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Why Foreign Aid Is Hurting Africa

Harry Guerrilla

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Why Foreign Aid Is Hurting Africa - WSJ.com
MARCH 21, 2009

A month ago I visited Kibera, the largest slum in Africa. This suburb of Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, is home to more than one million people, who eke out a living in an area of about one square mile -- roughly 75% the size of New York's Central Park. It is a sea of aluminum and cardboard shacks that forgotten families call home. The idea of a slum conjures up an image of children playing amidst piles of garbage, with no running water and the rank, rife stench of sewage. Kibera does not disappoint.


Giving alms to Africa remains one of the biggest ideas of our time -- millions march for it, governments are judged by it, celebrities proselytize the need for it. Calls for more aid to Africa are growing louder, with advocates pushing for doubling the roughly $50 billion of international assistance that already goes to Africa each year.

Yet evidence overwhelmingly demonstrates that aid to Africa has made the poor poorer, and the growth slower. The insidious aid culture has left African countries more debt-laden, more inflation-prone, more vulnerable to the vagaries of the currency markets and more unattractive to higher-quality investment. It's increased the risk of civil conflict and unrest (the fact that over 60% of sub-Saharan Africa's population is under the age of 24 with few economic prospects is a cause for worry). Aid is an unmitigated political, economic and humanitarian disaster.

Over the past 60 years at least $1 trillion of development-related aid has been transferred from rich countries to Africa. Yet real per-capita income today is lower than it was in the 1970s, and more than 50% of the population -- over 350 million people -- live on less than a dollar a day, a figure that has nearly doubled in two decades.

Governments need to attract more foreign direct investment by creating attractive tax structures and reducing the red tape and complex regulations for businesses. African nations should also focus on increasing trade; China is one promising partner. And Western countries can help by cutting off the cycle of giving something for nothing. It's time for a change.

I have been thinking this for quite some time although I think most charity should also be removed to help reign in the populations of Africa.

What do you think?
 
Yeah. Isn't that the point of foreign aid?

Only point I disagree with is the idea that charity should be reduced, or that the population needs to be reduced. Africa does not suffer from overpopulation. It suffers from blighted economies, criminal governments, and constant international meddling. Feeding and medicating the poor in Africa is not part of the problem-- it's sending food and medicine that will be stolen by the aforementioned criminal governments.
 
Yeah. Isn't that the point of foreign aid?

Only point I disagree with is the idea that charity should be reduced, or that the population needs to be reduced. Africa does not suffer from overpopulation. It suffers from blighted economies, criminal governments, and constant international meddling. Feeding and medicating the poor in Africa is not part of the problem-- it's sending food and medicine that will be stolen by the aforementioned criminal governments.

I agree but at the same time when the poor are being fed, what do they do after that?

They have no jobs or anything productive to do except screw each other, creating more little aid packages.

It may be cold but since it takes time for strong economies to develop what else is left?
 
Yeah, but ain't much you can do for work if you're hungry. Need a full belly to do anything useful with your back or your brain.

There aren't going to be any jobs until people are doing something useful to create them.

As for "cold"... I'm no humanitarian. I don't even particularly care whether or not Africa's "problem" ever gets solved. I just can't think of a single instance where population controls have ever been good for an economy, developing or otherwise. Where you see mouths to feed, I see consumers.
 
I agree but at the same time when the poor are being fed, what do they do after that?

They have no jobs or anything productive to do except screw each other, creating more little aid packages.

It may be cold but since it takes time for strong economies to develop what else is left?

It's tough when compassion and common sense are at odds, isn't it? My heart goes out to those kids we see on TV with flies on their faces and fat bellies from starvation. Yet my common sense tells me that many have been born into societies that are incapable of sustaining them. So yes, we save one little girl today, and fifteen years from now we need to save her two or three children. And so it goes...

:(
 
Yeah, but ain't much you can do for work if you're hungry. Need a full belly to do anything useful with your back or your brain.

There aren't going to be any jobs until people are doing something useful to create them.

As for "cold"... I'm no humanitarian. I don't even particularly care whether or not Africa's "problem" ever gets solved. I just can't think of a single instance where population controls have ever been good for an economy, developing or otherwise. Where you see mouths to feed, I see consumers.

I don't really infer them as positive population controls as I do think they are more natural.

If they and the environment can't sustain themselves the population should fall to something sustainable until real economic development can be established.
 
I have been thinking this for quite some time although I think most charity should also be removed to help reign in the populations of Africa.

What do you think?

I think you may be right. It's an ugly image when you think of starving children who didn't create the mess, but the following statement really sums it all up:

They have no jobs or anything productive to do except screw each other, creating more little aid packages.

Perhaps cutting off all aid will force them to migrate elsewhere, or stand up and revolt.
 
I think you may be right. It's an ugly image when you think of starving children who didn't create the mess, but the following statement really sums it all up:

Politically I try to be amoral or strictly follow the rules of stoic justice.
It is hard to say that people should die so that others may live.

We have tried the opposite and it isn't working.

Perhaps cutting off all aid will force them to migrate elsewhere, or stand up and revolt.

The most likely result will be mass starvation (thats already happening though) and a lot of people who don't have sickle cell trait dieing of malaria.

There is no where to really migrate except South Africa and The northern coastal countries.
 
It depends where and how the foreign aid is spent. I agree that a lot of that money is wasted. Money spent in Somalia or Zimbabwe is basically just disappearing into a black hole, because almost none of it gets to the people who need it.

Similarly, giving money to African nations to fight AIDS is the fashionable thing to do...but in many parts of Africa, there are much more deadly (but less sexy) diseases that ravage the country, such as influenza and tuberculosis.

So I wouldn't say that we need to eliminate all foreign aid. I just think that we should bypass most of their national governments and give it directly to charities, and we need to target it more to the needs of individual countries instead of thinking of "Africa" as a monolithic entity.
 
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It depends where and how the foreign aid is spent. I agree that a lot of that money is wasted. Money spent in Somalia or Zimbabwe is basically just disappearing into a black hole, because almost none of it gets to the people who need it.

Similarly, giving money to African nations to fight AIDS is the fashionable thing to do...but in many parts of Africa, there are much more deadly (but less sexy) diseases that ravage the country, such as influenza and tuberculosis.

So I wouldn't say that we need to eliminate all foreign aid. I just think that we should bypass most of their national governments and give it directly to charities, and we need to target it more to the needs of individual countries instead of thinking of "Africa" as a monolithic entity.

I would try that approach before eliminating aid.

I may work a lot better than way.

The locals must do something though to ramp their economy up otherwise we are still spending money for people to just do nothing and have more kids they can't feed.
 
If I were dictator of the world, I'd relocate all the people from Africa and make it one big game reserve. But I'm not.

;)
 
I have been thinking this for quite some time although I think most charity should also be removed to help reign in the populations of Africa.

What do you think?

I've come to a similar conclusion about two years ago. The problem with African Aid is that it does not promote the type of help Africa needs. For instance, the West donates huge amounts of food to alleviate malnutrition. This has the effect on completely decimating prices thus destroying any economic growth in the agricultural sector. So Africans stop farming because they can't make a living on it it. So less food is locally produced. You can see where this ends up. Coupled with lack of reproductive health choices causes land to be split into smaller and smaller plots of land and growing families, families slip further into poverty. Small farms can be alleviated somewhat with fertilizers, proper planting techniques and special seeds, but those are way out of the price ranges for these people.

Second, aid generally doesn't do clinical economics as Jeffery Sachs likes to call it. It's a one size fits all for the most part. Medical and food. Remember that virtually every country on the planet built its economy on the foundation of its agriculture. By denying African countries a stable agricultural base the options for successful development are quite sad. What we see today is African development based off of mineral wealth. But mineral wealth results in a form of dutch diease, something most countries, developed and developing are poor at managing. For instance, what does Nigeria export? Hydrocarbons. Can you think of anything else? Mineral wealth can only get you so far and in a continent notorious for incompetent dictators, we won't likely be seeing a South Korean model of taking profits from mineral wealth and using them to expand industries for long term future growth.

Third, and this is something many people don't quite seem to understand is that development aid can all go up in smoke in places like Africa. Kenya was a perfect example of where civil strife that is based in a tribal context can turn what was considered the Jewel of developing Africa into a literal **** storm. We need to break Africa of the tribal system if it is to truly develop. Or we will see civil conflicts on tribal tensions cause development and foreign aid gains to disappear.

There is one area of foreign aid that we should be promoting, even throttling up. Eradication of Aids and Malaria. The impact of those on the economies of African nations is immense. Huge portions of the workforce are completely eliminated, huge amounts of education and work hours lost. If we could eliminate those two, Africa could develop exponentially. Even if we solve nothing else, eliminating those two would do Africa wonders.
 
It depends where and how the foreign aid is spent. I agree that a lot of that money is wasted. Money spent in Somalia or Zimbabwe is basically just disappearing into a black hole, because almost none of it gets to the people who need it.

Similarly, giving money to African nations to fight AIDS is the fashionable thing to do...but in many parts of Africa, there are much more deadly (but less sexy) diseases that ravage the country, such as influenza and tuberculosis.

That is not entirely true. Africa is one hell of a big place and has many different problems depending on location.

AIDs is a HUGE problem in certain countries, mostly in Sub Saharan Africa, where as in others it is not the main problem. In the west we barely have infection rates that go over 0.1 to 0.5% of the population, but it is estimated that in some African countries the HIV infection rate up to 20+% of the adult population. Now I know it is very hard to get accurate numbers, however if these estimates are even remotely true, then the impact on the population is devastating. In places like Uganda, Botswana and other Sub Saharan countries with high infection rates, the local economy and social fabric has been devestated due to the HIV spread and death rates.

Unlike in the west, being infected with HIV in Africa is a death sentence pretty much. When the adults die, they leave uninfected children or even worse, infected children. So soon you have whole generations being taken out by mass deaths due to AIDs, and this creates huge problems for the economies of said nations, in the short and medium turn.

Plus people hit with HIV die more than often from things like influenza and other "normal sicknesses" because that their immune systems are compromised.

So I wouldn't say that we need to eliminate all foreign aid. I just think that we should bypass most of their national governments and give it directly to charities, and we need to target it more to the needs of individual countries instead of thinking of "Africa" as a monolithic entity.

Well that would depend on the country. But most aid does go to specific projects and not in a "lump sum" to governments. As for giving to charities.. well I am sceptical of that too. There are just as many "scam" charities out there that exploit the situation for their own personal need. May it be financial, political or religious.

To me the government run or international accepted charities (Red Cross, UNICEF and so on) are the best way of doing it, as long as the government run systems are not used to promote a political ideology over common sense. If they are, then they are no better than the religious based charities that only use the plight of Africa to spread the "good word" (regardless of religion) and that in turn contributes to the instability of the region....
 
Microfinancing seems like Africa's best shot at developing some industries. That and proper water management for farming. If Israel could do it, why not Africa? Zimbabwe, once Mugabe finally croaks or falls to an assassin, seems like a great place to try and influence positively for agricultural growth. They were producing a food surplus before their dictator came along, and Morgan Tsvangrai (however you spell it) seems nice and sane as a potential new leader.
 
There is a very good debate on this on Intelligence Squared - Home you can get the podcast on itunes.

Its a complex subject but i think there is no doubt some aid is based on people making themselves feel good than actually helping people.
 
Africa does not suffer from overpopulation.

Not as a whole perhaps, but in cultivated areas it may. Typically farming land is split up between the sons in a family. As population has increased the land clearly hasn't. Thus smaller and smaller plots of land are being forced to support growing populations. The white farms of Africa operated on economies of scale and thus didn't have to divide up crops merely to survive. Mugabe's land "reform" put Zimbabwe into the same system as the rest of Africa. Reducing populations on plots of land would help the problem. Instead of a small plot of land supporting two adults and six children which will then be divided into three plots of land between the three sons, the same size plot of land would support two adults, one son, and one daughter. The land then gets inherited by the one son, no division. As the son doesn't use up all of the crops, he sells some and sends his kids to school. Dividing the plots among growing populations strips them of their profits. No profits = No education. No education is the death of a country.
 
Not as a whole perhaps, but in cultivated areas it may. Typically farming land is split up between the sons in a family. As population has increased the land clearly hasn't. Thus smaller and smaller plots of land are being forced to support growing populations. The white farms of Africa operated on economies of scale and thus didn't have to divide up crops merely to survive. Mugabe's land "reform" put Zimbabwe into the same system as the rest of Africa. Reducing populations on plots of land would help the problem. Instead of a small plot of land supporting two adults and six children which will then be divided into three plots of land between the three sons, the same size plot of land would support two adults, one son, and one daughter. The land then gets inherited by the one son, no division. As the son doesn't use up all of the crops, he sells some and sends his kids to school. Dividing the plots among growing populations strips them of their profits. No profits = No education. No education is the death of a country.

What astounds me is that there are primitive methods of doing things that they don't use.

Water filtration, food preservation etc. What aren't these aid organizations do anything to teach them some amount of self preservation.
 
What astounds me is that there are primitive methods of doing things that they don't use.

Water filtration, food preservation etc. What aren't these aid organizations do anything to teach them some amount of self preservation.

The aid organizations to me always seem like they are merely there to stop the current hemorrhaging, not fix the problem to prevent future hemorrhaging. Dafur for example. The aid organizations there are to help prevent or slow disease and starvation. They aren't seriously actively trying stop the fundamental reason why people are suffering from diease and starvation: the civil war. True they are lobbying governments, but they aren't toppling the government.

To be accurate those, some organizations are providing water filtration through new technologies like simple UV sanitation.
 
That is not entirely true. Africa is one hell of a big place and has many different problems depending on location.

AIDs is a HUGE problem in certain countries, mostly in Sub Saharan Africa, where as in others it is not the main problem. In the west we barely have infection rates that go over 0.1 to 0.5% of the population, but it is estimated that in some African countries the HIV infection rate up to 20+% of the adult population. Now I know it is very hard to get accurate numbers, however if these estimates are even remotely true, then the impact on the population is devastating. In places like Uganda, Botswana and other Sub Saharan countries with high infection rates, the local economy and social fabric has been devestated due to the HIV spread and death rates.

Unlike in the west, being infected with HIV in Africa is a death sentence pretty much. When the adults die, they leave uninfected children or even worse, infected children. So soon you have whole generations being taken out by mass deaths due to AIDs, and this creates huge problems for the economies of said nations, in the short and medium turn.

I'm not saying that there aren't a lot of parts of Africa that have been devastated by HIV...just that that isn't true everywhere. For example, in West Africa and Central Africa, the countries are virtually flooded with aid money to fight HIV that most of them don't need...yet they don't get nearly as much money to address things that actually *are* a problem in their country, such as contaminated drinking water.

PeteEU said:
Plus people hit with HIV die more than often from things like influenza and other "normal sicknesses" because that their immune systems are compromised.

True...but those "normal sicknesses" are a much bigger problem than HIV in many parts of Africa.

PeteEU said:
Well that would depend on the country. But most aid does go to specific projects and not in a "lump sum" to governments. As for giving to charities.. well I am sceptical of that too. There are just as many "scam" charities out there that exploit the situation for their own personal need. May it be financial, political or religious.

This is true, but most charities are not like that. There are plenty of charities to help Africa that are very reliable and honest...unfortunately the same cannot be said of African governments. I can count the number of reliable and honest African governments on one hand.

PeteEU said:
To me the government run or international accepted charities (Red Cross, UNICEF and so on) are the best way of doing it, as long as the government run systems are not used to promote a political ideology over common sense. If they are, then they are no better than the religious based charities that only use the plight of Africa to spread the "good word" (regardless of religion) and that in turn contributes to the instability of the region....

I don't even really have a problem with charities telling people about their political/religious beliefs, as long as receiving the aid isn't conditional on acceptance of those beliefs, and as long as the beliefs they are promoting aren't actively harming the communities (such as Catholic charities misleading people about condoms). If some charity just wants to tell people about Jesus while they're handing out food, I really don't mind that.

However, your point about ideology infecting the foreign aid process is well taken. In that aspect, I think many Western nations could learn from China. China seems to have developed a system of economic aid that isn't conditional on accepting any ideologies...and it seems to be working quite well. China's only interest is finding business partners, not promoting human rights, and it actually seems to be doing more to promote human rights than a lot of Western aid does.
 
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The aid organizations to me always seem like they are merely there to stop the current hemorrhaging, not fix the problem to prevent future hemorrhaging. Dafur for example. The aid organizations there are to help prevent or slow disease and starvation. They aren't seriously actively trying stop the fundamental reason why people are suffering from diease and starvation: the civil war. True they are lobbying governments, but they aren't toppling the government.

To be accurate those, some organizations are providing water filtration through new technologies like simple UV sanitation.

That is a serious problem, it makes me rethink any notion I have of donating to an African charity.

They need to help fix it and not band aid it.

Using materials available would be a much wiser option in my opinion.

A hollow stick, a piece of charcoal, some sand and grass, then you assemble it and you have a crude but effective water filter.

Using to much technology in an non technological world has a short term life.
 
That is a serious problem, it makes me rethink any notion I have of donating to an African charity.

I suppose, but it is a good cause to help stop the bleeding as if we cannot stop that the entire cause is doomed. What I won't support is donating to a cause that helps an area that has tribal tensions that aren't being addressed. When all of the good work can evaporate literally overnight due to tribal tensions, what long term good is there?

They need to help fix it and not band aid it.

It's a bit of both. Stop the bleeding while fixing the underlying problem.

Using materials available would be a much wiser option in my opinion.

This is how Sachs views it. Give villages the tools they need, rudimentary electricity, transportation and sanitation and they'll take care of themselves.

Using to much technology in an non technological world has a short term life.

Africa isn't that backward.
 
I suppose, but it is a good cause to help stop the bleeding as if we cannot stop that the entire cause is doomed. What I won't support is donating to a cause that helps an area that has tribal tensions that aren't being addressed. When all of the good work can evaporate literally overnight due to tribal tensions, what long term good is there?

I would love to start a charity to deal with issues like that.
I don't believe in messing with people that are usually described as natives though.

The people who are already successful with their less technological society.

It's a bit of both. Stop the bleeding while fixing the underlying problem.

If a larger majority were taught how to slow many of their own problems then it could lead to advances in their communities I think.

This is how Sachs views it. Give villages the tools they need, rudimentary electricity, transportation and sanitation and they'll take care of themselves.

I agree for the most part. Depending on where it is I may exclude electricity and motorized transportation.

Overall that is exactly what needs to happen.

Africa isn't that backward.

I'd say some parts are mainly because no one can afford to maintain those things when aid workers leave.
 
I agree for the most part. Depending on where it is I may exclude electricity and motorized transportation.

Well, kids need electricity at night to study. And motorized transportation is often required to bring their crops to market. One truck for the whole village is sufficent.

I'd say some parts are mainly because no one can afford to maintain those things when aid workers leave.

Hence why in the process of aid, it's development. Cutting food aid would allow prices to rise allowing viable agriculture and thus revenue streams to maintain the technology. Many African nations while supporting Obama were very worried about his stance on Free Trade as much of their agriculture exports went to the US.
 
Well, kids need electricity at night to study. And motorized transportation is often required to bring their crops to market. One truck for the whole village is sufficent.

I think I'd start slowly, instead opting for the basics before we got to formal education. Of course that is only working with one village at a time.

In place of a truck which requires maintenance to, I think I'd opt for draft animals.

Goats and cows can do the same thing albeit slower. Plus they provide the benefit of food and milk.

I'm into primitive skills as a personal hobby, so as much as it is a benefit to their survival it would just be fun to me.

Hence why in the process of aid, it's development. Cutting food aid would allow prices to rise allowing viable agriculture and thus revenue streams to maintain the technology. Many African nations while supporting Obama were very worried about his stance on Free Trade as much of their agriculture exports went to the US.

They have to really start with some sort of internal sufficiency before they should think of exports, that would bring in money but you want to make sure that the money is going to the people actually doing the work.
 
I think I'd start slowly, instead opting for the basics before we got to formal education. Of course that is only working with one village at a time.

Well, if a country doesn't have formal schooling for their kids, it's hard to produce the educated stock to develop. It doesn't need to go beyond 6 grade equivalent.

In place of a truck which requires maintenance to, I think I'd opt for draft animals.

I think that depends where they are. If they are 20 miles out of Nairobi, it's probably fine for a truck. If you're in the boonies well away from any city, then an animal is a better choice.

Goats and cows can do the same thing albeit slower. Plus they provide the benefit of food and milk.

Speaking of which, I think the charities which provide livestock are excellent ideas. $10 for a pair of Geese which find their own food and reproduce quickly into a flock. Good idea. $500 for a cow which produces milk and can breed more cows? Good idea. Charity cash and food never help development. Livestock can form a basis for agricultural development.

They have to really start with some sort of internal sufficiency before they should think of exports, that would bring in money but you want to make sure that the money is going to the people actually doing the work.

I suppose, but restoring the agricultural market will cause a lot more people go back into farming which solves that problem. And it's not just exports, but a farmer taking his crop and selling it in the cities. Communication like a village cell phone is great for this as it maximizes their profits by selling when prices are high.
 
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