The Face of a Dollar a Day

Since I was little, Sally Struthers has been asking us to sponsor a child somewhere in the world who is living on less than a dollar a day. I’ve been working in Africa for the better part of the last ten years and have become accustomed to what I see in the village -where most African still live- that once made me stop and think. Six year olds taking care of two-year olds. Kids running around with swollen bellies full of parasites and orange-tinged hair – a sure sign of malnutrition.

In the countryside after the rains, the fields are full of green green crops and overripe mangoes lie rotting on the ground, and I can’t help but wonder how people here can be so poor. The soil is volcanic and fertile. But it’s malaria season, flooding has brought cholera to the surface, and bridges to health centers have washed away only to be rebuilt after an interminable period of time.

Here in Malawi, 133 of every 1000 children born dies before they turn 5. Amazingly, this figure is down from 189 deaths in 2000. Forty-six percent of children are stunted from malnutrition, and only 64% make it through enough school to considered be literate. Over half of Malawians live on less than a dollar a day.

I was in the bush last weekend, face to face with a young man speaking decent English with a good head on his shoulders. He has 2 small children, his wife has passed away. His salary comes out to a bit over a dollar a day, making him just slightly better off than many others in the village. But averaged across his small family of 3, he and his little boy and girl are each living on about 35 cents a day. Even if his kids don’t go to bed hungry, any extra cost -a minibus ride to the health center, a few secondhand clothes- will seriously set them back.

Progress is made slowly, but today out of each thousand born, 56 more children than at the beginning of the decade make it to their 5th birthday. Each step, however small a stride in keeping those most vulnerable alive, is bringing us closer to a world in which a child can grow up to earn more than a dollar a day.

Bits and pieces

While there’s been plenty of skittish talk around Kinshasa and sightings of Bemba’s guards with their red bandanas but yesterday’s midnight ultimatum has passed and so far, there’s no fighting in the streets.

Apparently the risk was enough to prompt some organisations to impose a curfew last night and others to limit circulation yesterday. In fact, folks around town were concerned enough that hardly anyone showed up at the cholera control meeting to discuss the cases that have been sneaking over to this side of the river from Brazzaville.

Meanwhile the Phantom Minister still holds office.

A cool drink of water

When you’ve got a disease outbreak on your hands, it’s a fine line between communicating prevention messages to the masses and avoiding mass hysteria. So when cholera broke out on the Brazzaville side of the Congo River, the government wisely decided to keep things a bit under wraps until after the Africa Youth Championship football match.

Meanwhile, an NGO that had recently launched a home water treatment project was busy disseminating a few communication messages on preventing water-borne disease. Sounds like a great idea, right?

Apparently the Ministry of Water and Energy didn’t think so. The communication messaging hit home a bit more than anyone had expected and the Brazzavillians began to refuse their water bills, claiming they should not have to pay for dirty water.

The Ministry, used to creative problem solving, quickly identified the culprit of said debacle: the NGO — and proceeded with a threat to shut the project down.

Keep in mind that this is the government that spent more sending the president and his entourage to the UN last year than the British government’s foreign assistance programme for the country. This is also the same government that stole USDA-surplus food which was intended to support another NGO’s humanitarian activities. Cheeky, eh?

Is it any wonder that our neighbour on the other side of the river ranked third (DRC is of course ranked first) on the list of the world’s hardest countries in which to do business?