Micro-finance in the spotlight

For a few years now micro-finance has been held up as one of those ideal ways of combating poverty in the developing world. Essentially a system of small loans to people who wouldn't otherwise be able to get credit the idea is that it enables the poor to buy that shovel to help themselves dig themselves out of poverty.

But as Karl Marx once said "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach him how to fish and you miss a golden business opportunity."

So the companies that have been managing the micro-financing operations make their money by charging interest well over the odds and because the system works by lending to small groups it allows the company to put pressure on entire communities with weekly meetings monitoring what they're doing to repay the mini-loans despite that fact that many workers are paid yearly. That's right, it turns out that micro-finance is another word for loan shark but, and here's a sweet spot, they aren't regulated in the same way as money lenders.

Because the ideology behind micro-finance says that you beat poverty through enterprise it was held up uncritically as a success even before the schemes were operational.

What started out as an idea to alleviate poverty has become a way of getting the poorest into the kind of debt they hadn't been able to get into before, and that has a very real price - including a wave of suicides, like that of 16 year old student Lalitha Mursilmula who was told by the company she would have to become a sex worker in order to pay off her families debts. She ran home, wrote a note to her family and then drank a lethal concoction of fertiliser. The unethical behaviour of the micro-finance has deepened an already existing problem.

In India politicians have ordered people *not* to pay back their loans because of the social harm the industry is doing which in turn is leading to India's own little sub-prime crisis. It seems to me that the way to solve the problems of capitalism is not to find new and more ingenious ways of tightening capitalism's grip on the world.

CSR special: Ring-fencing NHS, schools and aid

There are a number of departments that the government has protected from themselves (which is obviously very merciful). To much headlines the NHS, schools and DfID are all areas where the Comprehensive Spending Review has not bitten... or did it?

The NHS budget is protected with an extra ten billion over the next four years, the schools budget retained and to much trumpeting aid is, in fact, increasing. However, this is not the whole story.

Many health campaigners are understandably confused at the way the coalition say the NHS is safe in their hands but they still seem force to fight to retain services and fight privatisation. roughly one in five trusts admit that they have closed down a major service or department in the last few months. The privatisation is ongoing Tory/Labour policy but why should services be closing down if the money's protected?

The answer is three fold. First of all the overall budget is ring-fenced, not individual services and the rise (of 2.5%) is actually less than the increase needed to preserve services. That means if the money is moved into one area it inevitably has to move away from another. The government is very keen on an extraordinary overhaul of the structures of the health services which, in itself will cost money that would have been spent on other services, leaving aside whether that reorganisation would be a good idea.

Secondly the capital expenditure is being reduced by 17% and there are twenty billion pounds worth of 'efficiency savings' already in the pipeline.

Thirdly, the increasing cost of drugs in particular (as well as additional strain of obesity and an aging population) mean that certain areas of spending are eating up more than their fair share of the cake.

Public sector union UNISON was very clear on how the ring-fencing will still mean cuts when they said that; "Patients and staff will soon see through the facade that the NHS is being ring-fenced, when at the same time it has been told to make £20bn worth of savings.

“The NHS is not safe. Some hospitals are already cutting back on vital life-improving operations such as cataract, hip and knee replacements. The NHS needs extra funding just to stand still. It will not be able to keep up with the demands of a growing elderly population and the cost of increasingly expensive treatments and drugs.

“The Government’s latest NHS “reforms” will intensify the market and introduce more private sector provision. They will cost £3bn to implement and create havoc and instability just when the NHS can least afford it.

“Staff are facing a two year pay freeze, many vacancies are being left unfilled, pensions are under review and the number of managers will be cut by 45%. Another Tory broken promise – the NHS is under siege – it is not being protected."

So what about schools?

Well, this is slightly different. Back to UNISON; “The coalition is being dishonest by saying that the schools budget will be boosted. Schools also get vital funding and support services from local authorities, which are being hit by drastic cuts. Many will struggle to afford to help schools support children with special needs, or run truancy units. Schools will have to dip into their own funds to pay for these essential services.

“Up and down the country schools support staff are facing losing their jobs. It all adds up to mean cuts will disproportionately hit on children with additional needs in schools.”

Essentially the 'schools budget' makes up only a portion of the total moneys that schools receive which is why specialist services, like one to one tuition are under threat. Local authorities, as we have already seen, are under a huge amount of financial pressure and it would unbelievable if their contribution to schools did not suffer.

Oh, and then there's the lost funding of the Building Schools for the Future programme which lost billions in investment for schools in dire need of refurbishment. In fact, after the fiasco of the handling of BSF scrapping (which turned out to be a hell of a lot more popular than Gove expected) it's arguable that it would have been impossible to take more out of schools than they already have.

Aid

Now, surely I should be overjoyed to hear the news that there will be a significant increase in the aid budget? 37% over four years looks pretty good, especially in the context of the cuts. Well, let's take a closer look first.

Tucked away in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office cuts it turns out that a number of their projects will now be delivered by DfID, how many and how much they will cost is left unanswered as yet. More importantly while the FCO is to "increase its focus on championing British companies to win export" they also account for a good portion of the increase in Official Development Assistance (ODA).

After all while other, much more useful, quangos went to the wall the Export Credit Guarantee Department who love the shady world of arms exports, etc, and all that entails.

I'm intrigued as to whether there will be any slippage between meeting the Millennium Development Goals and maintaining British financial interests. I should point out I'm not being artful here, it genuinely unclear so far - however - Section 2.97 in the Review states "British international development policy [to be] more focused on boosting economic growth and wealth creation".

Continuing my concern that the aid budget may be being used with an eye to British interests is that 2.97 continues that 30% of the ODA is to be used in conflict countries "with particular focus on Afghanistan and Pakistan". I'm really sorry to be cynical and I'm not down playing the fact that these two countries desperately need aid but for the British State to focus on areas where British troops are in conflict with the locals is not a coincidence.

Anyway, while an increase in the aid budget is always welcome we should ensure that aid should be used as aid not as an adjunct to business interests or the military effort.

While we're talking about DfID it's to be welcomed that a *new* quango overseeing how the money is to be spent has been set up however I'm concerned by the idea that DfID is to be a "leaner organisation with a focus on managing aid efficiently and effectively, by seriously reducing back office costs." Sorry to be picky but cutting admin costs does not automatically make you more efficient and effective.

Indeed DfId had already been streamlined under Labour and this had resulted in severe restrictions in the number of projects they could manage. The consequences of this is that aid will tend to be delivered either by the very biggest NGOs or consortiums of large NGOs.

Smaller international development organisations (of which there are many) already find it extremely difficult to work directly with DfID because they simply do not have the capacity to work with the small fry. The Coalition's proposals will simply deepen this trend driving small specialist NGOs out of business while heaping money on their super-sized cousins.

All in all what I'm trying to say is that it is not surprising that the Coalition have tried to win as many good headlines as they can amid the carnage - but ring-fencing services does not, in this case, mean that the future of those services are secure.

World poverty day

Today is World Poverty Day, an initiative to help raise the profile of international development issues during the General Election. I thought Vote Global's coverage of the Green Party Manifesto was interesting, but I was more interested in John Hilary's comments on development over aid.

He makes a telling point when he states that "we must resist any suggestion that aid is the lead issue when it comes to international development." Rather we need to be looking at our policies on trade and investment, the corruption of UK corporations in the developing world and arms exports. I think this is a very strong approach.

Bragging about raising the aid budget is like putting someone on the dole and then raising their unemployment benefit a little. You don't get to boast you're good to the poor when you've actually impoverished people.

The policies of unrestricted free trade, propping up friendly undemocratic regimes and bolstering the enormous power of oil companies, for example, are direct attacks on some of the most vulnerable and poorest people in the world.

Issues like debt are used to reinforce these failed international policies - but that is just one of the sticks we use to make sure that our ex-colonies know their place.

I know it's an old phrase but I'd find it difficult to support any party at this election that was not looking towards a truly "ethical foreign policy". That doesn't just mean natty soundbites and a small increase in the aid budget but a real reappraisal of the British government's approach to the rest of the world.

Taxing speculation Robin Hood stylee

It's nice to see the Tobin Tax doing the rounds again, this time re-branded as the Robin Hood Tax. Although, to be fair, the organisers claim it's not the same thing at all, because Tobin wanted a way to slow down the rate of international financial speculation and the Robin Hood-ites just wants to redistribute some of the proceeds.

This Robin Hood Tax is the very simple idea that by raising a tiny tax (a puny 0.05%) on bankers' speculative transactions we would raise a phenomenal amount of revenue which could be put to good uses - nurses, international development, and the like. The hundreds of billions a year this tax raised could do an enormous amount of good rather than simply feeding the fires of the financial casino.

Mark Thomas was ranting about this idea tonight on Radio Four, Patrick Harvie MSP is raising the idea in the Scottish Parliament and even the gorgeous Bill Nighy is on board.

I think the idea of a micro tax on speculation is perfectly winnable, although rather than see it as a purely revenue raising technique I'd like to see that money raised specifically for international development so it doesn't just go into the nuclear weapons pot or the tax breaks for the rich silo. But no one listens to me anyway, grumble, grumble.

The more popular we can make the idea of the redistribution of wealth and a sustainable economy the better. This campaign is definitely part of that.

The campaign video is rather enjoyable, although I'll be honest and confess that I'd listen to Bill Nighy read out the phone book and still be perfectly happy. Obviously this youtube clip has a better political message than the phone book and so is much more worthy of your time.



Hilarious update: It seems that Goldman Sachs may have been up to some dirty games if this report in the Guardian is anything to be believed.

Winston sticks it where the sun don't shine

This story is a bloody marvelous illustration of how, despite claims from some quarters, the internet revolution has not quite made it to even quite developed parts of the globe. A South African IT company based in Durban raced "an 11-month-old bird armed with a 4GB memory stick against the ADSL service from the country's biggest web firm, Telkom."

Guess who won! Winston, the aforementioned pigeon, took two hours to fly 60 miles with the stick whilst the file was only 4% of the way there. Frankly Winston could have walked the stick home and he'd have still won.

I only mention it because Winston has demonstrated with admirable clarity what I was arguing in the Morning Star in July that Africa is not witnessing "a new dawn of connectivity for the masses" despite the inflated claims about the new undersea cable that's just been hooked up.

It's also nice to see people use inventive media stunts to giving big companies the bird. That's a real feather in their cap! OK, I'll stop there.

Anyway, why take it from them when you can check out Winston's website and hear it straight from the pigeon's beak (check out the video, hilarious).

Tourism is anti-development

Your friend and mine Tony Blair has been arguing that tourism is the way out of Sierra Leone's troubles. Mr Blair wrote in the Guardian that;

"economic collapse and a decade-long civil war drove tourists away – many to neighbouring Gambia which now attracts more than 100,000 visitors a year, mostly Europeans in search of winter sun.

"But the fundamentals that made Sierra Leone an attractive destination remain strong: unspoilt beaches, beautiful tropical islands, world-class fishing and diving, and a rich cultural and historical legacy linked to its role in the slave trade and beyond."

The day after Aminatta Forna disagreed. She points out that;

On Blair's last few trips to the country he has never left the airport... But it is the madness of how modern aid is distributed and prioritised that, despite the billions spent by the international community, the country's infrastructure remains scarcely improved.

In 30 years every new leader - be they dictator or democratically elected president - has promised the economic miracle of tourism, the quick fix. It hasn't happened yet. For the Gambia, a small strip of country with few natural resources, tourism offered the only choice. Forget diamonds - Sierra Leone, with rich agricultural soils, has a better choice. Once a rice-exporting country, it is now a rice-importing country. Investment in agriculture is long-term, sustainable, and would benefit the entire country.

But nothing can happen without a working infrastructure.

Quite. For real development you need a real economy, but there's a deeper issue here about how tourism effects nations in the developing world. It creates an economic and political apartheid.

In many countries it creates entire swathes of a nation where the poor cannot go. Sometimes the poor are simply priced out by a parallel economic system, sometimes they are literally barred from entry by force. Tourism can also create an economic distortion that actually shifts people away from the long term work of building an economy that benefits everyone. As I wrote in January 2008;

"If people in the local area see that they can, potentially, make five times as much engaging in tourism rather than, say, agriculture or manufacturing the simple truth is that you are encouraging that area to develop the least sustainable, least useful part of their economy. Your friendly tour guide has made a very rational choice to try to groom tourists rather than doing something that might actually help build up long term resources."

In order to create safe zones for Westerners an overt militarisation takes place to keep out those whose living standards fall well below that of the wealthy visitors. The corrupting influence of corporations entrenches a staggering inequality.

A new resort in Sierra Leone would require helicopters priced highly enough to exclude 98% of Leoneans. A resort would mean beaches "unspoilt" by Africans, Hotels where the only locals in sight are taking out the bins and turning down the beds. Lastly it requires walls. High walls well manned with armed guards so that one patch of Sierra Leone excludes Africans just as surely as Fortress Europe and the USA.

Health care, electricity and policing are all improved for the tourists. But this comes to the detriment of improvements for the poor. I'm certainly not opposed to tourists per se, we should all have the opportunity travel, but I am opposed to gearing a poor economy towards prostituting itself to the Global North.

It makes sense to Blair who appreciates the benefits that living in a pampered parallel universe brings. For the millions living in grinding poverty tourism offers nothing because it closes off opportunities rather than creates them. Building infrastructure, economic regeneration and democracy has to be done for the benefit of all the people.

Crumbs in a time of crisis

Many are worried that with the economic crisis spending priorities across the world will be pulled away from much needed action. Climate change is the obvious example, but the international development "community" has similar concerns. Many of the richest countries in the world have struggled to live up to their commitments and the concern is that the world's poorest will be pushed off the agenda.

Speaking to the FT Salil Shetty, director of the UN Millennium Campaign, said "developing nations are estimated to be facing losses of at least $300bn to their economies up to 2010 as a result of the economic slowdown and are particularly vulnerable to global shocks... It’s a very ironic situation where people who cannot afford to have bank accounts are now facing the consequences of something they didn’t have anything to do with."

Without any economic cushion to protect them those who live at the very bottom of the economic pyramid are particularly susceptible to problems in the economic situation. The golden rule that says the poor will always pay the highest price for any recession goes double in the international context.

Shetty estimated that rich nations needed to contribute an additional $140 billion in aid annually up to 2010 to meet their existing commitments, “small change” compared to the hundreds of billions of dollars being spent on the bailout of western financial systems. Interestingly our own International Development Minister Douglas Alexander seems to be making some similar noises in this direction.

Alexander pointed to the global benefits of tackling absolute poverty in the developing world;

"Tackling this poverty will make a better world for all of us. Ignoring it risks storing up problems for the world's future – in the same way that sub-prime mortgages in the US stored up problems for the world's economies.

"In Doha this weekend representatives of donor nations and developing countries will come together to focus minds on the need to meet earlier spending commitments. The poorest people in the world want and deserve a commitment that goes beyond warm words. They rightly complain that all too often words are not matched by action. All nations represented in Doha should sign a statement of global solidarity – wealthy countries promising to provide the aid they have promised".

We'll have to see whether that happens or not - although far too often aid comes with conditions attached, conditions that suit the needs of international corporations seeking cheap labour or resources in the nations concerned but that do little to allow those nations to develop a sustainable and independent economic policy.

This post was partly a Follow up on something I wrote earlier

International aid makes you live with your mother

Well, according to the BBC it does. In one of their regular articles on why international aid makes everyone in Africa lazy this caught my eye;

While I was filming in Uganda, local newspaper editor Andrew Mwenda took me and my crew to his home village near the town of Port Loco in the west of the country. There he introduced us to two men, one in his sixties and one aged 26.

"This man represents the tragedy of aid," he said pointing to the older of the two. "While this man represents the potential of aid," he said indicating the younger man.

Mr Mwenda explained that the sexagenarian was the chairman of the local parish council who had spent most of his life living off aid money, supervising projects meant to benefit the community. Today he is an alcoholic who still lives with his mother.

The younger man started selling potatoes in the village square at the age of 17.

Less than 10 years later he owns the largest and busiest store in the village. He has not received one penny from aid, yet he has bought himself land and has built a house.

"So you see," Mr Mwenda said. "If aid were to offer this young man support in the form of low interest credit he could not only expand his business offering employment opportunities and a valuable service to his community, he could also eventually pay the money back."

Well I'm convinced, compare a sixty year old alcoholic with a twenty something entrepreneur and you have a convincing argument for letting the free market solve all the world's problems. I mean why can't the poor be more like the rich - then we'd all be driving round in BMWs!

Here's my alternative version, just for fun you understand.

Here we have two men. One who takes the bus, the other who rides a bicycle.

The bus user, a man with one leg, has spent his life waiting at chilly bus stops or sitting on the top deck now spends listless hours in solitary masturbation consumed with self loathing.

The cyclist on the other hand owns a chain of fashion boutiques without the aid of a single bus pass. Surely if we just cleared these buses out of the way it would make way for thousands more bicycling boutique owners to take our economy into the space age.

I might have something more serious to say about this later...

USAID playing politics with contraception

Has anyone else noticed this? The US government's international development arm, USAID, has banned aid for contraception and family planning advice in six African countries where Marie Stopes International (MSI) is the main (or only) provider of those services.

The US government has been examining the work of the UN and NGO's in China around family planning and the controversial one child per family policy. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte warned "During the course of our evaluation of UNFPA's work, we learned of other organizations that conduct activities in China. The relevant funding agencies are conducting a comprehensive analysis to determine what appropriate and lawful actions can be taken."

The US has claimed that UNFPA and MSI have taken part in forced abortions and other practices but MSI strenuously, and verifiably, deny this. Add to this that a US fact finding mission said that there was "no evidence that UNFPA has supported or participated in the management of a programme of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization in China."

Despite this Negroponte's "analysis" has led to the US withholding $34 million in aid from UNFPA under a Regan era amendment that, according to the Washington Times, "Only Republican administrations have enforced." This is much needed aid that is directly aimed at women's health and family planning in the developing world.

Dana Hovig, MSI chief executive said that "At a time when world governments have pledged to increase their commitment to improving the health of women, only the Bush Administration could find logic in the idea that they can somehow reduce abortion and promote choice for women in China by causing more abortion and gutting choice for women in Africa."

Whilst MSI receives no funding direct from USAID it does distribute USAID supplied contraceptives in Ghana, Malawi, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe. The current supplies will run out in two or three months and these six extremely poor countries have little option but to cease cooperation with MSI or see the aid dry up.

Since this announcement other African countries have also begun to refuse to work with MSI for fear of jeopardising much-needed US funding. The lesson's clear, work with the Chinese Government and the US will make life difficult for you.

International Development is likely to be an area where China and the US clash more and more as China begins to spread its wings in Africa and South America. Proxy battles like this are likely to become more frequent and the main loser will be the most vulnerable.

Green MEP Jean Lambert is a Member of the European Parliament's Working Group on Reproductive Health, HIV/Aids and Development. She said that;

"Marie Stopes International provides vital reproductive health clinics and in some countries they are responsible for delivering a large proportion of family planning services.

"This policy is extremely damaging for the women who rely on a regular supply of contraceptive goods, which are a vital tool in combating the spread of diseases such as HIV/Aids and protect those whose health may be at risk if they become pregnant.

"Punishing African women is not a means to lobby the Chinese Government to change their reproductive health practices. The US expresses concern about coercive abortion in China, yet this policy will leave many African women with predominantly unsafe abortions as their only option. This policy is anti-developmental, jeopardising women's health and reproductive rights."

Without a shred of evidence the US government has put at risk tens of thousands of African women and made the efforts of aid workers more perilous - all the while conducting fake posturing over the rights of women. I don't think we should give any credence to their claims that it's about rights in China when their own investigation showed that neither UNFPA nor MSI have been involved in dodgy practices.

This is about international, imperialist politics and it's the poor who are the first to suffer.

Blog Action Day: Poverty, aid and the collapse of capitalism

There may well be many bankers and financial gurus crying into their hand stitched, Saville Row hankies right at the moment but one of the over looked aspects of the current financial meltdown is the effect it will have on Western governments commitment to international development.

Aid budgets are likely to be hit hard as rich nations realign their priorities to shore up a convulsing market. Whilst these nations have the kinds of reserves that they can toss into black, economic pits in the hope that they will stem the slide towards meltdown developing nations have no such luxuries.


Surging food and fuel costs have hit the poorest in developing nations the hardest and it's at this moment that the global financial crisis has pushed them further down into desperation. As United Nations General Secretary Ban Ki-Moon said;

"The situation would be alarming enough if it were confined to a matter of hunger, but a wide-spread lack of food triggers other threats, from social unrest to environmental degradation.

"Even before prices started rising, 800 million people were going to sleep hungry every night. At the same time, the effects of climate change, including increased exposure to drought, more erratic rainfall and extreme weather events, threatened to confront millions more with malnutrition and water shortages. And now, with energy costs rising and the price of food having more than doubled in the past year alone, an additional 100 million people could be pushed into hunger and poverty."

So a global system that was failing the people of developing nations yesterday is upping the stakes in the most terrible way today. Jacques Diouf, the director general of the UNFAO ( United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation), has warned that despite record harvests in 2008 millions more will be going hungry this year than last.

"The great uncertainty now enveloping international markets and the threat of global recession may tempt countries towards protectionism and towards reassessing their commitments to international development aid... Borrowing, bank lending, official development aid, foreign direct investment and workers' remittances - all may be compromised by a deepening financial crisis.

"It is vital that this momentum be maintained... Unless political will and donor pledges are turned into real and immediate action, millions more may fall into deeper poverty and chronic hunger. The global financial crisis should not make us forget the food crisis. Agriculture needs urgent and sustained attention too to make hunger and rural poverty part of history,"

That is, whilst there is plenty of food and no shortage of hungry people the way we choose to distribute that food, capitalism, cannot deliver. We might see chief executives on the news but it is those at the bottom of the financial food chain, who were always closest to starvation, who are the invisible victims on the deepening crisis.

According to the World Bank;

"Sub-Saharan Africa already has seen some effect as a result of the crisis, according to Michael J. Fuchs, lead financial economist in the World Bank’s Africa Region. Stock markets in Africa’s larger economies – Nigeria, Kenya, and especially South Africa -- are mirroring those of developed markets, and international bond issues that were growing have slowed. The small size of African markets also means that even limited withdrawals could have significant impact."

In a global system no stone gets thrown in the pond without causing ripples, and when it's a big stone slap bang in the centre of the pond - those ripples will be felt where ever you are. The danger that the crisis in one sector creates a crisis in the next is clear to see right now, but as priorities shift small, inconsequential departments, like International Development, could well get squeezed as rich nations tighten their belts.

The UK's International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander said;

"There is a real risk that efforts to eradicate global poverty will be undermined by the global financial and commodity price crises... The World Bank is forecasting that a sharp deceleration in the growth rate of developing countries - from 6% to 4% - could have a similar impact to a recession. "

In our natural concern for our own economic well being let's not forget that we have the slack to accommodate financial ruin in a way that those who are closest to the edge have no hope of doing. Internationalism is more needed now than ever and it is up to us in the West to ensure our governments don't turn their backs on those commitments they made in more prosperous times.

This post is part of Blog Action Day: Various people have discussed the utility of action days like this one, like John Hilary and Benjamin Solah, but I've taken a vow of getting on with it so wont be discussing whether highlighting topics via days of blogging action are worthwhile or not.

Cartoons by the stupendous Steve Bell.

Dark Poppies, full of blood and poverty

The war in Afghanistan is not going well for anyone. Not for the Afghans (whichever side, or caught in the middle) and certainly not for the occupying forces who've recently had to admit that they don't trust the Afghans to run their own nation and they've had to scale down their military objectives.

Now that Afghanistan is the source for the majority of the world's heroin we're in a bind. We came to make the world free from terror (mission accomplished, natch) and whilst we were at it we'd make the Afghan's free from tyranny (they'll get back to us on that one I reckon).

The justification for our foreign fighters being in Afghanistan is the war on terror - but whilst we're there we may as well pursue the war on drugs and blame the Taliban for the increased drug production. Under quite what mandate we're doing this I've never quite worked out.

The US forces have hoped to spray chemical agents from the air in order to destroy the only livelihood Afghan farmers have. A charming guy called Chemical Bill is very keen on the idea but they're always getting knocked back. Possibly because the whole concept does not fit very easily with winning over the hearts and minds of the Afghan population.

Whilst we should give Western forces the credit for sticking to what they know - destroying economies - this is not a tactic that is likely to end up with an effective and democratic state at the end of it. You don't meet developmental goals in one of the poorest places on the planet by poisoning the soil.

It seems we can't even do what the Russians did in the seventies, namely build a functioning state which delivered some sort of benefit to the population - or what the Taliban did when they all but eradicated drug production in the areas they controlled. With British backed corruption (that appears to go right to the top) and a third of the Afghan police as drug addicts you've got an uphill struggle on your hands.

What I don't understand is why we don't try the obvious solution. Instead of setting ourselves against the interests of the Afghans why not work with them? Buy up the poppy and manufacture medicines. We get life saving drugs, they get a legitimate income with which they can begin to build decent lives from themselves.

Afghanistan would be a better place to live, they'd be less violence in the world and maybe, just maybe, we'd stop stoking the flames of hate that creates terrorism and religious fundamentalism. Where's the down side? That it's not politically expedient for "respectable" politicians to endorse buying opium perhaps? Maybe, although my concern is that, in fact, it's because the welfare of the Afghan people isn't even on their agenda. It just is not part of the plan.

The crisis is a gift to the Obama campaign who have led with criticism of the Bush strategy on Iraq and Afghanistan, describing the Afghan situation as a forgotten war. We can hope that a removal of Bushite foreign policy from the White House may mark some sort of shift in the region, although I suspect it might not.

Of course, if Sarah Palin were ever to get a say over Afghan policy Christ knows what would occur seeing as she doesn't even know where it is (which I think is pretty bad when she is fighting an election where Afghanistan is one of the major issues).

Whatever the disheartening short term prospects, it seems to me that there are things that we can do to meet the aims of rebuilding the country, giving some sort of empowerment to local people and easing up on the killing and destruction that does not seem to have served us particularly well up to this point. But those alternative strategies involve working with Afghan people with their interests at the top of our priorities, which is probably why I'm pessimistic about the chances of that happening any time soon.

Interesting link on winter '08 survey of Afghan opium farming.

Liberalisation over here and there

With deregulation very much on people's minds I thought now might be a good time to discuss the international consensus on the "liberalisation" of public services in the third world. By liberalisation I, of course, mean private companies delivering public services like water and electricity.

Whilst this is clearly a debate in regard to public utilities in the West, with some for and some against, there seems to be an unparalleled consensus when it comes to the governments of the developing world and their (in)ability to run public services without private help.

Partly this is historical. In the West there has been long term infrastructure investment so a break up usually involves pawning the family silver. In much of the third world this infrastructure is in a far more uneven state, and underfunded governments have difficulty finding the funds to roll out new pipelines (for example) to rural areas. Who better then than private companies to do it for them? After all 51 of the 100 largest economies in the world are corporations who are only too willing to make long term investments for long term returns.

A failing state whose government doesn't care one way or the other whether the people are well served is unlikely to be able to deliver essentials like a decent telecommunications network to the most isolated communities. So when it came to handing Tanzania's water provision over to a UK company no one was willing to argue that this wasn't going to work after all, they're the experts. Except it was a disaster (see previous).

The same argument applies there as it does here. Private companies provide these services in order to make a profit. So the service will be the minimum required and the cost will need to include the director's new private jet. You get less for more in an NHS hospital run by private finance - why would it be any different under an African sun?

The only real difference is that when private water companies stuff up over here it's just a case of more leaky pipes and higher bills - over there whole communities run dry. Whilst good financial management is obligatory - the aim has to be the human benefit in country not the benefit to rich Westerners.

The very point that makes liberalisation seem more acceptable in developing nations (weak, ineffective states) also means the ability of these states to regulate the behaviour of private companies is far, far lower than in the West - making accountability more important, not less. Plus the greater the liberalisation the weaker these states become until there is barely any democratic control over the way public utilities are run.

The free market dogma has meant that the very thing that undermines the ability for developing world states to become effective managers over essential services is seen as the thing that is the saviour of these services. This week President James Alix Michel of the Seychelles told the UN "developing countries are obliged to follow WTO rules to the letter, even to the extent that they may undermine domestic economic policies formulated to protect vulnerable sections of society... The Seychelles receives only 7 per cent of the revenue from tuna caught and shipped in its waters by foreign fishing vessels annually... This, to my mind, is unacceptable. I ask you, is it unreasonable to fight for a better share of the proceeds?”

But these nations are told that taxation of private profits might scare away investment. But when that investment is of no benefit to the nation what use is it anyway? In Bolivia the gas industry went for years without making any significant contribution to the national coffers, and the jobs it provided were almost entirely staffed by non-Bolivians - which meant it was only when the Morales government introduced proper taxation (under the misnomer nationalisation) did this significant industry begin to fund a program of reforms that have a direct impact on the lives of the poorest Bolivians.

Even the WTO admits that "There is no causal link between foreign investment and poverty reduction. 80% of FDI is in the form of mergers and acquisitions, little in the form of productive investment that creates jobs and exports."

During a largely unobjectionable speech this week WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy argued for "the reduction of barriers to trade in critical services, such as banking, energy, and environmental services". This whilst the rest of the world is arguing for an increase in regulation to the banking industry. So even when the tried and tested methods of modern capitalism are being rethought for the West the third world still gets the same old mantra about the state being a barrier to growth. That's because they see the world in a very particular way.

Lars Thunell of the World Bank's International Finance Corporation (IFC) let the cat out of the bag when he said in August that "We believe that providing clean water and sanitation services is a real business opportunity." Well, gee, now it seems inspiring, where as before it was just about saving lives - now I understand we can also make a profit - let's go for it!

But in practice, in places like Zambia, "the twin policy goals of ensuring commercial viability and meeting social objectives have been shown to be incompatible, if not contradictory, under the new system." The WTO says that "Water privatization, almost everywhere else that it has applied, has meant more expensive and lower quality water for poorer communities, or even, as in Puerto Rico, no water at all for the poor. (The rich in these places benefit from fine water.)"

Shripad Dharmadhikary talks about how "The [World] Bank's knowledge is frequently created by highly paid, often international, consultants, who have little knowledge of local conditions. The knowledge creation is mostly directed towards arriving at a pre-determined set of policies - privatisation and globalisation. This knowledge creation is often selective, in that information, evidence or experiences that do not support these pre-determined outcomes are ignored." In other words people in poor nations are disempowered by 'experts' in rich nations when it comes to running their own economy and essential services.

International mechanisms are used to bulldoze opposition rather than help build the infrastructure of poorer nations. So, for example, "the benefit of GATS [are seen as] as helping to overcome domestic resistance to change, to render domestic protest against privatization futile. It is time we examined whether this is really the appropriate tactic to raising living standards, or whether listening to the concerns of the poor is in fact necessary."

A bit of a trawl though the WTO archives revealed that even organisations responsible for this mess recognise that their past behaviour has not been entirely helpful. "In almost all countries that have undertaken rapid trade liberalisation, wage inequality has increased [seeing a] 20-30% fall in wages in some Latin American countries. Trade liberalization is negatively correlated with income growth among the poorest 40 per cent of the population, but positively correlated with income growth among higher income groups. In other words, it helps the rich get richer and the poor get poorer."

But whilst it's important to recognise that the market does not provide magical solutions we still aren't out of the problem that very poor countries often do not have the skills nor funds to invest in major infrastructure projects. Global envision express this idea most clearly when they said "The fact is that most developing-country markets are too small to support infant-industry promotion and their states are too weak, incompetent and corrupt to efficiently administer the complex instruments required. As for WTO rules, it makes sense for developing-country governments to voluntarily enter into commitments with other WTO members that bind in sensible policies (for example, to restrict subsidies and performance requirements), and provide external discipline against silly and harmful government intervention."

In other words, if you play by their rules you don't have real options. Without the ability to invest in upfront investment there is no way to avoid the inevitable corruption that comes from working with Western corporations. Alternatively you could substantially tax their profits to fund a better deal that takes you out of the indignity of waiting for aid packages that don't deliver and having political 'reform' foisted on you that is just a one sided set of rules that lock those nations into further dependency.

You don't build effective states by systematically undermining their ability to deliver the essential services that their populations demand. The ability to build functioning democracies relies upon the ability of local people to have direct control over their economy and public utilities. Sadly when international corporations end up running it all you end up with a bunch of very ill served consumers rather than empowered citizens.

Tanzania says bye to Biwater

In 2003 the Tanzanian government was put under immense pressure by the IMF and World Bank to privatise state run organisations in return for much needed debt relief. This included water and sewage services which were awarded to UK company Biwater, also known as City Water, with the financial support of the UK government "including £440,000 on a publicity campaign to highlight the benefits of private enterprise" 1.

Well, all did not work out as planned for Biwater and less than two years later they found their staff deported and their company seized by the state. It was one thing to force a liberalising contract onto a poor nation you have undue influence over it's quite another when the new water company simply cannot do its job.

Biwater's argument is familiar and essentially boils down to "a contract is a contract" and have demanded millions in compensation. What's so familiar about this is that it's always the government that has to keep to the contract and never the company. The company did not meet its contractual obligations, failed to run the capital's water systems properly, invested less than half the money it was obliged to in infrastructure and City Water went broke - the government rightly decided the contract was null and void.

Biwater were horrified that some tin pot government cared more for the people who'd be denied the right to water and sanitation than it did for some piece of paper they'd been forced to sign under duress, so they took them to the international court. Today that court ruled that the Tanzanian government was naughty but had nothing to pay. Good for them (for once).

In short Biwater were rubbish. Or, in the chairman's own words, there was ‘corporate failure all the way to Dorking’. They were unable to "perform" to the standard of their state owned predecessor, were bringing in less profit and water charges were higher. It would be one thing if this was a company producing luxury goods, but this is water and sanitation, essential to life - and they were screwing it all up whilst screwing the poorest down hardest.

Tanzania had no choice but to step in and take over the failing company. A government spokesman justified this saying "expropriating their property was like shooting a corpse - no harm done." Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch said “Biwater failed the people of Tanzania, yet it had the audacity to run to an international trade court to try to get millions of dollars off of its mismanaged scheme to profit from water, this is fitting justice.”

Earlier this year a "tribunal ordered City Water to pay £3m in damages to Tanzania, and £500,000 towards legal costs" but Biwater have refused to pay up insisting that City Water (the subsidiary company they set up for the deal) no longer existed and therefore could not be held accountable for any fine. Nice bit of having your cake and eat there. They mess up the water supply but instead of coffing up for the fine they insist they want compensation for having been put to the trouble of messing it all up. That's how business works I guess.

Tanzanian government lawyers however take a different view and say “The whole affair was the prescription of the World Bank. It will be fair that they should pay the government,” after all this is a poor nation having been stitched up by international institutions who have been proved wrong in their thesis that private companies are more effective than public ones in providing public services. Even the terms of the deal were explicitly in favour of the rich. According to WDM "98 per cent of the funds to support the water privatisation in Dar were to be spent in the areas where the richest 20 per cent of the population lived."

Even big international institutions are beginning to question whether the third world can cope with purely free market solutions to their problems. You can't expect a government to sit back and watch as the price of water rockets whilst the service deteriorates, but I guess that's why they always needed the financial strong arm tactics in the first place, to make sure that there was no place on Earth where Western corporations were not making money.

Corruption is the West's problem

Newsnight a couple of nights ago had a focus on African corruption and whilst I wasn't able to watch the entire report what I did see made me squirm a little. We had a series of (African) people who essentially seemed to be calling for the end of aid until the continent's corruption problem was sorted out.

I think this is rather a problematic view. Partly because it amounts to punishing the poor twice over, but also because it seems to ignore the very basic fact that Western companies, and to a lesser extent Western governments, actually contribute to this corruption and actively collude in it. With the current disparity in wealth the West is able to bend these governments to its avaricious will.

Prem Sikka points to the recent transparency international report (pdf), which demonstrates serious concerns over the willingness of Western governments to deal with corporations. "Behind the facade of mission and corporate social responsibility statements, companies and their executives seem only too willing to indulge in bribery, corruption and a variety of antisocial activities that affect the life chances of millions of citizens. The government's inertia provides positive encouragement."

Arms and oil companies are, of course, the worst offenders but it would be wrong for us to think that this is the only area where it is us that is the corrupt and anti-democratic partner. As Sikka says "Bribery and corruption destroy social fabric. Yet governments and regulators continue to see bribery and corruption through the prism of corporate interests and do little to inconvenience them."

You only have to look at this story from Paraguay where a US anti-corruption NGO has been found to be riddled with bribery, giving contracts to its "friends" and other assorted dodgy practices. The West assumes it has a moral superiority over Third World countries - but in a great number of cases it is the cause (direct or indirect) of the lack of democracy, and that's without bothering with some sort of unconvincing history lesson. We have the wealth to look respectable, but it does necessarily not make it so.

Having said that my usual note of caution is this, just because Western companies and governments are complicit in acts of corruption, anti-democratic activities and greed it does not mean that these vices are not to be found among the native population of the third world countries who, to state a rather banal truth, are just like us - it just means both sides are complicit. Dictators should face accountability for their crimes, as should their Western backers.

The racism seems quite tangible when we look at the case of Simon Mann. The British Press appears to be quite sad that this leader of an armed gang of mercenaries who were preparing to violently overthrow the government of Equatorial Guinea (supposedly with the nod from the US and other governments) has been given a hefty sentence.

The theme appears to be that these Africans don't understand you can't lock up a *white* man in some dirty prison over run with *black* men, and more than one report has suggested he could serve his time here. Why? If he was good enough to try to overthrow their government he can face their justice can't he? It was a risk he willingly took in the hope of robbing the country three ways from Sunday.

I mean, they might put their dark hands on him. An Englishman and an officer! Hilariously one report outlined his service in the SAS and then asked so how could he have become a violent, anti-democracy mercenary... well, possibly the two things aren't so different? Maybe one thing led to another - who do you think supplies the world with arms and mercenaries? Peace loving Norway?

If this had been Africans plotting to overthrow the Welsh Assembly these same papers would be baying for the blood of those who have got off Scot free, and possibly demanding the bombing their country of origin. Let's just be glad that Equatorial Guinea does not have the access to weapons that some of our more reliable customers for weapons do.

When one of "ours" tries to overthrow a government and help himself to the oil wealth all we hear is complaints that they've been nasty to him, but anyone with dark skin only has to mention that the system of government here is not so great and it's cue for much arm flapping and freakish shrieking. Let's end the double standards.

If we're serious about building democracy in developing nations then we have to root out the rot at home. We help bring Mark Thatcher to justice, we end the complicity between arms companies and the government and we bring the corporate criminals to book. We can't continue treating serious corruption as some sort of African boys own adventure - where the lives don't matter and the wealth is just ours for the taking.

Get Foxy

Yesterday saw Firefox, the open source web browser, attempt a download world record with its final release of version 3 (the beta version has been around for a little while but this is the "finished" version). Apparently there is no current record holder so I'd say it was reasonably likely that they've won that title.

Being the good citizen I am I complied and downloaded the new version which seems slightly slicker and feels a bit faster than my previous version. Which is nice. No problems so far.

The Guardian reports that they had so many downloads that it overwhelmed their servers, which is hardly surprising when you're talking about 14,000 downloads per minute.

It was an excellent stunt to help increase the take up of Firefox which, although it is the leading open source web browser, is still well behind Internet Explorer. 18.4% of browsers worldwide use Firefox against Microsoft's 73.8% - despite the fact that Firefox is free and IE is part of the dark machine.

Open source software, like Firefox, Thunderbird and Linux, use the principle that if something is collectively owned, open to all and free it actually turns out a more secure and effective system than one that is hidden behind tight security where benign users cannot point out problems, fix bugs and make cool new suggestions. That principle certainly seems to hold true and Firefox is a far better system than IE and Ubuntu is more secure than its Microsoft mirror image Windows, which is consistently vulnerable to viruses and the like.

Funnily enough when the developers first started on Firefox the logo was copyrighted which prompted hardliners to create an exact copy of Firefox (with identical updates) called Ice Weasel where even the artwork was free. I keep meaning to transfer over but never get round to it.

Alas, whilst it's nice to have alternatives to software tied into the corporate machine, you can't actually step outside of the capitalist model altogether. So, if you look at the world map, you can see that of six and half million downloads of version three just one of them is in Chad. Yes, that's one person. In fact the map looks pretty much like any other map of statistics related to wealth. The richer the country the more people are downloading FF3.

One note of caution on the map by the way: it doesn't have anything built in to account for the population levels in each country so it can give a distorted picture if you're not careful. For instance 145,000 people have downloaded FF3 in China (at the time of writing) which puts it in the darkest colour on the map - but please remember that proportional to their population they "should" be getting around two million. But the map's very interesting none the less.

"But it's free!" You cry, "surely poorer nations would have a higher take up." Sadly whilst it may be in the interests of third world countries to step out of the pockets of the big players - the very fact that they have less economic leverage has left them more, rather than less, vulnerable to that system. Whilst some development projects have aimed to promote open source it's actually been difficult to compete with the industrial might and prestige of Bill Gates and his epigones.

It's also the case, and this probably doesn't need stating but I will anyway, that with limited funds, computers, bandwidth and electricity it's probably going to decrease the number of people in poorer nations using any software at all in comparison to richer countries with a high technological penetration.

That doesn't mean letting up on promoting this sort of thing because it can't solve every problem of inequality all in one go. It just means that there are no magic bullets that can sidestep other social, economic and political factors. If bullets can step that is.

Every new society grew in the womb of the old so we can't just discard these alternatives as inadequate (which they are taken alone) but we should use them to help promote the idea of a more equitable world - where technology is available to anyone who wants it not simply rationed by wealth and kept secret for the sole purpose of expanding the riches of the powerful.

Operation Burma Blitz

After you've shot someone it's much, much easier to give them a banana. This seems to be the logic behind those siren voices calling for humanitarianism by force. However, there do seem to be some crucial problems with such an approach.

1. Who's forces? Americans? British? Congolese? I don't think so. Where are they? How quickly could they get there? Wouldn't everyone be dead in Burma by the time the friendly bombs come raining down? Anyway we can't afford it.

2. What would they do? Kill all military personnel that came near them? Kill anyone who tried to touch the bananas? Use their air power to obliterate things that later turn out to be convoys of children? Stand about whilst everything happens as before? What's the mandate?

The Burmese army would be better deployed helping the relief effort (which I believe it is doing at the moment, probably very poorly) than having to deal with hostile military interventions.

3. The repercussions of a resisted military invasion would not be confined to Burma. This region has had its fair share of jungle wars against Western occupiers, and they have a better than average score sheet too.

Burma shares a border with India and China - neither of whom would be entirely impressed with marines yomping about in the jungles, Bangladesh - which has a strong Islamicist current that might get excited about that sort of thing, Thailand (who might not care) and Laos for whom this could bring back unhappy memories. The Lib Dems make it sound like this would be easy - I say bloodbaths often are, but their consequences can be "unwelcome".

4. Would NGOs operate under these conditions? No, of course they wouldn't. "Hello, my mates just killed your Dad, never mind, have a biscuit." It's not the way its done I'm afraid.

5. Perhaps we could bring them democracy? No, we couldn't. Our entire record in the region has been to suppress democracy in favour of maintaining colonial relationships. We can't even pinch their oil because it's Western companies that are already pumping it.

A bayonet is a weapon with a worker at either end. Neither of them is smiling.

I understand the call to do "something" and the situation is horrifying. But those who've called for the use of force AGAIN because they don't care whether it works, only whether we appear to have tried to help are not friends of the Burmese people. Aid efforts cannot operate under invasion conditions and killing people in order to save them has been tried before. It doesn't work.

The Pride of Nations

We are all disgusted when a natural disaster of horrifying scale strikes a nation and the government does not seem to bend over backwards to help its citizens, possibly due to their ethnicity.

We're troubled when they allow political differences to bar entry to much needed humanitarian assistance, despite being unable to deal with the consequences of the disaster. When a government puts "face" above the good of its people it helps us to recognise a government without a moral centre. Especially when it's leaders are relaxing elsewhere.

Many of us are concerned when we realise that there appears to be no urgency to the idea of reconstruction and allowing the poorest to suffer in the most terrible of circumstances, and the ability of the press to report is restricted.

When a belligerent government, who is despised by many in the international community, is seen to care so little for its own people that it purports to protect many are caused not a little consternation. All because of ideology, all because of national isolationism, all because of idiocy and corruption, all because they see the people as an inconvenience and an unwanted expense.

But the lessons of Hurricane Katrina, that the government's interests are often opposed to the interests of the people, seem to be ones that require repeating over and again lest that very government starts posturing and making out they have the moral authority to lecture others on how they put their own political agenda above the good of the people.

Burma notes

I'm learning bits and bobs about Burma that don't seem to fit in with the official story in the press. I don't pretend any particular knowledge of the area but there are some salient facts which might be useful to draw upon when listening to the news.

1. Burma is part of George W Bush's axis of evil.
2. Which in the last years has meant that they are under threat of military intervention.
3. The US government regards them as an enemy power.
4. The US is sending military hardware to the region.
5. The Burmese authorities are reluctant to let the military of an enemy power trample around in their territory.

OK. I don't think there's a flaw to that logic which shows, perhaps, that the Burmese authorities are not being simply mindless bastards. Just to add weight to this point I'd like to point to the fact that India and China are shipping in aid, equipment and personnel right now with no problems - but then they haven't spent the last seven years arguing for regime change in Burma.

In this context the Liberal Democrat argument that we should airdrop aid into the south against the will of the Burmese authorities is both unrealistic, untried and completely insensitive to the political context where Western aid is suspect not aid in general. What about assisting the Chinese and Indians to give assistance and turning the military hardware around so the Burmese authorities don't feel under threat?

Next point.

1. The devastating impact of this natural disaster has been felt largely in the South.
2. Southern Burma is home to the longest running insurgency on the planet.
3. The Karen National Union and Karen National Liberation Army have been fighting the Burmese government since 1948, based largely in Kayin State.
4. The Karens, who have resisted ethnic cleansing and repression for decades, have been enormously successful in resisting the attempts by the Chinese armed Burmese military to literally wipe them out.
5. To the West of this rebellion in Mon there has been an equally long movement for Mon independence with a military wing in the shape of the Mon National Liberation Front.
6. Although this movement has been largely crushed or bought off this does not negate the fact that it has been a home for political dissent since the 40's.
7. Both Kayin and Mon are two of the areas hardest hit by this disaster.
8. Perhaps it is in someone's interests not to allow aid and rescue packages to get into these areas efficiently.
9. This may be one of the reasons that the Burmese authorities okayed Western aid packages but wanted to determine where this aid went themselves.

I mean it may just be me being cynical but surely the undoubtedly repressive government of Burma may weigh up in their calculations whether it is in fact useful to them to have the two centres of most long standing dissent absolutely obliterated.

No one has mentioned this factor on the news - am I missing something?

Darfur: what's not to be done?

John A asks "Intervention in Darfur - right or wrong and why and to what extent?"

Darfur, the Western region of the Sudan, is a very poor place that has been riven by civil war since 2003, a time when all eyes around the world were fixed on Iraq. This is a country that has a history of decades of religious and ethnic strife laid over the top of the struggle for control by a small elite based mainly in the East of the country.

It is estimated that the casualties of this current conflict have cost hundreds of thousands of lives and displaced more than two million people, many of them living utterly impoverished in camps over the border in Chad. It's also the case that mutilations, rapes and ethnic cleansing have been systematically used throughout this conflict.

The Sudanese government, far from simply being unable to deal with the scale of the war is an active participant in it. Arming militias and conducting its own operations, including murdering journalists. The UN has accused Sudan's government of orchestrating and taking part in "gross violations" in Darfur.

If ever there was a time and place for extending the hand of friendship to those in dire need it is here and now. Just a few days ago the UN released a report condemning the Sudanese government for attacking villages in Darfur killing 115 people and displacing 30,000. This is not yesterday's news it is going on now - however, the newspapers chose not to currently report the crisis - what with the nude pictures of the French President's wife and other events of world shattering importance.

A few years back UN resolution 1706 called for over 20,000 UN troops to come to the aid of the 7,000 poorly equipped African Union troops already stationed in the country. Years later it has still not happened due to the fierce opposition of the Sudanese government. It's one thing to station peacekeepers tolerated by both sides (like in the Ivory Coast) its quite another thing to face the armed resistance of a government well accustomed to civil war in its own backyard. The situation has been further complicated by a series of cross border raids into and from Chad, something the UN hopes some progress is being made on.

It's too easy to label this as simply an ethnic conflict when there are so many layers of problems laid on top of each other. Poverty is at intense levels in much of the country and, with less than half the children going to school, the long term prospects for the economy do not look good. The government has long favoured the East of the country and is happy to ignore the economic, social and political needs of the Western parts of the Sudan and they are happy to repress, jail or murder those who protest. The UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon has put the conflict down, at least partly, to climate change, citing "disputes over water resources are a major cause of the conflict in Darfur".

Of course there are fears that if we "sit back" we will see a repeat of Rwandan genocide or worse. What the simple calls for military intervention miss though is that UN troops will meet resistance and become, in effect, one more armed gang - loaded with money but with no local roots. Any military intervention in the Sudan would look far less like Jar Head than Black Hawk Down.

In other words we'll hear simplistic phrases used to justify a military presence, whilst on the ground only more harm is being done, ending with humilating defeat. Without undercutting the causes of the conflict flooding the terrain with foreign fighters will do little to improve the situation.

On a positive note - it *is* possible to make a difference even in the most unfavourable terrain.
For example, the World Health Organisation has declared Somalia a polio free zone, despite the difficulties development workers have faced in the region. It is possible to improve peoples lives without sending in helicopter gun ships. When the US troops withdrew from Somalia in '95, after a few of their lads got killed in the process of massacring hundreds in Mogadishu, they left a legacy of distrust for the West - but they opened up the possibility of working in the country again, by taking their guns out of the situation.

Somalia has many, many deep problems but the WHO has been able to make a small but real difference to those who live there. The same can be true of Darfur.

The international community can and should intervene to address those severe issues around poverty, education, water and food supplies which can, over time, both improve the quality of life for those who are not yet refugees in their own country and undercut those factors feeding into the conflict. That cannot be done at the same time as the deployment of heavy weaponry. It can't even be done coupled with the task of regime change - no matter how good that sentiment might make me feel.

There is no short cut, feel good solution to the problems of Sudan. Sorry. But I do believe the West can and should do our best to sow the seeds of peace in this most unpromising of areas. There are no guarantees and there are no easy answers - but tackling the economic and social roots of the problem is key, sending in the mercenaries is not.

If you'd like to suggest a topic for the Daily (Maybe) leave a message here.

Corruption: ours and theirs

In the Independent today there is an article on Britain's aid payouts which it claims are "open to corruption abroad". Abroad mark you, abroad. I'd like us to what exactly corruption is, and whether it's brown skinned foreigners who have a monopoly on that particular human failing.

It's a big topic so I'm going to concentrate on a particular talk I went to a couple of weeks ago and people can draw inferences if they so wish. Mark Ward is one of the top people in USAID which, as the name implies, is the US government's body for allocating aid. One of his jokes went something like "Here at USAID we're not an En-Gee-Oh - we're just a Gee-Oh." Well, I laughed.

Ward had just come back from Pakistan where he'd been running the operation, the second largest in the world (no, the biggest isn't Israel, as Ward pointed out "We just write them a cheque.") and he was very clear about what his objectives were when he first returned to Pakistan to head up the company.

He was in a difficult position because the Bush administration had, prior to 9/11, stopped all government aid to Pakistan. Realizing their mistake they were forced to go in anew. His objectives were that USAID was to deliver fast, visibly and without scandal – he’d also have to account to the US government as to whether their “aid” was money well spent. The implications of these priorities were, in my view, eye opening.

Now, Ward came across as a very able and interesting man. Someone it would be pleasant to share dinner or have a session on the Dreamcast with. However, the content of what he was saying, when you stripped away the benign smiles seem, well, unsatisfactory.

Firstly, the fast. How do you deliver fast? Keep to the urban areas and deal with the easiest problems. Now, that’s an interesting use of aid don’t you think? Are we talking about delivering lasting change in the infrastructure here? Is this a recipe for helping the most needy in society – like those who live in poverty in the most isolated communities? Nope – they don’t get a look in.

There was an exception to this in the case of Kashmir – as there is no way of delivering aid in a purely urban environment there. So he concentrated on convincing everyone that they could “build a private sector to attract foreign investment.” So if there's a profit in it today your kids will get an education otherwise - hard cheese.

Secondly, the visible. We can see immediately that if your priority is to be seen to be doing good things it means your concern is more about PR than it is about relief and assistance. But it also dictates who you work with. So, for instance, someone asked Mark about working with the government and already existing institutions in order to deliver quickly – by injecting cash into pre-existing structures. Sounds a reasonable idea if you want to improve local education with your bulging wallet, you go to the schools and colleges that already exist. Yes?

Sorry, no. If USAID assisted Pakistan's government to improve hospitals who takes the credit? The Pakistani government, even when people know that USAID was involved. That wont do. If your aim is to make people in Pakistan like you it isn’t enough to do nice things – you have to be *seen* to do nice things, even if that means holding back effective delivery.

Lastly no scandals. Ward focused on creating what he called “bomb proof projects” i.e. ones that would not collapse if the workers were murdered. He told us he’d feel pretty bad if he hired US workers, got them to come all the way to Pakistan, and then they got killed. So he hired local help instead. He “indigenized the programs” so that when aid workers were killed it wasn't Americans coming home in body bags and the other workers would be more likely to stay in place.

I'm genuinely not saying Mark Ward is a racist. I am saying that he values the lives of Americans more highly than those of local workers in terms of the objectives of his mission. I should also point out he thought locals would be less likely to be killed than US citizens - which is almost certainly true.

So the plan in Pakistan, in summary, was to make the US government look as good as possible whilst allowing the people of Pakistan to take all the risks. Where there was a choice between effective, long term delivery and the visibility of USAID it was style over substance every time – as policy.

This may or may not make for good US foreign policy, from the perspective of the White House, but I remain to be convinced that this makes for effective delivery of aid in the interests of the people of Pakistan.