People Starving In Africa

[Expecting Rain]

Threads on everything else, nothing about the drought, does anybody care anymore?

[Woody1985]

People are probably desensitised to it now. I can recall seeing the adverts since I was very young and when people see them on TV etc unfortunately they probably just fade in like any other advert.

There are people who care and do a lot of work for them though and big charity events. I think Children in Need etc break their records every year.

I give to charity through my work but don't really think anything of it to be honest.

Governments can do more than we can but they won't.

[Scouse Hibee]

Stop bringing children into the world if you can't provide for them :grr:
Fed up seeing starving children/babies!

[J-C]

A difficult subject matter here, on one hand we have the visions of innocent people from another country starving, on the other we hear about problems in these countries with inner fighting/corruption etc and food not getting to those that need it.

How long was it when Sir Bob and his buddies sang their Christmas song, 1984 and still 27 years later we're talking about starving thousands in Africa. Even every 2 years we have comic relief were millions are raised and a portion given to Africa.

Surely it's imperitive to try to stabalise these countries and ensure that any aid given finds it's way to the actual people who need it, not the Guerilla factions who steal and then make profit from it.

Unfortunately, Africa is a vast country with huge areas of drought which lasts for many years, starvation is a natural occurance there but the fact we see it on our tv's makes it all the more harder to bear.

[Jack]

People are probably desensitised to it now. I can recall seeing the adverts since I was very young and when people see them on TV etc unfortunately they probably just fade in like any other advert.

There are people who care and do a lot of work for them though and big charity events. I think Children in Need etc break their records every year.

I give to charity through my work but don't really think anything of it to be honest.

Governments can do more than we can but they won't.


I don't know how old you are Woody but I remember taking 3d (1.25p) to school every Wednesday in the earlyish 60s for the Biafra Babies.

IMO western, other non-African governments and charities are already plenty. It’s the African governments (not all) that I think are the root of the problem with the corruption that’s already been mentioned.

I had a friend who was working in the British Embassy in Ethiopia when that 'first' hit the headlines. I was told that the RAF, who were flying in the aid, were being charged £400 to either take off or land for each trip by the government. Then there were bribes that had to be paid every couple of miles it seemed!

There was one African country refused to accept aid a few years ago saying the continent had become aid dependent and it wasn’t doing them any good. Another part of this was that while all that aid was going in it allowed the governments not to spend money on caring for their people but to use their [bribe] money for buying more weapons to kill each other with!

[Leicester Fan]

A lot of this particular problem is to do with drought so it's not just a case of ordinary aid.

What we have to ask is does aid do more harm than good?

I appreciate that this is The Daily Mail (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2012074/David-Camerons-foreign-aid-How-money-squandered.html) so I'm sure some people will immediately dismiss it or assume that the Mail is deliberately trying to starve black people to death:rolleyes: but if you give this article a chance it raises some good questions.

[hibsbollah]

Terrible situation in Somalia which is barely a nation at all, far less a stable enough administration to manage a massive humanitarian crisis. You can text a donation to 70000 'HELP' to Disasters Emergency Committee. (assuming you are not overcome with 'compassion fatigue', and dont believe the ludicrous fairytale that the DEC gives its money to african dictators).

Alternatively, you could comfort yourself with the thought that famine controls world overpopulation. Just avoid the babies dying on the news and you might even not need to think about it.

[Twa Cairpets]

A lot of this particular problem is to do with drought so it's not just a case of ordinary aid.

What we have to ask is does aid do more harm than good?

I appreciate that this is The Daily Mail (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2012074/David-Camerons-foreign-aid-How-money-squandered.html) so I'm sure some people will immediately dismiss it or assume that the Mail is deliberately trying to starve black people to death:rolleyes: but if you give this article a chance it raises some good questions.

I did read it through, and feel as if I need a wash.

There are undoubtedly many examples of corruption waste, stupidity and double standards, but there is a need to differentiate betwen urgent humanitarian assistance due to drought which is affecting 10 million people, and aid in general.

Personally, I'm more than happy for help and money to go to help people who would die if that aid wasn't provided, and provided now.

The article is also typically sly and misguiding and in horribly mail-seque way. In the sub-heading it says "The fact is we’ll soon be spending more on the Third World than on the Home Office".

At first reading, it seems like we wil be paying more for overseas aid than we do domestically. They then quote £11.4 billion as the aid budget by 2014. As the NHS budget is £110billion, this is if not a lie then the article is clearly misleading, and designed to make people scared and angry.

I loathe the Daily Mail. I really do

[Beefster]

At first reading, it seems like we wil be paying more for overseas aid than we do domestically. They then quote £11.4 billion as the aid budget by 2014. As the NHS budget is £110million, this is if not a lie then the article is clearly misleading, and designed to make people scared and angry.

Haven't read the article but, from what you're saying, it sounds like they're saying that the Home Office budget is less that £11.4 billion. Are you looking for something that isn't there?

I'm not sure what the NHS has to do with anything though but their budget will no doubt be £110 billion anyway.

The Daily Mail is the Daily Mail. Everyone knows what its agenda is so I don't understand why folk still get upset about it.

Edit: Before I get accused by GORDONSMITH7 of being a Daily Mail-reading Nazi. I don't read/buy the Daily Mail either and never have.

[Twa Cairpets]

Haven't read the article but, from what you're saying, it sounds like they're saying that the Home Office budget is less that £11.4 billion. Are you looking for something that isn't there?

I'm not sure what the NHS has to do with anything though but their budget will no doubt be £110 billion anyway.

The Daily Mail is the Daily Mail. Everyone knows what its agenda is so I don't understand why folk still get upset about it.

Edit: Before I get accused by GORDONSMITH7 of being a Daily Mail-reading Nazi. I don't read/buy the Daily Mail either and never have.

Yes, that is what they're saying. I used the NHS purely as an example of spending on a domestic service (and have now corrected my million/billion typo...)

The article is written in a very cynical manner, with wording deliberately used to inflame the anger of those already in posession of views of red-faced anglo-saxon fury.

[Sir David Gray]

These threads keep popping up every so often, the last one was probably the one on Children In Need.

Nothing will change with the situation in Africa until their governments are sorted out and corruption is eradicated. Billions upon billions is paid by Western nations every year to these countries and hardly any of it makes it way to the people who really need it, those who are starving and those who are dying of preventable and treatable diseases.

There are countries in Sub-Saharan Africa who are literally kept going by the aid that they receive. They are given so much in aid that they cannot possibly hope to ever fully repay the money.

Also, someone else has made this point already and it's true. In a lot of these countries, the average woman has about 8 or 9 children and it's just a never ending cycle because they cannot afford to provide for them all. A middle income family in Britain would struggle to bring up 9 children, never mind a jobless single mother in Burundi.

[heretoday]

Africa is an absolutely bloody place. It's like going back in time to where people gathered in tribes and the price of life was as nothing.

I think South Africa has a lot of responsibility now since they are the most economically successful country on the continent.

With success comes responsibility. If S.A. wants to be a European style nation they need to get their their heads out of their fundaments and carry the flag for the rest of that beknighted land.

[Nuitdelune]

I buy them the equivalent of a goat--though I had hoped it was an actual goat each month--thought I might cancel but would feel guilty doing so. On the cheery side--I got given two goats--very clever things and endless amusement--love vehicle tyres but only if afixed to your vehicle

[Leicester Fan]

You've all, unsurprisingly, misunderstood the point.The point is not how much money we are giving in aid but whether it does more harm than good.



The economist Peter Bauer famously said aid transfers cash from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries. His words have been underlined by scores of studies that found idealism tempered by harsh reality.
Zambian economist Dambisa Moyo revealed the West had given more than half a trillion pounds to Africa, but over the past three decades the most aid-dependent recipients saw negative annual growth rates.
Haiti is another example. It was given official aid of more than £6 billion — four times as much per person as Europe received under the Marshall plan for post-war reconstruction — in the 50 years before last year’s earthquake.
Private aid poured in as well, with more charities operating in Haiti per capita than any other place on the globe. Despite this, income fell by a third.
It has, of course, endured despotic leaders, dreadful corruption and political unrest.
The same goes for the Dominican Republic, with which it shares an island — but while receiving far less aid, this nation saw incomes and life expectancy soar over this period


MYTH 6: Aid changes the world for the better
British aid props up repressive autocrats.
Human Rights Watch issued a devastating report last year that revealed how DFID’s 250-strong staff in Ethiopia failed to monitor annual spending of nearly £300 million.
Worse, British taxpayers’ money was shoring up an autocratic regime, funding indoctrination and with food used as a political weapon.
The same is true in Rwanda, where Britain aided a sham election last year by funding the electoral body that prevented the president’s rivals from standing and the media council that closed independent newspapers.
This tiny nation, a favourite of Mr Mitchell, is being given an average £83 million a year despite last month’s disclosure it had sent a hit squad to assassinate exiles living in Britain.
We have also given substantial sums to Yemen, despite the concerns over the regime’s appalling human rights record that has helped fuel unrest.


Are any of the above points incorrect?

[Twa Cairpets]

You've all, unsurprisingly, misunderstood the point.The point is not how much money we are giving in aid but whether it does more harm than good.

Are any of the above points incorrect?

I don't claim to have any huge knowledge of this topic, but it would not seem that Moyo's vies is by any stretch universal. Jeffrey Sachs (http://blogs.mcgill.ca/humanrightsfellows/2011/06/30/ending-famine-and-poverty-the-%E2%80%9Ckool-aid%E2%80%9D-question-and-answers-by-big-fish/) for example has a different take.

But on a very basic level, in a humanitarian crisis, international aid does more good than harm. Unless you believe people dying needlessly is doing more harm than good.

The comparison with the Marshall plan is irrelevant. It might not be wrong, but I dont see the point it serves.

As for all the other points, some may be right, Im sure. Im also sure that lots of aid is wasted and diverted to corrupt individuals and governments. This is a very different argument to saying that aid causes more harm than good. If the examples used are justification for stopping aid, its a pretty flimsy and facile argument.

[Leicester Fan]

I don't claim to have any huge knowledge of this topic, but it would not seem that Moyo's vies is by any stretch universal. Jeffrey Sachs (http://blogs.mcgill.ca/humanrightsfellows/2011/06/30/ending-famine-and-poverty-the-%E2%80%9Ckool-aid%E2%80%9D-question-and-answers-by-big-fish/) for example has a different take.

But on a very basic level, in a humanitarian crisis, international aid does more good than harm. Unless you believe people dying needlessly is doing more harm than good.

The comparison with the Marshall plan is irrelevant. It might not be wrong, but I dont see the point it serves.

As for all the other points, some may be right, Im sure. Im also sure that lots of aid is wasted and diverted to corrupt individuals and governments. This is a very different argument to saying that aid causes more harm than good. If the examples used are justification for stopping aid, its a pretty flimsy and facile argument.

But if it's aid that is perpetuating poverty in the first place?

In countries like ours if a govt messes up the economy or indulges in corruption we remove then at the next election.In an aid recipient country they would probably recieve more aid. Where is the incentive to change?
If we pay for schooling in a country then the govt of that country can divert the money that they were going to spend on schooling into arms deals or Swiss bank accounts.
It's not like aid is a new idea. We've been doing it for years and things seem to be getting worse.

I'm not totally against aid and I'm not saying it's always wasted, I just think sometimes we have to step back and ask ourselves if this is actually working.

[Leicester Fan]

I don't claim to have any huge knowledge of this topic, but it would not seem that Moyo's vies is by any stretch universal. Jeffrey Sachs (http://blogs.mcgill.ca/humanrightsfellows/2011/06/30/ending-famine-and-poverty-the-%E2%80%9Ckool-aid%E2%80%9D-question-and-answers-by-big-fish/) for example has a different take.

But on a very basic level, in a humanitarian crisis, international aid does more good than harm. Unless you believe people dying needlessly is doing more harm than good.

The comparison with the Marshall plan is irrelevant. It might not be wrong, but I dont see the point it serves.

As for all the other points, some may be right, Im sure. Im also sure that lots of aid is wasted and diverted to corrupt individuals and governments. This is a very different argument to saying that aid causes more harm than good. If the examples used are justification for stopping aid, its a pretty flimsy and facile argument.

But if it's aid that is perpetuating poverty in the first place?

In countries like ours if a govt messes up the economy or indulges in corruption we remove then at the next election.In an aid recipient country they would probably recieve more aid. Where is the incentive to change?
If we pay for schooling in a country then the govt of that country can divert the money that they were going to spend on schooling into arms deals or Swiss bank accounts.
It's not like aid is a new idea. We've been doing it for years and things seem to be getting worse.

I'm not totally against aid and I'm not saying it's always wasted, I just think sometimes we have to step back and ask ourselves if this is actually working.

[Twa Cairpets]

But if it's aid that is perpetuating poverty in the first place?

In countries like ours if a govt messes up the economy or indulges in corruption we remove then at the next election.In an aid recipient country they would probably recieve more aid. Where is the incentive to change?
If we pay for schooling in a country then the govt of that country can divert the money that they were going to spend on schooling into arms deals or Swiss bank accounts.
It's not like aid is a new idea. We've been doing it for years and things seem to be getting worse.

I'm not totally against aid and I'm not saying it's always wasted, I just think sometimes we have to step back and ask ourselves if this is actually working.

Or, if you look at it another way, in an environment where there are limited resources and a basic level of governance, the removal of aid is likely to create conflict with the attendant suffering and atrocity as the factions compete to control those meagre resources.

This "incentive to change concept" is to my mind a somewhat arrogant argument. We're not talking about guys living on the scheme, wilfully doing themselves in. It is people who are living in real poverty at a subsistence level.



If we pay for schooling in a country then the govt of that country can divert the money that they were going to spend on schooling into arms deals or Swiss bank accounts

It's not like aid is a new idea. We've been doing it for years and things seem to be getting worse.



On the assumption of course that money was going to be spent on schooling. I'll restate again that Im sure huge amounts of money are diverted, but casual throwaway lines like this don't add to the quality of your argument.

Why are things not getting better? Population change (African population has quadrupled roughly in the last half century according to this (http://visualizingeconomics.com/2007/12/09/comparing-population-growth-china-india-africa-latin-america-western-europe-united-states/)). Climate change. Drought. More efficient ways of killing and subjugating populations. The exploitation of resources for (primarily) western demand and growth. Religious restriction on contraception. Primitive (in the real sense of the world) attitudes towards western medicine. Aids.

Lots and lots of things really - to blame the problems of Africa on aid is to be very, very simplistic.

[HUTCHYHIBBY]

I buy them the equivalent of a goat--though I had hoped it was an actual goat each month--thought I might cancel but would feel guilty doing so. On the cheery side--I got given two goats--very clever things and endless amusement--love vehicle tyres but only if afixed to your vehicle

Eh?

[Lucius Apuleius]

I first came to Africa in 1972. I am not going to go through all the points raised above as I have a raging bloody hangover!!! However, a couple of points. I have had the discussion so many times about the number of kids people have here. You have to understand the African (very similar to the Asian) extended family culture. The theory is when they grow old those kids, that have survived, will look after them. The more kids that survive, the better their own life will be. We are currently building a $9 billion project with around 10,000 employees. Ain't no pension scheme for them and unless Brass LNG or train 7 on Bonny gets the go ahead, no prospect of any work for the vast majority of them once this project is complete. Look at the CIA website. Average life expectancy is mid 40s. Average number of kids is around 5. A lot of this is down to infant mortality, AIDS and malaria. All things the west can help with without pumping millions upon millions of dollars in aid into the country. Nigeria does not need the money, it needs assistance and it needs a stable government unsullied by corruption. The latter will probably not happen in my life time unfortunately. The first we can do, and I like to think that the skill sets we are leaving Delta State indigenes with will definitely go a long way to making their lives a lot better. Nigeria has dropped from the 6th or 7th biggest oil producing country to around 15th last I read. That is sad. The infrastructure is not here. The refineries are not here. They produce oil, send it abroad to be refined and then buy it back. Mental. There is a huge kerosene shortage at the minute. Nobody can cook. Goodluck Jonathan and Sambo his sidekick will hopefully make a difference. A lot depends upon what the north (Muslims) do. On another note, someone mentioned something along the lines of they gather in tribes. Of course they do. Try and have a look at parts of Africa. It is not as if they can just decide to pee off somewhere else. They live in villages and they live as a tribe, everyone helping each other. Another thing, it is rainy season here. It rains for about 8 months of the year yet they have no way of retaining that rain and having it moved to areas that are in drought. Anyway, enough, away for an Alka Seltzer.

[Leicester Fan]

This "incentive to change concept" is to my mind a somewhat arrogant argument. We're not talking about guys living on the scheme, wilfully doing themselves in. It is people who are living in real poverty at a subsistence level.


Well obviously I was talking about changing the govt.

[Nuitdelune]

Eh?

I meant that I do this £3 a month thing to starving African families and it is supposed to buy them goats and the like to try and rebuild their futures rather than giving them food for emergency measures etc.

My own goats are real ones who have a fascination trying to eat vehicle tyres but if you give them a tyre to try and keep them away from one's own tyres, they never look at it--just go for the ones actually on the vehicle.

Does this help? Sorry if not!

[HUTCHYHIBBY]

Cheers! Its all become clear.