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AID exacerbates African poverty says African economist.
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
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I think she makes a good point in comparing what the west and China are doing in Africa. China invests in infrastructure partly enriching Africans but (non-emergency) aid simply keeps them in poverty and even has unintended negative consquences.
and in before wargh daily mail.
I think she makes a good point in comparing what the west and China are doing in Africa. China invests in infrastructure partly enriching Africans but (non-emergency) aid simply keeps them in poverty and even has unintended negative consquences.
and in before wargh daily mail.
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It's what looks like a potential jewel of information, conveyed by a poisonous rag.
It's one of the reasons why Fair Trade goods are often a better initiative - the whole 'give a man a fish' thing clearly makes sense; witness the Nobel prize winning work of micro-credit initiatives in Bangladesh, for example.
Oh, and Bono is a tax-dodging, self-serving cunt.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c86d4410-1a5f-11dc-8bf0-000b5df10621.html?nclick_check=1
Luckily there's been a move in fair trade over the last couple of years, originally you used to have the best paid people in a country were the unskilled coffee pickers, so the brighest and best would move to that rather than jobs such as engineers, architects, mechanics - which would have grown the economy. To be fair there does seem to have been a shift towards putting money into infrastructure rather than direct to the pickers.
However, the biggest problem is endemic corruption. Starting a business in many (albeit not all) African states (and not just Africa, Bangladesh and Nepal also spring to mind) often meant paying so many kickbacks to low level functionaries that any profit was wiped out, plus when you started it you had to pay plenty of cash to traffic peelers if you wanted to move your goods anywhere. So people didn't start business or employ anyone else or produce enough money to save and invest.
At a higher level the corruption stopped multi-national's investing in countries, the hassle just wasn't worth it; especially when places like South Korea were welcoming you with open arms. Without MNC's bringing in technology and expertise (and typically also paying much more than local businesses) companies were stagnating and relying on older, less efficient techniques.
Of course despite all the platitudes from Western Governments the best thing they could do would be to remove tarrifs, which wouldn't only be great for the Africans who can actually sell stuff without being slammed with hideous taxes, but great for the majority of us who could also stop being ripped of by European farmers gouging us for all we're worth. France would throw a strop though
Bono is on stage and calls for the audience to hush. Slowly he begins to clap his hands, whilst the rest of U2 stand silently behind him. Eventually he intones, "Each time I clap a child in Africa is dying."
To which someone from the front row calls, "Well, why don't you fucking well stop then?"
As for Bono's rant, I believe it's vital to view his words in context. The context being, of course, that Bono is a grade A cunt.
SG this is the type of unfounded blanket rational choice argument that typifies exactly what Mwenda is NOT arguing - as well as being both an horrendously generalised and dismissively racist statement (whether that was the intent or not).
No but again this is a point made by the author himself - he appears to be quite careful in distinguishing what specific type of aid he is looking at. I think you are right in the sense of how it is reported (e.g: Aid = bad) because the argument is far more complex than this.
Agreed - it's a process that will take time and I don't think will ever be 'perfected' - but it's certainly a better alternative than the ruinous 'structural adjustment' programmes.
True up to a point BUT I'd add the cavaet that it isn't so much corruption that is the problem, it is whether what is called corruption is conducive to good business. Self-evidently MNCs and their presence does not equal an increase in quality of life across the board.
Problem solved.
That sounds like a quote straight out of the mouth of Robert Mugabe.
I don't think a statement can reasonably be refuted on the grounds that someone undesirable could in theory have said it
If we cared enough to spend the minimal amount of money it would cost to give Africans clean water and give all of those with AIDS anti-retrovirals they could work themselves out of poverty reasonably quickly.