Haiti, Medika Mamba, and the problem with foreign aid
Claire Berlinski ·
Jul 1, 2010 at 4:50am
Here's a fascinating article by Pooja Bhatia about the unhappy fate of an indigenous Haitian peanut butter company.
Unfortunately, the Medika Mamba tale has been far too common in Haiti for years, emblematic of what has been wrong with foreign aid. Local producers can rarely compete with the influx of food, medicine, and other supplies that aid agencies bring. This is part of the reason why today -- after decades of aid dependence -- Haiti has almost no local economy for these goods.
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May '10
Re: Haiti, Medika Mamba, and the problem with foreign aid
this site says: 10,000 NGOs in haiti...
http://www.mantlethought.org/content/haiti-putting-ngos-their-place
As T. Dalrymple wrote recently about Tanzania: "Aid represented two-thirds of Tanzania’s foreign-exchange earnings; one might say that its largest export was requests for such aid."
Jun '10
Re: Haiti, Medika Mamba, and the problem with foreign aid
It's hard to stand by and do nothing when one sees the poverty and misery of many living in Africa and other third world countries. But what to do? The tons of food handed out destroys local farming, clothing does the same to local textile industry. Not to mention that the whole system props up the local thugs in charge. I have no idea what the answer might be, but past practices don't seem to have done much good, and in many cases may have been harmful.
May '10
Re: Haiti, Medika Mamba, and the problem with foreign aid
I suspect that 90% of the other part of the reason is corruption where someone doesn't want anything to compete with his/her rice bowl - the cancer of the developing world.
May '10
Re: Haiti, Medika Mamba, and the problem with foreign aid
The answer is really relatively simple. Notice that World Vision had it figured out while UNICEF did not. That explains again why no UN-linked agency should ever be put in charge of anything, anywhere, any time.
I wonder where we can get Plumpy-Nut so we can compare it with our own favorite peanut butter brands?
Re: Haiti, Medika Mamba, and the problem with foreign aid
Again, I say: You got to places like Haiti, and you see the white vans from the various NGOs zipping around, and it's hard to decide whether the vans are there because the place is such a disaster, or is the place a disaster because there are so many vans around.