Please Explain African Aid to me

All I ever hear about these issues is about how much money nations should give them.

What do they do with the aid money?

Obviously hunger is an issue.

Im in the agriculture business. You know what I have?

Enough grain to feed thousands of people that I cant sell because the markets absolutely suck. Why doesnt the government kill 2 birds with 1 stone.

SHUT OFF the agriculture payments and programs. What farmers need is cash, not surveys and statistics about how poor they are. Spend that government money on actual product that you can ship.

Think of how many lives would be helped. Farmers here make some cash and people in other countries get to eat instead of crooked governments hording aid cash.

Set the world straight.
Source

I for one hate it when celebrities get involved in issues like this. Sure its great that they care, but they dont always have the right idea.

Earlier this week, Blair failed to win over Bush to the idea of doubling African aid to $50 billion by 2015. The U.S. did agree to provide $674 million into an immediate African famine relief initiative, but that's far less than the anti-poverty push the British leader envisions.

They G-8 leaders will be facing intense pressure from the public, fortified by a heavy dose of celebrity endorsements for global debt reduction.

Movie star Brad Pitt, rocker Bono and Canadian pop singer Sarah McLachlan signed ads calling on Goodale to pressure the G-8 to drop the debt of poor countries. And that's just part of a global campaign that will culminate in a series of rock concerts around the world, focusing attention on third world debt during the G-8 summit.

Now please, explain it to me if I have it wrong.

The way I see it from your idea is that western farmers get more money and the people of Africa get food to eat, seems good to me.
However this is simply a bandage on a decent sized wound, we need long term solutions to the problem along with short term relief.
The main problems in Africa are: corruption, lack of infrastrucuture and decent agriculture

Link

* We need to build up and in many places create workable infrastructure that the people of Africa can use to better their lives, the use of local labour should be looked into both as a way of getting funds to the local workers and as a way of getting Africans involved.
* We should stop simply throwing money at the issue, we should focus on the short term relief of the starving and the sick but we should also focus on the long term issues of agriculture, healthcare and education.
* We need to deal with the corrupt leaders of Africa through political and financial boycotting of their funds, the people of Africa deserve better and its our responsibility to see that they are led by people who want to help their people rather than use them as a source of income.
* Through the UN (United Nations) we need to spread peaceful democracy through Africa, the people of Africa deserve to elect leaders that they want not what the vote riggers want. The UN needs to set up fair and free elections that are free of corruption and vote rigging.

I think I mentioned my thoughts on another thread but I put them on my site as well, its not a indepth solution but a basis of maybe what we should work towards.

African Aid ? Got this in an email this morning...

Mathematically Challenged: "[The US] is next to last in the share of national income it gives -- 16 cents of each $100. On average, major European nations give more than twice as much -- 36 cents of each $100."

That's The New York Times, manipulating statistics just a tad, since the U.S. (you the taxpayer) gives 25 cents of every dollar going to Africa. ++ This week's Left Media Buster Award: "Headline in yesterday's New York Times: 'U.S. Challenged to Increase Aid to Africa' which topped a piece by reporter Celia Dugger. The article states that the European Union has 'agreed unanimously...to almost double assistance to poor countries over the next five years. Japan this week reaffirmed its pledge to double aid to Africa in just three years.' All this in the run-up to British Prime Minister Tony Blair's visit to Washington this week at which he 'hopes to shake loose more American aid for Africa.' Way, way, WAY down in the ninth paragraph we read that the 'United States has tripled aid to Africa to $3.2 billion since Mr. Bush took office.' ." --Rich Galen

***********************

The 'United States has tripled aid to Africa to $3.2 billion since Mr. Bush took office.

So .. take the 3.2 billion in TAX money Americans give up to support Africa.
And the 9 billion in TAX money Americans will be giving up to use on African
HIV research... And all the private donations that Americans give to Africa
that aren't counted (heck .. Americans privately gave 4 billion in Tsunami
relief alone, a chunk of which went to Africa - believe it or not!)...

You'd think with all this coming in from America ... not to mention all the
$$$ coming from Europe, and the Peace Corp volunteers, and the church
volunteers, and the rest ... that some progress would be made in Africa.

So why does Africa still have hundreds of thousands of it's people in
Slavery, owned by other Africans? Why are people still hungry and
why are many people not getting health care and education?

CORRUPTION. It's gotta' be the age old answer.

Did you know that long time ago in the 1960s ad 70s Africa was very rich country speacilly in east African. Tanzania was one of the first countries to have electicity.

As for AID money i think its better use this money to build school and education facuility like they say learn the man to fish and he will ask you once

like they say learn the man to fish and he will ask you once

couldnt agree more, however it these days it seems more like....
"build a man a fire and hes warm for day, set him on fire and hes warm for rest of his life"

The money is not just for food, which is why the aid also comes in the form of investments into the country and building of infrastructure for future political and ecomic stability.

You do have a good idea though insofar as buying the food from farmers and giving it to Africa, but it would be better in the long run if we instead taught the Africans to farm so they could feed themselves.

It's pretty simple,

Tony Blair during the joint news conference with Bush at the White House suggest $25 Billion is required in African Aid. Bush low balls and suggest giving an extra 674 million dollars. After the world, and most importantly Bono reads the fine print, i'm sure that amount will be paid over the next 25 years. meaning nothing really gets solved anyways..

People have to die (NWO control) in order for global population to remain manageable/profitable...

[edit on 9-6-2005 by syntaxer]

Originally posted by Dulcimer
Im in the agriculture business. You know what I have?

Enough grain to feed thousands of people that I cant sell because the markets absolutely suck. Why doesnt the government kill 2 birds with 1 stone.

SHUT OFF the agriculture payments and programs. What farmers need is cash, not surveys and statistics about how poor they are. Spend that government money on actual product that you can ship.

They already do that.

www.grain.org...
The World Food Programme (WFP) is the biggest cog in the world’s food aid machinery. The US is by far the biggest single donor to the WFP, providing more than 60% of aid. But it insists on either donating foodstuffs or tying cash contributions to the purchase of US produce. This policy is part of a deliberate strategy to subsidise US agriculture and undermine its agricultural competitors. [8], [9] Giving aid in kind alleviates the symptoms of famine but perpetuates the causes.

A lot of the aid the US and other countries give actually go into buying US goods or it goes to pay for services from US companies.
There was a report done on it recently:
www.actionaidusa.org...

There is no lack of food in Africa, there is no lack of resources in Africa. the problems will not be solved by throwing money at the place, just as it hasn't worked in the past.

The problem is the people.

Its the tribalism that divides people
Its condoning viiolence to achieve ends
Its the corruption that destroys societies
Its the conflict between religious groups who cannot live in peace

Basically its the failed societies and corrupt and incompetent leadership that destroys Africa. Its corrupt from the bottom to the top, the corruption is endemic to the societies there. If you hcange the leaders you will still have the sme problem.

There are a few good countries in Africa, but they are the ones that have held on to the western models that founded them.

No amount of money will solve that until the psyche of the people is changed. Whats the chances of that happening? Minimal.

Originally posted by AceOfBase

Originally posted by Dulcimer
Im in the agriculture business. You know what I have?

Enough grain to feed thousands of people that I cant sell because the markets absolutely suck. Why doesnt the government kill 2 birds with 1 stone.

SHUT OFF the agriculture payments and programs. What farmers need is cash, not surveys and statistics about how poor they are. Spend that government money on actual product that you can ship.

They already do that.

www.grain.org...
The World Food Programme (WFP) is the biggest cog in the world’s food aid machinery. The US is by far the biggest single donor to the WFP, providing more than 60% of aid. But it insists on either donating foodstuffs or tying cash contributions to the purchase of US produce. This policy is part of a deliberate strategy to subsidise US agriculture and undermine its agricultural competitors. [8], [9] Giving aid in kind alleviates the symptoms of famine but perpetuates the causes.

A lot of the aid the US and other countries give actually go into buying US goods or it goes to pay for services from US companies.
There was a report done on it recently:
www.actionaidusa.org...

That is interesting, although I am in Canada. I remember during the tsunami aid they didnt want material goods, they wanted cash.

This is the problem in sending money. How is it spent? Do we really ever know?

I guess you really dont know how it is over there until you actually live or work over there.

Originally posted by Netchicken
There is no lack of food in Africa, there is no lack of resources in Africa. the problems will not be solved by throwing money at the place, just as it hasn't worked in the past.

The problem is the people.

Its the tribalism that divides people
Its condoning viiolence to achieve ends
Its the corruption that destroys societies
Its the conflict between religious groups who cannot live in peace

Basically its the failed societies and corrupt and incompetent leadership that destroys Africa. Its corrupt from the bottom to the top, the corruption is endemic to the societies there. If you hcange the leaders you will still have the sme problem.

There are a few good countries in Africa, but they are the ones that have held on to the western models that founded them.

No amount of money will solve that until the psyche of the people is changed. Whats the chances of that happening? Minimal.

Well I really there are some western countries that are heading this way as well... mine being one of them. we wont starve btu we will sure be struggling due to corruption and bad governing.

Netchicken................you tell the facts straight...........

add this little tidbit too.........

do you realize that a population is most liable to procreate at its highest rate when starving to death??

Believe it or not.......biological natural selection has hardwired humans to have their highest sex drive when they are starving............why?

Straving communicates a threat to survival to the body........the body's reaction is to increase hormones to act as a drive to help continue the species in the event of perceived death coming to that individual.......

You often see the most out of control population issues where food is most scarce...............this biological response contributes to the problem too......

I've read where the average African sexually active has sex with over 200 partners........and that many African men have 20 to 50 children to numerous women that are unaccounted for.........

How can you have a prosperous and functioning society with that kind of behavior and not expect to see the tradegty we see today?

Throwing money doesn't solve that..............

NetChicken, you are pretty right on with the problem. Also you know that something is wrong with some psyches over there when "witch" doctors are telling hiv infected men that they can get rid of it if they have sex with babies...there is just something really wrong going on over there with the way their minds are working...

Netchicken has it right, no need for me to repeat what he has said, but IMO the AIDS epedemic is natures way of "taking care of business"

Remember that scientist in Jurassic Park who said nature will always find a way??...well over-population, starvation, war, lack of fresh water and filth have pushed these Africans to the point of extinction and I think perhaps nature will take care of business if mankind does not.

Anyhow, money will not help cause it goes to the Fatcats, the military and the militias...Im sure almost none of it gets to poorest Africans.

Im sorry to say the Africans will have to help themselves....over the years HUNDREDS of BILLIONS of dollers have gone to Africa and theres nothing to show for it.

Maximu§