THE HUNGER
SHOW
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If you want to know
about hunger, then go to Mieso. Some Villages had a total failure during the
last harvest. They are really in trouble. Pictures of hunger on TV-Screens come
from there. Most of the journalist go to that area, and the president has been
there too - for a couple of hours.
…
The weather was not
favourable. Is he happy about the rain now? ‘the rain is good for our oxen. In
one week time there will be grass again. Otherwise it is of no use for us’.A
neighbour: ‘ We get 14 kilos per head and month. We eat since months the same
food. But the worst thing is, that we couldn’t sow this funny maize
fromoverseas . It is sterile.’
…
Aliye’s neighbour complains:
Without seeds they are dependent on aid supplies permanently. Alye Mumed …
‘Look at my field! It is ploughed, it is prepared. Now I cloud begin to sow!
May be, I have some chance this time’.
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Grain, that is supplied
to Ethiopia as food aid is due to many reasons not germinable. … The Ethiopian
government is aware of the seeds problem, but it a makes a business out of it.
It has launched an agricultural package programme, in which it sells to the
farmers seed and fertilizers on loan. But the package doesn’t help the farmers,
who are really suffering. They become dependent not only due to the repayments,
but also because of the seeds. These are highly developed hybrid seeds from the
American firm Pioneer Bred International, which promises rich harvest for one
season. It cannot reproduce itself and it must be bought every year.
…
The 3500 m² lake Tana
scheins under the sun light. The Blue Nile originates here. The surrounding
areas show dense settlements. One has a good view from an airplane, that the
small farms witness how the farmers use any farm space.
… Debre Tabor lies 100
km from Bahr Dar. Klaus Feldner works here. The agricultural expert, working
for the German technical Cooperation firm (GTZ), supervises the ‘Integrated Food
Securing South-Gondar’. His region is also, according to official statements,
described as strongly under hunger emergency. The bearded German shakes his head in disbelief,
after he studied the numbers and statistics of the forecasted catastrophe. ‘Again
a number of districts are declared as non-food secure. During my seven-years
stay here, I have never experienced that even a single district has been
removed from the statistics. The status remains unchanged, irrelevant of,
whethergood or bad harvest years. Here, in the villages there are individual
families, that face emergencies. But it is not the whole village.’ Feldner is
confident, that Ethiopia could not only feed itself, but could also export
food. The potential
of this country is gigantic.’
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South-Gondar is
Feldner’s last project and his “first success”, according to his words: The
cereal Triticale, a crossing of wheat and rye. Feldner brought Triticale to Ethiopia in
the 90s, after it has been cultured in the South African University of Stellenbosch
in two variation that are suitable to tropical situations, after prior tries of
the Ethiopian government in introducing other Triticale-breeds were failures.
In the meantime, the seed with the long awns is spreading rapidly among the small fields of the Amharic farmers,
independently of the GTZ- efforts. In
order to evaluate Feldner’s Masterpiece, even some Ethiopian Ministers and
Ambassadors of EU-States have journeyed the long way from Addis Ababa to Debre
Tabor.
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Anger on the ‘white
collar’ aid workers
The brawny 60-years-old man has
to go through unorthodox ways for this success: … he smuggled the seed and
equipment to Ethiopia. He is often in quarrels with the Ethiopian Orthodox
church, because it forbids the strictly worshipping Farmers in the highlands
working on their fields on uncountable religious holidays.
… Feldner criticizes
that the development aid in Ethiopia is increasingly being more an academic
practice. There is a steady increase of highly qualified scientists, with
neck-ties and shirts that are populating the desks in the capital city as
consultants. ‘There is lack of people who could take a plough in their hands’
says Feldner.
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He criticizes the World
Food Programme for its double standards. He considers it as a government friendly,
in addition, it pursues its own interests, which is not perceived by the world
community. ‘If there is no
hunger catastrophes, the WFP could no more finance its gigantic organisation.’
They get money for each distributed ton of food. Therefore, they are highly
interested, to exaggerate crisis situations. Ethiopia, South Sudan and
Bageladesh have been in the last decades, the continuously flowingsource of money for the
WFP.’
The government doesn’t
tolerate any critics
… Bekele … ‘we must
enble our farmers to feed themselves’… ‘The task of the aid agencies shall not
be, to bring bread to the people. The helpers should enable them to bake it
themselves. In the last 20 years, huge amount of aid money has been squandered.
This must end.’ Many aid agencies aggravate the problem, which they are
supposed to solve. This is due to the fact that their functionaries draw the
justification for their existence from the Organising of food aid, says the
government official. A huge accusation – that is shared by the
umbrella-association of the
catholic aid organisation in Ethiopia, with 141 members. They believe that in
the meantime, one-third of the 325 registerdaid agencies in Ethiopia, are busy
exclusively in distributing food aid. “Sustainable development” and “Help for
Self-help“, as we
know them from big talks and study papers remain with out any
attention.
Bekele reports about
enormous food surpluses, that are produced in different parts of Ethiopia. The
last record harvest was in 2001. Neither the people who are facing shortages,
nor the farmers that produce the surpluses are gaining any profit. On the one
hand, due to lack of marketing system, on the other side, due to food aid
imports - also during years of good harvests. Twenty to 40% of the yearly
imports of, on the average,800 000 tons of grains supplies, land in the markets
of the towns and villages for give-away prices. No farmer can compete with this
dumping prices. In many areas no cerealis cultivated. Instead, Chat is flourishing in large areas
in East Ethiopia.
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In their
publicdeclaration and conferences, government representativesin Addis Ababa
always affirm, that one must depart from food aid. But instead, the aid
industry is being controlled much perfectly. For the currently governing party
EPRDF, a party that governs Ethiopia alone and a party with a wide network of firms,
food aid is not an emergency solution, but a blessing.
… Big trade and
transportation firms, that distribute food aid in the country and which are
owned by the government party, earn about 150 [US] dollars from each ton of food
aid. Depending on the magnitude of the proclaimedemergency situation,
three-digit millions flow into the coffers of the party. In addition, the party
applies food aid as rewarding means, in order to secure the loyalty of its
supporters.
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Due to his
participation in the student protests of 2001 one of the prominent opponents of
Ethiopia, the Economist Berhanu Nega, has been jailed. … The small, agile guy …
comes to the point: ‘Is drought followed by a hunger catastrophe? Of course
not. It has structural causes. For example, the fact that the state owns the
whole land. Private initiatives, for instance in irrigation systems or new
production methods remain neglected. Our farmers produce applying wooden ploughs, as it is the
case since 3000 years. The average farmer produces on one hectare land, and
this is the case for 85% of the 65 million Ethiopians.’
… Nega… goes on:
‘our Government doesn’t want to change anything, it wants neither the
privatisation of land, nor strategies for industrialization. Why? Maybe,
because it can hold to power only in this manner. It has already lost its
supporters in urban centers.’ Foreign food aid, believes Nega, does not
contribute to solve this problem, it rather cements it. The donor countries and
aid agencies should focus their
attention on the democratisation of Ethiopia. ‘
Sustainable development can only come from within.’
All TV-Teams shot the
same pictures
… Although the EU has
participated in the preparation of the forecast on the looming drought
catastrophe, the statistics is seen critically – as far as no one is quoted by
his name. “The number are therefore note quite reliable. “
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Two dozen teams,
comprising of employees of the government, the UN and aid agencies, upon whose
work the statistics is based, have estimated the situation in November 2002, in
a haphazard manner. Finally, while preparing the report, the responsible people
stroke a deal concerning the millions, who are going to be hungry. The report
is after all an expression of the fight-for-a-bigger share of the yearly allocated aid.
… Since months waves of
aid is rolling for the hungry in Southern Africa. In order not to be forgotten,
dramatic numbers are required.
Representatives of the Ethiopian
government and of WFP pleaded to confront the world community with much higher
number of the hungry, the people of the EU want lower numbers. “Some how, an
agreement is reached”, says one insider.
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The word Ethiopia is a reliable
means of pressurizing financially stronggovernments, because many people still
remember the hunger catastrophe of 1984/85. … ‘Then, the Ethiopian government
and the world community have allowed, that tens of thousands in the North of
the country had to die of hunger. The indescribable death could be experienced
so closely on the TV. These pictures were a shock, and Ethiopia plays
this card regularly. And it is also easier for the
aid agencies to mobilize the public with the symbol Ethiopia.”
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[In 2000] Once more the WFP
has worked on the publicity and has invited TV-Teams, whose pictures had the
right impact. BBC, Reuters, CNN – the big guns of the industry reported.
“Ethiopia 2000” became a
fast-selling item . … ‚ Every thing happened only in the small place Gode in Ogaden.
But the TV-Pictures were so intense, that one has the
impression, that the whole Ethiopia is sinking in hunger again. Almost all
TV-Teams shot their pictures in Gode, the same pictures of hunger and they
had same interviewpartners. This single case was projectedfor the whole
country. It was the talk of ten millions that are hungry’. This exaggeration
was too far even to WFP-head Catherine Bertini. But her statement, ‘ this is
not a hunger catastrophe,’ was not heard by any one.
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The climax of the this
year’s hunger catastrophe is forecasted by the Ethiopian government and by the
spokesman of the WEF in Addis Ababa, for the months April and May. They urge
for speed. Until then, many millions of dollars and food aid must have flown
into the country.
And no one would
criticize them, they had not warned earlier.