Delusions will not make poverty history

Contents: #AidPrograms">Massive aid programs have not ended African poverty, #WarsAndGenocide">Wars and genocide in Africa, #PopulationGrowth">Population growth ignored, #LandGrab">Problems compounded by wealthier nations' land grabs, #Botswana" id="Botswana">Botswana, with its stable population, a model to follow?, #FurtherAid">Can further aid programs solve poverty if population is not stabilised?. It is 25 years since Ethiopia's globally publicised famine and Bob Geldof's famous 'Feed The World' campaign. In 2005 world leaders and celebrities, stirred again by the plight of Africa, pledged to increase taxpayers' support and cancel debts. Now the aid bucket is rattling again, as east Africa endures its worst hunger crisis in eight years. Will it make any difference? #AidPrograms" id="AidPrograms">Massive aid programs have not ended African poverty Africa has had more than ten times the Marshall Aid given to Europe since the Second World War - a trillion dollars, or $5,000 for every African alive today. Yet many African countries are poorer now than in the 1980s. The UN has admitted that it won't meet its Millennium Development Goals in Africa but fails to explain the underlying causes for pessimism. Commentators point out that Africa has had more than ten times the Marshall Aid given to Europe since the Second World War - a trillion dollars, or $5,000 for every African alive today. Yet many African countries are poorer now than in the 1980s. Half of Africa's 700 million people live on 40p a day or less. Nigeria has squandered much of its oil wealth and Zimbabwe has moved from a relatively prosperous country to the brink of collapse. ... for every dollar the West lent Africa between 1970 and 2000, eighty cents was recycled back to off-shore bank accounts by African elites, while the World Bank estimated in 2004 that 40 per cent of the world's aid budget was going on paying consultants. We read that for every dollar the West lent Africa between 1970 and 2000, eighty cents was recycled back to off-shore bank accounts by African elites, while the World Bank estimated in 2004 that 40 per cent of the world's aid budget was going on paying consultants. #WarsAndGenocide" id="WarsAndGenocide">Wars and genocide in Africa Much of the continent has staggered from one bloody turf war to the next, whether genocide in Rwanda and Sudan, chopping off arms and legs of children in Sierra Leone or shoot outs in the Congo over control of mineral wealth. It is a testament to the resilience of African people that they manage to pick up their lives and carry on. Now, more and more have Europe in their sights, seeking a better life. #PopulationGrowth" id="PopulationGrowth">Population growth ignored Yet one huge issue is largely ignored. In 1950 the population of Ethiopia was just 16 million. By 2005 it had increased to nearly 78 million and is forecast to increase a further 80 million over the next 25 years, confounding the media image of people starving to death, though this is also true. The country already has massive unemployment and not enough food. How will it provide all the schools, jobs, hospitals and food to feed a population that is set to double in size? Across Africa, similar facts unfold. UN estimates point out that worldwide food production needs to double by 2020 to feed an estimated global population heading well over eight billion. Nowhere is that pressure felt more keenly than Africa. ... over 80 per cent of Africa's cultivated soils are seriously degraded and risk 'permanent failure' because the rapid increase in population has forced farmers to grow crops on the same fields rather than leave land fallow The director of Food Security at the Rockefeller Foundation, Gary Toenniessen, warned that over 80 per cent of Africa's cultivated soils are seriously degraded and risk 'permanent failure' because the rapid increase in population has forced farmers to grow crops on the same fields rather than leave land fallow. Even fertiliser no longer helps. #LandGrab" id="LandGrab">Problems compounded by wealthier nations' land grabs Lured by cheap labor and untapped potential, desert countries with rapidly rising populations, such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait are snapping up farmland in underdeveloped African nations to grow crops for consumption back home. Amid this crisis, some of the world's richest nations are coming to Africa to farm. Lured by cheap labor and untapped potential, desert countries with rapidly rising populations, such as Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait are snapping up farmland in underdeveloped African nations to grow crops for consumption back home. The Emirates government recently signed a deal in Sudan for up to 70,000 acres south of Khartoum. In June 2008, the depth of environmental devastation across Africa was revealed for the first time by the United Nations Environment Program. Using satellite photos, taken over four decades, geographers constructed an atlas of environmental change. It reveals an image of destruction on a vast scale - of disappearing forests, shrinking lakes, vanishing glaciers and degraded landscapes. The fact that the Blair/Brown Africa Commission report said almost nothing in its 177 pages about the need to tackle demographic pressures while giving £8 billion of UK taxpayers' money to the continent is astonishing. In mid-2007, sub-Saharan Africa had 788m people, but will soar to 1.8 billion by 2050 according to the UN's 2006 population projections. Rapid population growth will fatally jeopardise Africa's development efforts. The large number of young Africans - 2 out of 3 people are under 25 - and persistent high fertility levels imply that high population growth will continue despite the Aids epidemic. In mid-2007, sub-Saharan Africa had 788m people, but will soar to 1.8 billion by 2050 according to the UN's 2006 population projections. #Obstruction" id="Obstruction">Obstruction of population control programs may cause population to exceed even UN projections However, all this assumes a decrease in the continent's birth rate to 2.5 children on average, against an average 5.5 today. This rapid decline in fertility levels is far from guaranteed given the lack of recognition of the population issue by both the UN and aid agencies. A population of well over 2 billion in the region by 2050 is plausible if a major food crisis doesn't cause mass starvation first. In its latest 2008 report, the UN admits that its population projections for Africa will likely be subject to future upward revisions if fertility fails to decline. In March 2008 Nigeria's Catholic dominated Anambra State made it illegal to encourage the use of condoms and other forms of contraceptives. This in a country of 148 million people, set to double by 2050, where the average birth rate is 6 children per woman and its demand on resources is 40% greater than its bio-capacity. More than 3.9 percent of the adult population also have HIV/AIDS, and the rate is rising by around 300,000 a year, according to a 2006 estimate by the UN programme UNAIDS. Despite the International Conference on Population and Development's call for universal access to reproductive health in 1994, reproductive health and population was omitted from the UN's Millennium Development Goals and remains neglected. #Botswana" id="Botswana">Botswana, with its stable population, a model to follow? Botswana is highlighted as a model by the Africa Commission, a country with one of the highest AIDS rates in Africa. It says: "Thirty years ago Botswana was one of the poorest and most aid-dependent countries in the world. Today the landlocked nation is one of Africa's biggest success stories. It has undergone consistent economic growth and is now classified as a 'middle-income' country. But Botswana has diamonds. Look across the continent and it is often precisely those countries with the greatest amounts of mineral riches that are in most trouble. But Botswana bucks the trend...Yet its diamond industry employs only about two per cent of the country's small population." Perhaps the lesson is that better governance and a population of just 1.8 million has helped to spread prosperity further - a point the Commission seems to miss. #FurtherAid" id="FurtherAid">Can further aid programs solve poverty if population is not stabilised? In late 2007, seven major international aid organisations announced a multimillion-dollar Global Water Initiative to tackle declining supplies of fresh water for the world's poorest people in 13 countries – all but four in Africa. In these same countries, the US-based Population Reference Bureau predicts that between 2005 and 2050, populations will rise from: 13.9 million to 39.5 million in Burkina Faso; 77.4 - 170.2m in Ethiopia; 22- 47.3m in Ghana; 33.8 - 64.8m in Kenya; 13.5 – 42m in Mali; 14.0 - 50.2m in Niger; 11.7 - 23.1m in Senegal; 36.5 - 71.4m in Tanzania; and an astonishing 26.9 - 130.9m in Uganda. The industrialised nations have promised millions of dollars of taxpayers' money to help Africa tackle AIDS, yet rarely do we ask the complex reasons why nearly two-thirds of the world's 60 million AIDS victims are African – the sexual promiscuity of many adult relationships, prostitution and poverty. AIDS is a tragedy, but unless the huge population growth on the continent is also tackled, spending millions on AIDS prevention will see ever more Africans facing a life of unemployment, poverty and starvation. With many of the world's poorest countries already suffering huge unemployment and some of the highest birth rates, the potential for fuelling instability, extremism and a global tide of migration will present new security challenges for the world, says CIA Director Michael Hayden. The UN predicts that to keep up with a rapidly expanding global population, one billion new jobs need to be created over the next decade just to maintain current employment levels. With many of the world's poorest countries already suffering huge unemployment and some of the highest birth rates, the potential for fuelling instability, extremism and a global tide of migration will present new security challenges for the world, says CIA Director Michael Hayden. With unconscious irony, the Africa Commission says: "We have done our best to be blisteringly honest," quoting an old African Proverb: "Not to know is bad. Not to wish to know is worse." Unless a real world effort is made to help Africans challenge bad governance, devastating turf wars, corruption and a population explosion, there is no chance of 'making poverty history.'