After following a link on twitter I was directed to this article by Christopher Hart writing for the Mail online which is actually a very thought provoking piece. In it he discusses the view of Dambisa Moyo. Ms Moyo is Zambian born and here family still live there now. She is also holds a Doctorate in economics from Oxford and a Masters from Harvard. To add further gravity she spent several years working for the World Bank and is now head of research and strategy for a sub-Saharan African Bank. This is one of the many observations she makes about aid in Africa.
Imagine there’s an African mosquito-net maker who manufactures 500 nets a week. He employs ten people, and this being Africa, each of those employees supports as many as 15 relatives on his modest but steady salary. Some 150 people therefore depend on this thriving little cottage industry, producing a much-needed, low-cost commodity for local people.
Then, Moyo writes: ‘Enter vociferous Hollywood movie star who rallies the masses and goads Western governments to collect and send 100,000 mosquito nets to the afflicted region, at a cost of a million dollars. The nets arrive and a “good” deed is done.’
The result? The local business promptly goes bust. Why buy one when they’re handing them out for free? Ten more people are unemployed, and 150 people are without means of support.
She goes on to say:
And that’s not all. In a year or so, those nets will have sustained wear and tear, and will need either mending or replacing. But the local net-maker is no longer around.
So now those previously independent and self-sufficient Africans have to go begging the West for more aid. Intervention has actually destroyed a small part of Africa’s economy, as well as its spirit of enterprise. Thus aid reduces its recipients to beggary in two easy moves.
Go and read the whole piece. It really is thought provoking stuff.
