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Links About the Famine in the Horn of Africa

Last updated on August 7, 2011

I am generally not a fan of bullet points, even though they are apparently the one tried, tested, and true method of increasing blog readership. In this case, I am willing to use them because there is simply too many interesting things to read and watch about the current famine in the Horn of Africa. Here goes:

  • If you only check out one of these links, spend 25 minutes watching this Al-Jazeera English segment, which was sent to me by my colleague Don Taylor. Bottom line: The problem is local politics, not necessarily a lack of food to go around.
  • A shorter version of the same argument here, in a Washington Post op-ed by Bill Moseley, who is also in the Al-Jazeera segment linked to above.
  • Owen Barder makes a similar point and adds that development aid does work in these circumstances, pointing to Ethiopia’s safety net program as an example.
  • Lastly, the Center for Global Development’s Charles Kenny writes in Foreign Policy about how famine in our time is a crime, but he further points to weak or nonexistent infrastructure such as roads — the existence of which are the result of political will anyway — as a cause of famine.