U.S. vs. Kenyan Farmers

A nice little NY Times piece which reinforces how small pieces of U.S. legislation can have dramatic effects on the developing world. Some good bits:

Families participating in an American-financed irrigation project from 2002 to 2006 were promised payment in corn for clearing the land and digging canals. The Kenyan government objected to the importation of American corn because the country was awash in a bumper harvest that had caused corn prices to plunge.

The result: American officials, prohibited by law from buying the corn locally, could not deliver it. As the impoverished families waited in vain for sustenance from the American heartland, malnutrition among the youngest children worsened and five people died of hunger-related causes.

Across Africa, the United States is more likely to give people a fish — caught in America — that feeds them for a day than to teach them to fish for themselves. Since last year, for example, the United States has donated $136 million worth of American food to feed the hungry in Kenya, but spent $36 million on agricultural projects to help Kenyan farmers grow and earn more.

And even that small budget for long-term projects in Kenya is expected to dwindle. The United States Agency for International Development, known as Usaid, in seeking to concentrate scarce resources, has dropped Kenya from the list of countries eligible for undertakings like the irrigation project here.

USAID is one of the best U.S. government agencies. They do a lot of great work -- under the radar -- in underdeveloped countries. Unfortunately, they often have their hands tied by domestic legislation which hurts foreign countries to benefit special interest groups in the U.S. The culprit this time? As is usually the case when it comes to agriculture policy, it's the farm lobby; the bloated Farm Bill prevented the government from honoring its commitment to starving Africans to provide them food, unless that food was grown in the U.S. Sounds like an okay deal, right? But the economics of this presents a harsher reality. By shipping in American corn, the price of domestic corn (in Kenya) was depressed, so local farmers had to either sell their own at deflated prices, or not sell it at all. So the net effect was that the country actually got poorer through the mechanism of our aid, and some of the people actually starved to death while waiting for the promised food. All this so that rich farming corporate conglomerates could receive huge subsidies from the U.S. public in order to grow food. A bit from the article highlighting how USAID's hands were tied:

Members of Congress who favor the current system say the support of influential commercial groups is needed to sustain political support for food aid. They warn that ill-timed purchases of food in Africa in times of scarcity could send food prices higher, harming poor consumers.

But critics in Congress contend that the United States could feed far more people more quickly if it could buy surplus food in Africa. It might also help boost the incomes of African farmers, by providing a market for their crops, they say.

The Bush administration is now trying to change the law so that up to $300 million of food can be bought in poor countries during emergencies.

The criticism of those favoring the status quo might be valid: if we buy food locally (in Africa), then the increased demand could (probably will) increase prices for everyone else. But it should also boost employment, wages, and production which should bring the market back into equilibrium pretty quickly. As the article points out later, Iowa alone got $1.58bn in farm subsidies in 2005. In other words, American farmers are well taken care of; the piddling amount that we propose to purchase in Kenya shouldn't greatly effect their bottom line.

The U.N. recognizes this; they did what USAID couldn't (but wanted to do): bought the food in Africa and gave it to the starving people.

Still the program has been a success, despite the U.S.'s backwards agro policies. Poor Kenyans now have irrigable land for the first time, and many of them are on the path to self-sufficiency. That is a good thing, but the lesson must be learned: freeing up USAID to act in the best interests of those whom they are charged with helping will have the best possible effects. This can help the U.S.'s standing as well; we may have lost the MidEast to radicalism. We should make sure that we don't lose Africa as well.