevera http://dewoflittlethings.wordpress.com/2009/10/18/more-donors-needed-to-fund-feeding-scheme-for-1-billion-hungry/

Urging world leaders to boost efforts to help the record number of hungry people around the world, top United Nations officials today underscored the need to prioritize immediate food aid for the one in six of the global population who are malnourished

The flow of food aid is at its lowest for 20 years, while the number of hungry has grown to its highest point ever, pushing past one billion people.

“Over the past two years, volatile food prices, the economic crisis, climate change and conflict have led to a dramatic and unacceptable rise in the number of people who cannot rely on getting the food they need to live, work and thrive,” said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in a message marking World Food Day.

“We must respond to the needs of the hungry, first by ensuring adequate political and financial support for emergency food assistance,” stressed Mr. Ban.

This year the World Food Programme (WFP) has set out to feed 108 million people across 74 countries, but a severe budget shortfall has meant reduced rations for many of the hungry and the suspension of feeding schemes in some countries.

WFP noted that so far this year international donors have contributed $2.9 billion to its $6.7 billion 2009 budget.

“Let’s remember that more than one billion people won’t get enough nutritious food to eat today,” said WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran.

“We can change this. Our challenge is to turn ‘No Food Day’ back into ‘World Food Day for the hundreds of millions without food on their table tonight,” said Ms. Sheeran.

She said that for decades WFP has provided emergency food assistance to around 10 per cent of the world’s hungriest men, women and children, but this year – for the first time – the agency is unlikely to reach that target.

As the UN’s largest emergency relief agency, WFP’s resources have been stretched this year by a number of unforeseen humanitarian disasters, such as recent flooding in the Philippines, the need to expand food voucher programmes in the occupied Palestinian territory and a recent eruption of a long-running conflict in northern Yemen between Government forces and Al Houthi rebels that has forced 150,000 to flee their homes.

“The silent crisis affecting one sixth of the all of humanity is also leaving a serious impact on this region,” said Daly Belgami, WFP Director in the Middle East, Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

In addition to addressing the aftermath of natural disasters, Mr. Belgami said that WFP also has programmes aimed at improving children’s access to education and helping local economies by purchasing food locally. “Donor support is needed to maintain this level of assistance to the most vulnerable in this region.”

In his address marking the Day, Director-General of the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) Jacques Diouf called on world leaders to reach a “broad consensus on the total and rapid elimination of hunger” when they gather in Rome for the World Summit on Food Security of Heads of State and Government on 16-18 November.

Mr. Diouf also urged leaders to agree to increase agriculture’s share of official development assistance (ODA) to 17 per cent, the level it was in 1980, from its current 5 per cent.

“That amount of $44 billion of official development assistance that we need to devote to agriculture development is very low compared with the $365 billion spent in 2007 to support agriculture in the rich countries, the $1,340 billion spent by the world each year on armaments and the trillions of dollars found in short order in 2008–2009 to prop up the financial sector,” said Mr. Diouf.

However, Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique, Uganda, Viet Nam, Thailand and Turkey have provided cause for hope by significantly reducing the number of undernourished people in their countries over the last five years, he said.

“This means that we know what should be done and how it should be done,” said Mr. Diouf. “Generally, programmes, projects and plans exist and are simply waiting for the political will and resources to become operational.”

Another priority strategy to combat world hunger outlined by Mr. Ban in his message, was the need to invest in food production and distribution, including the provision of safety nets and assistance for smallholder farmers and support for longer-term agricultural productivity, market access and fair trade.

He said that next month’s food summit in Rome is another opportunity to focus on country-led and regional strategies, country-level partnerships and increased levels of assistance.

“I encourage all nations to pursue coordinated and comprehensive strategies for agricultural development and effective social protection so that vulnerable people – women and children in particular – can get the food they need for nutritional security and well-being,” said Mr. Ban.

Also on World Food Day, WFP highlighted an international video competition, called “Hunger Bytes,” for students, aspiring film-makers and professionals to raise awareness about the levels of malnutrition around the world.

The competition, hosted by YouTube, encourages people of all backgrounds to submit short, thought-provoking and unique videos of less than one minute on hunger. Participants can increase their chances of winning by sharing the link with friends and online communities such as Facebook, MySpace and through blogs.

Excerpt from UN News Service: http://www.un.org/news/

From Foreign Policy: “The recent disastrous earthquake in Indonesia has prompted a quick humanitarian response from Western countries, raising some key questions: Who decides what kind of emergency food aid is delivered, and should it be healthier? This argument is not new — nutritionists and development workers have been debating it for years — but improved food options are causing it to heat up again.

This is no abstract discussion. A child dies of malnutrition every six seconds. The World Health Organization estimates that, at any given moment, 20 million children are suffering from the most severe form of food deprivation — frequently as a result of other crises, such as earthquakes, hurricanes, droughts, and civil unrest. Emergency food aid has to bring them back from the brink quickly and reliably. Unfortunately, serious questions have been raised about the healthful properties of the fortified, blended wheat, corn, or soy flours that are the mainstay of many emergency food programs. Is using these foods when better alternatives are available ethical?

A rising chorus is advocating that food-aid staples — which have the advantage of being affordable and widely available — be replaced with a highly nutritious, easily transportable paste, formulated in 1999 and now broadly distributed by Doctors Without Borders (MSF, for Médecins Sans Frontières). In 2006 and 2007, the organization treated more than 150,000 malnourished children in 22 countries with ready-to-use foods, including Plumpy’nut. Plumpy’nut, which is made from powdered milk, ground peanuts, oil, powdered sugar, vitamins, and minerals, comes in foil packets and doesn’t need refrigeration. Its value was celebrated last year on 60 Minutes.

Plumpy’nut tastes like peanut butter, and kids love to eat it. But it’s expensive, and critics say it’s better to reach as many people as possible with a more affordable choice. And the need remains great…”

Click here to read the rest of this article.

Although I have not written much about this lately (the arrival of a new class means that I have little time to read the news in-depth) the World economy is still suffering. I read in a Danish money newsletter that one in eight Americans receive food aid. According to the stats this is the highest number ever and about 3.6 mio Americans have joined the scheme this year. The average support is $113 a month. Remember, this is food aid. It basically means that 12.5% of Americans can’t afford to feed themselves. Scary that!

Then it is comforting to see that the IMF reports that the World economy is on its way back on track and that the economy will grow in 2010 and probably more than expected – the estimate is 3%. However, IMF Chief Economist Olivier Blanchard warns Governments about things thinking that the crisis is over. Private spending is much needed to turn this round and with unemployment still on a high it is likely to take time. I suppose one might summarise this as “Spend but don’t over-spend”, as some certainly used to do.

The conflict between the Kingdom of Buganda and the Ugandan government continues. Our own Dr. Catherine Sagala, Legacy World Missions’ Executive Director in Uganda (and herself a member of the Buganda tribe) said in an email to us that “The riots in Kampala were triggered by current politics of intrigue.” President Museveni blamed the conflict on opposition to the government, and has said that something shouold be learned from Uganda’s history. He has a good point; throughout Uganda’s history, much of its instability has been caused by a breakdown in relationships between Buganda and the government. The resulting instability leaves the country vulnerable to everything from military coups (like those in which Milton Obote and then Idi Amin siezed power) to famine and disease. As this conflict continues, we’re carefully watching the situation to see exactly what result this is going to have on the MOST vulnerable Ugandans: the unprotected women and orphaned children who are most at risk.

Worse yet, The World Food Programme is pulling out of Uganda’s Karamoja District, which could cause as many as a quarter of a million schoolkids to drop out of school. A local official said that when the emergency relief ends in November, “nobody will go to school. They will all look for wild fruits to eat.”

Happy kids at KAYDA Facility in Uganda receive their first shipment of food from Legacy World Missions

We’ve seen the direct link between food and education in Uganda. Legacy World Missions’ food program feeds 10,510 school-aged kids every day, and has done so for a year. The reports we’ve recieved back from our partner homes and schools has been remarkable; school attendance is up dramatically and academic performance has improved.

We’ve said before, there are plenty of worthwhile criticisms on why food aid can hurt more than it helps. It can undercut local farmers, depress the local economy and even support civil war through the black market. And frustratingly, Uganda’s one of the most fertile places on the planet and could easily grow enough food to feed the entire Horn of Africa, but with political instability, two years of concurrent droughts and floods and a lack of infrastructure to get crops to market, we’re fighting famine among the poor, and this affects children the most.

We designed Legacy World Missions’ food program to keep a tight control on the inventory and make sure the food went entirely to the target population: schoolchildren. So far, we’ve delivered more than 7 million meals for a year, with almost no theft or damage loss, and by literally every measure, the program has been a success.

It’s not enough, though. Several of our partner facilities are low or completely out of food, and as other international aid like the World Food Programme cease their efforts to help, we’re trying hard to stop a full-scale crisis among Uganda’s orphaned children.

We’re working on several possible solutions right now to creatively tackle the problem. The most effective option would be to ship another container of food from the US to Kampala, which we can easily do. The food– almost 19 tons of it– is already procured through our partnership with USAID, but the shipping and clearing costs are prohibitively high. $15,000 would cover the cost and feed more than 10,000 children for six months.

Like every other charity, foundation, nonprofit and ministry, we’re feeling the economic pinch. It’s frustrating to know that, with food becoming less secure for Uganda’s schoolchildren and civil unrest threatening more violence, the only thing preventing us from protecting these vulnerable children is money. Hopefully, we’ll have a solution worked out by the end of the week, so check back for good news.

Blessings from the Legacy Staff

Something is wrong:

LONDON (Reuters) – Food aid is at a 20-year low despite the number of critically hungry people soaring this year to its highest level ever, the United Nations relief agency said Wednesday.

The number of hungry people will pass 1 billion this year for the first time, the U.N. World Food Program budget shortfall. (WFP) said, adding that it is facing a serious

To date the WFP has confirmed $2.6 billion in funding for its 2009 budget of $6.7 billion.

“This comes at a time of great vulnerability for the hungry,” the WFP said in a statement.

“Millions have been buffeted by the global financial downturn, their ability to buy food is limited by stubbornly high prices. In addition, unpredictable weather patterns are causing more weather-related hunger,” the WFP said.

School Feeding Program, Kenya - after the clashes.

Mukuni basic school feeing program, Zambia.

Sources:  Top –   Moses Ouma Migoya; Bottom -  The Butterfly Tree

In my last blog I talked about the impact of food assistance on local diets in the Southern Hemisphere; programs such as the two depicted above.

But food assistance to the poor or to schools by means of  federally-assisted food programs can also impact on diets – or diet expectations -  in the Northern Hemisphere, as a recent article in ‘The Pig Site’ suggests:

…USDA announced last week that it would purchase $30 million worth of pork products for public feeding programs, well short of the $50 million purchase that had been requested by the National Pork Producers Council (NPPC). USDA cited federal budget constraints….

…The most popular product in the spring USDA buy was a pre-cooked pork patty that could be made of either sow or butcher hog trimmings…

Pig raising - as many other agricultural activities in North America and the EU - suffers from the global recession.

Is this going to substantially change the diets of the poor or of kids receiving federally-supported lunches?  No, certainly not this one example.  But it is the cumulative effect of a variety of federally-subsidized foods and food products that could lead it that direction.  Has any work been done on this topic?  Maybe – though I’m not aware of it.  If you know or have thoughts, let us know about it!

P.S. – I’m certainly not against federally-supported programs in supplying food – but am concerned about the implications and unintended outcomes.

Mandatory distribution of foodstuffs produced by the donor country is written into many of the humanitarian assistance grants supported by American and EU governments.

My first experience with mandatory food aid took place some years ago when working in the Red Sea Hills of Egypt and Sudan with Beja tribes.  The USAID grant supporting the project required  the distribution of PL480 foodstuffs – primarily enriched cornmeal and corn oil that was surplus production from US farms.  That project is described HERE:

Although many  the Beja were indeed severely mal- and undernourished, the foodstuffs that we delivered were simply not their ‘own’ food.  Consequently, a good deal of it was sold to local merchants who then sold on to other merchants in the Nile Valley.

In this way, the Beja were able to gain a little cash in order to buy food that they wanted as well as to purchase other necessities.

More recently, however, the dumping of American and EU foodstuffs in the Third World has come under increasing criticism and I join that criticism, for several reasons:

1. Over time, and in the absence of other basic foods, we are forcefully changing local diets and this translates into the recipient population wanting to purchase or grow and process items that oftentimes may not be suitable for local ecosystems, markets, processing procedures, etc
2. Food dumping can depress demand for production of locally suitable foods in regions undergoing an emergency –  ODI and other organizations have conducted studies on this dynamic and some of the studies are referenced below
3. Globally, food-dumping creates an artificial demand for food products that is neither sustainable nor ‘real’.

More recent examples of food-dumping, from here in Burundi, are found in refugee camps, internally displaced persons camps, school feeding programs, maternal-child health programs, and so forth.  In all of these are found food items from North America, the European Union, and elsewhere that are not always appropriate for local diets but that often do serve the over-arching purpose of getting rid of surplus food products in the North.

In more global terms, according to one study:

Of the nearly 3 million tons of food aid provided by the United States in 1996, almost one-quarter was in the form of PL 480 Title I sales  in which food is sold to third world governments on easy credit terms for resale to local livestock industries as feed, and to local food-processing companies who make pasta, bread, cooking oil, and other products for urban consumers. While the proceeds from these sales must generally be used for “development” purposes, which are specified by USAID, Title I has long been used as a primary tool to create new markets for U.S. grain exports. In practice, it functions as corporate welfare. According to a study published by the University of Nebraska Press:…

But while  I do not support conspiracy theories on the part of big businesses as the considered goal of food aid, I do see many of the tentacles of international food aid having developed along neocolonial lines .  The trail of food aid is long and complex, and as most historical sagas did not develop in ways that were originally considered.

There are no easy answers to this dilemma.  Who would deny food to kids such as the following?

A widower with his children, all suffering from moderate to severe malnutrition. A family with whom we worked to improve animal husbandry

One of the malnourished children whose mother we incorporated into a family gardens project with widows and their children who were internally displaced.

And who would not be pleased to see results such as these, from MCH (maternal-child health) programs that use ‘food-dumped’ food aid?

Happy mom with healthy twins

Boys in the feeding program

Moms who were part of the home gardens project, their children were receiving supplemental feeding and the vegetables grown by the mothers went both to their own homes as well as for market sales to earn a little income.

There are efforts underway to address the issue of food aid on multiple fronts – in donor countries, with regard to food aid policy, in recipient countries – also with regard to national food aid policy,  and with programs to support improved food production at local levels – such as the program for fresh foods in refugee camps, put up in FB by Mariana Kavroulaki, which inspired me to write this blog (thanks, Mariana!).

Personally, I feel comfortable working both at the policy level, to develop ‘farmer-friendly’ policies that support local food production, marketing and processing – as well as at the local level, with farming communities overcoming emergency conditions (such as in the above photos) to invigorate farming practices and sales. In this way, to incorporate developmentally-oriented activities with food aid in ways that ‘wean’ local folk off the aid as soon as possible.  As the saying goes, more easily said than done!

A few references providing background on the issues:

Preliminary Analysis of food Aid – Tsunami

US food Aid, time to get it Right

Food AID or Food Sovereignty?

Who will feed the Poor?

CARE Turns Down U.S. Food Aid

BBC 2 is currently running a series of documentaries that are looking at the FUTURE OF FOOD fronted by former Fair Trade patron George Alagiah both here in the UK and the rest of the world generally.

The first episode looked at the issue food security and water in particular and showed the lengths to which  a Punjab based wheat farmer goes too to access water to irrigate the wheat that is headed to the west and the level of debt this has left him with whilst elsewhere in Punjab some have committed suicide as they could not cope with the level of debt they were in nor could they see a way out.

This week’s episode has left me (us) with some dilemmas. With European waters over fished and  dwindling supplies, we are heading further a field  to look for fish and one of the countries at the receiving end of our quest for fish is Senegal a relatively poor African country. Fish is a vital part of the diet of the coast villages in Senegal but with the  arrival of European fishing boats, these locals don’t stand a chance and one fisherman said "he simply wishes they would go away". The consequences of the Europeans fishing Senegalese waters has meant that fish in Senegal has become so expensive that most local people can’t afford it!

The story moves on to a farm in Kenya that grown green beans for UK supermarkets. I was having dinner whilst watching this part and on my plate was grilled Salmon, mangetout, grilled courgettes and tomatoes and I must admit to struggling to finish it.

The Kenyan story is very sad indeed. A country that grows and exports a lot of food to the UK but has to rely on UN FOOD AID to feed its people! Perfectly good beans being rejected because they have a bit of soil on them or are  the wrong shape!

The programme touched on the issue of Bio fuel. Yes we need to protect the environment and one way is to check our fuel consumption and the sources of fuel. But is it fair to take away farming land form rural people that use it for growing food and turn it into a field for bio fuel crops that neither people nor animals can eat?

What about feeding cattle on cereals/grains in order to fatten them whilst  some people can’t access this cereal for food? I sincerely don’t know what the answers to these questions are, but all I know is that we need to address these issues one way or another.

As George said we have some tough choices to make especially here in Europe. Our food choice is currently threatening  the food and water security of some of the poorest people in the world. It would appear too that we face unknown future in as far as our own food security is concerned unless we rethink how we farm and eat.

Is the way forward to "GROW" our own? Is the ethical thing to do to farm our own fish instead ot taking fish from those that need it the most? What about our shopping habits? Are supermarkets simply giving in to our demands of super perfect Kenyan green beans?

Have you got a view on any of the issues raised here? Please share it! I would urge to to watch George’s programmes on BBC 2 or iplayer

Government food trucks deliver emergency vegtables to the roiling masses of this grand city…hoooooray. Article here. All they’ll probably need to make the deliveries is a couple of humvees to get them through the crimeridden streets.