American Aid Robs Africa of its future
I have seen the Big Blue Screen of Death in Las Vegas, in fast food joints, at airports, in banks, on hotel TVs, almost everywhere. The one seen here in the photo right is at the Toys'R'Us store at Times Square, New York. If the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's program to help Africa is anything like Windows then we can expect the continent one day to go into a Big Blue Screen of Death.
Why is it that entertainers, celebrities, billionaires, and world leaders think they know what is best for Africa? Instead of knee-jerk handouts of food and money, what Africa sorely needs is for everyone just to stop helping; they're killing the patient. In a previous article of mine, For Gods Sake - Stop Helping Africa, I begged everyone to stop sending money and food to Africa altogether; not because I want Africans to suffer, but quite the opposite, because all the good intentions are misguided and actually cause more suffering.
Now we learn from Sunday's New York Post that Kenya is home to the largest slum in Africa and happens to have the highest number of aid workers per capita (1). Coincidence? No, it is directly related. The more we help Africa - the worse we make Africa.
For example, just last Wednesday it was announced that the University of Florida Received a Gates Foundation Grant to Help Fight Malaria Worldwide (2). Sounds good, eh? Well, if they keep the research focused on scientific matters then the moneys will be well spent. But if instead they focus on policies to control the disease in Africa then it is not only a waste of money but to the extent they interfere in Africa they make the situation worse.
Let me give you an example of how Americans waste money on Africa: In the past malaria was fought by distributing free mosquito nets, which by the time they finally reached an African village wound up costing between ten and sixty dollars. As good-intentioned as this seems, all we have done is spend a fortune killing the possibility of a local entrepreneur from operating a business spraying homes with an insecticide that will keep them mosquito-free for six months at about $2 a family (3). We wasted money on the quick fix instead of creating jobs and inspiring a self-sustaining culture.
Feeding Starving Children Does Not Help Africa
The problem of course is that celebrities love those photos of starving children if only to show that they care. But feeding starving children does not help Africa - it only makes for more starving children. Less glamorous and seemingly callous would be to ignore the children and simply build more roads. Not aid but infrastructure. Building roads would make it easier for local farmers to bring their produce to market and thus encourage more local production of food. Simply sending in food, although it makes for a compassionate headline: "Hollywood Celebrities feed the starving Children!" in fact discourages local farming and consigns that area of Africa to perpetual dependence on foreign food aid and results directly in more starving children.
How can a local farmer stay in business when all his customers are getting free food? All the years of free food, with all its good intentions, has made Africa a basket-case where once it was the food basket for the world.
But roads take time while children are starving and no one wants to take a picture next to a shovel inaugurating a road project when it is oh so cute to be photographed with an African baby, swollen tummy and all.
It is unfortunate that many Christian groups think they are doing God's Work by sending food and money to Africa. They are not. They are doing the Devil's Work. After all the "help" they have been giving for more than half a century, there is more misery, more suffering, more hunger, more disease and incredibly more deaths than before they stuck their nose in God's Business. Stop it already. Have any of you a smidgen of human decency?
ENDNOTES
(1):
The New York Post, 15 Mar 2009, GIVING 'TIL IT HURTS FIGHTING THE FOLLY OF UNFETTERED AID TO AFRICA
In the past 60 years, more than $1 trillion dollars in aid has been funneled to Africa, and the continent has only grown poorer and more corrupt.
Moyo, a Harvard-educated economist and author of the controversial new book, "Dead Aid: Why Aid is Not Working and How There is a Better Way for Africa," says it's all because of a simple truth: Western donations to Africa don't help Africa.
"The billions of dollars in aid sent from wealthy countries have not achieved their basic goal of helping to reduce poverty or increase growth," said Moyo. "That couldn't be more clear."
(2):
University of Florida Foundation, Inc., 11 Mar 2009, UF RECEIVES GATES FOUNDATION GRANT TO HELP FIGHT MALARIA WORLDWIDE
In wealthy countries, the war against malaria was won nearly half a century ago, but the disease continues to afflict communities in the developing world. Now the University of Florida (UF) is doing what it can to help fight malaria. UF announced today that it has received a $1.5 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to develop modeling tools for malaria elimination. This is the first time a UF researcher has been awarded a direct grant from the foundation.
David L. Smith, associate director of disease ecology at UF’s Emerging Pathogens Institute and an associate professor in the zoology department, will lead work on the new project. Smith’s previous research has focused on policy-oriented science related to malaria outbreaks, spread and management.
(3):
The American, 3 Jul 2007, Africans to Bono: 'For God's sake please stop!'
We can fight malaria by distributing free mosquito nets, which may cost $10-$60 each by the time you get them down often impassable dirt roads. Or, as Shikwati suggests, we can train locals how to operate a business spraying homes with an insecticide that will keep them mosquito-free for six months at about $2 a family.
We can spend billions importing medication, or you can invest in local farms that grow the Artemisinin, a Chinese herb with potent anti-malarial properties, and the factories that process it.
We can continue the endless cycle of need and dependency, or you can create jobs, develop indigenous capacity, and build a sustainable future.
Aid not only crowds out local entrepreneurship, it makes governments lazy and deprives countries of the incentive to build effective institutions. Public revenue derived from taxes makes governments directly responsible to their citizens. Free money builds white elephants and bloated bureaucracies, it being far easier to create new government jobs than implement policies to fight unemployment, especially when someone else is footing the bill.
The perverse result is that many of Africa's best and brightest become bureaucrats or NGO workers when they should be scientists or entrepreneurs. Which is why some are wondering: why not just take the aid money and invest in local business?
