Going, Going, Back, Back, to Mali, Mali
Or, just going to Mali in late January. To do some of my own D.I.Y. Foreign Aid, but not too much.
Oh, and a list of animals I will see. Including this guy.
Aid in Africa
I just read Dead Aid by Dambisa Moyo, who is originally from Zambia, worked for Goldman Sachs for awhile, and went to Harvard and Oxford. Moyo discusses that why there hasn’t been vast improvement in development even with the $1 trillion-plus that the West has given to Africa. She argues that aid is actually hindering growth – in that there is no accountability, it incentivizes governments not to find solutions or other forms of revenue, it puts and keeps corrupt officials in power, and it hurts domestic growth.
One example of the hurting domestic growth:
There is a mosquito net maker in Africa…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…with the market flooded with foreign nets, however, our mosquito net maker is promptly put out of business.
Her solution: tell African countries that their aid flow will end in five years. This will force the country to find other, more accountable forms of financing such as trade, FDI, bonds, remittances, and micro-financing, all leading to a more accountable government, a strengthening of institutional infrastructure, and growth.
Another interesting point from this book: Africans believe that the Chinese are more helpful than Americans because of all their FDI. The Chinese also give their investments without conditions of reform or policy, and simply require that the specific project of building a road or power infrastructure be done. And the Chinese make sure the recipients of their money are accountable.
Moyo also criticizes Jeffrey Sachs‘ vision of the Millennium Development Goals, and they’ve had a few responses to each other here and here.
It’s tough to wrap my head around all of it. Yes, if we cut aid that will result in immediate issues and perhaps deaths of the poor. But, would continuing aid at current and increased levels just perpetuate the current environment, and hurt more than those who suffer while countries scramble to find more accountable funding?
Annie Dillard’s “Pilgrim at Tinker Creek”
Over the summer I read a lot, including Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, which you probably need to read at least 50 times at half speed to truly digest it. But my favorite book over the summer was Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. I highly recommend it. A sample passage:
I reel in confusion; I don’t understand what I see. With the naked eye I can see two million light-years to the Andromeda galaxy. Often I slop some creek water in a jar and when I get home I dump it in a white china bowl. After the silt settles I return and see tracings of minute snails on the bottom, a planarian or two winding round the rim of water, roundworms shimmying frantically, and finally, when my eyes have adjusted to these dimensions, amoebae. At first the amoebae look like muscae volitantes, those curled moving spots you seem to see in your eyes when you stare at a distant wall. Then I see the amoebae as drops of water congealed, blueish, translucent, like chips of sky in the bowl. At length I choose one individual and give myself over to its idea of an evening. I see it dribble a grainy foot before it on its wet, unfathomable way. Do its unedited sense impressions include the fierce focus of my eyes? Shall I take it outside and show it Andromeda, and blow its little endoplasm?
She throws in great random facts, like how locusts are actually enraged grasshoppers, along with fantastic musings on life. And it’s fairly short.