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Ethiopia
struggles with 'green' hunger |
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 August
12,2008 - They call it the green hunger.
Four-foot cornstalks sprout from rain-soaked earth, and wind billows
fields of teff, the staple Ethiopian grain. Goats and cattle are getting
fat on lush grasses - but the children are still dying.
"It's strange to see hunger when everything is so green,"
said Wariso Shete, 26, a southern Ethiopia farmer who recently buried
his 3-year-old son. "But there is no food. The boy just starved."
Once again, images of emaciated children are emerging from this Horn
of Africa nation, rekindling memories of the 1984 famine that killed
nearly 1 million people. This time Ethiopia has been grappling with
a double whammy: drought in its traditional breadbasket and a global
food crisis that has pushed prices sky high.
Although recent rains and an influx of humanitarian aid have experts
cautiously predicting the crisis might be stabilizing, nearly 10 million
Ethiopians will need emergency assistance to survive until the harvest
in September.
Green hungers are just one of the oddities in Ethiopia's decades-long
struggle to feed itself. The country, considered the water tower of
East Africa because its highlands are the primary source of the Nile,
suffers chronic drought. It is Africa's second-largest corn producer,
but still requires hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign aid
every year.
An exploding population is one cause. Others point to a socialist-leaning
government that's been slow to embrace market-based policies. And
everyone agrees that international donors spend too little - less
than 5 percent of all aid - on long-term development, such as irrigation,
to correct underlying problems.
In an interview, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi emphasized that the current
crisis masks dramatic progress.
"This emergency is occurring in an environment of spectacular
success in agriculture," he said. "The vast majority of
farmers have never had it so good."
Agriculture production is growing by 10 percent a year, he said, and
as recently as 2006, Ethiopia grew so much corn that it exported surplus
to Sudan.
National pride might explain why the government initially seemed to
downplay the drought, accusing the United Nations of exaggerating
the number of malnourished children. Meles's exasperation with those
who portray Ethiopia as desperate and needy was evident.
"I'm telling those people to go to hell," he said. "Ethiopians
are not hapless. They are not helpless. We are making a real dent
in poverty."
One big problem is population growth. Ethiopia, with an estimated
80 million people, has doubled since the mid-1980s. About 40,000 babies
are born a week.
Simply put, the nation, in which 85 percent of people are small farmers,
has reached a point where it can't easily grow enough food to meet
its needs. Although agricultural production has increased overall,
it has declined per capita, according to the World Bank.
Even in a year without drought or crisis, one in 10 people rely on
international food aid to survive. More than 400 children die every
day from malnutrition. Ethiopia is one of the few African nations
with its own factory for Plumpy'nut, a peanut-based paste used to
remedy acute malnutrition.
"We have not moved far enough away from the poverty line for
us to have enough cushion," Meles said. "One unexpected
weather event can push us over the precipice."
Some praise Ethiopia's government for its antipoverty campaigns, which
have reduced child mortality by 40 percent. New roads have fostered
nationwide trade, helping agricultural markets stabilize. The government
allocates about 17 percent of its budget to agricultural development,
nearly three times as much as its African neighbors.
But Ethiopia's state-dominated economy is also blamed for the persistent
food shortages. The government controls all major industries, and
there is no private ownership of land.
Under pressure from Western donors, Meles, a onetime Marxist who says
he now welcomes a free market, has opened the window to private enterprise,
most notably allowing private flower farms to export to Europe. But
economists are skeptical.
"They talk about free market, but you don't see it," said
economist Befekadu Degefe, a government critic. "They see the
private sector as a threat, as competition, so they try to eliminate
it."
"The government hand is still a little too heavy," said
Glenn Anders, USAID's mission director in Ethiopia. "They look
more to the Chinese model." (Los Angeles Times)
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