LOOKING A GIFT HORSE IN THE MOUTH: THE BATTLE AGAINST STARVATION IN MALAWI

When Susan George, formerly of the World Bank, wrote her revolutionary book How the Other Half Dies (Penguin, 1976), it pricked the conscience of those concerned with humanitarian issues globally. Others however, were keen to dismiss the work as an overstatement of the problem of world hunger and the global regime to combat this. The fact is that although global food production has increased manifold and at a faster rate than global population growth, the problem of hunger persists. Some of this hunger is caused by temporary factors - a particularly bad year of drought or caused by the failure of a leading crop. At other times, as in Somalia, Zimbabwe and North Korea, the difficulties of scarce resources are compounded by exploitative political regimes that remain unconcerned with the production and distribution of food. It is clear that in such circumstances the relatively wealthy benefit more than others with ethnic, linguistic and other minorities often stranded at the bottom of the appropriately christened, ‘pecking’ order.

The international community has been concerned with this situation for some time, with agencies such as the Food and Agricultural Agency (FAO) and the World Food Programme (WFP), seeking out ways in which to relive such situations through a series of emergency measures, and better planning to avoid the descent into famine. Concomitant to these efforts, various governments have become involved in bilateral food aid. This aid is often directed at countries facing drought and famine with food packages providing inhabitants with the means for a basic survival that would be otherwise denied to them. By and large, this form of aid is motivated by humanitarian concerns and, has often significantly alleviated particularly acute shortages. Yet the issues are far more complicated than a simple and generous donation from those with plenty to those with little, as has begun to become starkly clear in Malawi.

Faced with famines in 2002, 2003 and 2005, the State was particularly grateful when the international community stepped into the breach to provide for the population. The assistance, led by the World Food Programme, was timely, focussed initially at the provision of meals at schools throughout the State, and had the added benefit of attracting children to schools in a country struggling to educate its population. The -result of what amounted to a well thought-out idea, was an increase in school enrolment and a near guarantee that every child in the State would be fed at least once a day: a luxury in some cases that was beyond the imagination of many. So successful was the model that it had begun to attract the attention of other States struggling with similar problems.

The United States of America, attracted by the efficiency of the programme, expressed a desire to join in, with a donation of $20 million over three years. Yet the fine print of the deal is crucial: access to the grant is conditional upon the food being bought off American farmers, and transported by American ships to Malawi. The result is a discrepancy whereby the cost per tonne of food will be $812 instead of $320 that is paid when sources locally. While the actual cost of the food is the same, the transportation and distribution costs add almost two-thirds to the American figure. Now the immediate crisis has passed and the State has begun to come to its feet, a new problem has surfaced: the ‘aid’ package has not stopped. Just last month the US announced that it would send another $20 million worth of corn and maize to Malawi. This corn and maize is sourced from Kansas and Iowa where farmers produce to vast excesses, with an additional subsidy estimated to be in the range of between $5-10 billion of American tax-payers’ money.

The food entering Malawi is causing a glut in a potentially good harvest year, and squeezing out local farmers, who cannot find any market for their produce. The result is that many are likely to see their produce destroyed without an opportunity to get a fair price for it. The medium term ramification is that the farmers are unlikely to earn the necessary cash to buy seeds to plant for next year’s crop and thus a gradual cycle of dependence is being formed.

The imposed compulsion to spend the attractive food aid packages on American produce is ensuring handsome rewards for farmers in Iowa and Wyoming with an additional boon for American shipping: it has begun to spell doom for indigenous African farmers. In addition there is evidence that some of the ‘in kind’ donation being sent to many African countries, is being delivered for sale at market prices to US based NGOs like Save the Children and World Vision, to generate cash to support the work of the organisations themselves.

Of course the notion of subsidizing farm produce is not exclusively an American preserve. Europe, with its Brussels funded programme of subsidies ensures adequate ‘protection’ for its farmers through a series of regulations and tariffs that keep cheaper African farm produce out of the European Union. Thus despite the constant rhetoric of the importance of free trade and the oft-heard criticism of other States’ (i.e. non US and EU) protectionist measures, in this, the fulfilling of the most basic of human needs, the powerful ensure that they and theirs come off best. Sometimes, as in the case of situations of particularly acute shortfalls this largesse is well received, but at other times, it feels very much as if the rest of the world is required to sit captive at the feet of the wealthy States, waiting to pounce on unwanted or carelessly thrown morsels that may fall to the ground.

The international regime for human rights has for long been overtly concerned with the plight of the individual and her/his civil and political rights. Yet as we have seen in the more than five decades that have passed since the passage of the Universal Declaration for Human Rights (1948) to be able to truly address the human rights of every global citizen, we have to see their rights as being both indivisible and collective. While the human rights regime has begun to become more active on economic and social rights, it is still to take on unequal world trade regimes with any sustained rigour. As this important example in Malawi demonstrates, this is a vital necessity to prevent the escalation of global inequality. As for Gift Horses and Mouths – well food aid risks being one gift where the pleasure and subsequent rewards are truly, all in the Giving.

1st June 2007

For a more detailed look at the situation in Malawi see the Guardian Newspapers Food Monthly Magazine or join in the debate entitled ‘Does Food Aid Do More Harm than Good? On www.observer.co.uk/blog.