...Introduction Famine is described by the Global Express Edition as a “crisis in which starvation from too little food results in a sharp amount of deaths in one place,”[1] and a crisis it is. In addition to war, famine is also one of the most common ways of which people are dieing in the sub-Saharan Africa region. Famine, on the other hand, is not as widely talked about, around the world, but leads to the same result, numerous amounts of deaths. Hundreds of thousands to millions of people in sub-Saharan Africa have died as a result of this crisis in different nations, such as Sudan, Ethiopia, (fill in different countries). However, famine is not something that happens overnight, and many factors lead to this major crisis. There are many major factors that build up to the final occurrence of a famine in sub-Saharan Africa. The major causes of famine are droughts, war, economic issues, and food distribution. One of the five causes may lead to a major famine, however, when two or more of the causes “work together” to produce a famine, the situation may become hectic. For example, if a war happens to erupt during a drought, it becomes harder for a nation to prevent an all-out famine crisis rather than if their was just a drought. It has become apparent that international and national intervention is needed to help prevent future famines from taking place. Organizations such as the United Nations (UN), Food Association Organization (FAO), United States Aid...
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...Aniela Santoso EIL 320 Section 6 October 15, 2014 The Solutions of Food Shortage in Somalia Africa, or as known as the Dark Continent, is the world's second-largest and second-most-populous continent. Every time this continent is mentioned, usually we immediately think about extreme poverty, children’s malnutrition, food and water shortage, also deadly diseases such as HIV/AIDS and Ebola. We only recognize the problem from the surface and just rely on humanitarian organization’s aid. But in reality, people in Africa, especially in Somalia, have undergone a very serious problem of food shortage and famine for a long time and still depend on international’s aid without helpful solution. In fact, Somalia has experienced a situation of acute malnutrition in more than 30 percent of children, at least two deaths per 10,000 people every day and access to less than four litres of water a day (CARE, 2012). Therefore, this paper will examine the possibly long-term solutions in economic, social, and political sectors to overcome the root of this problem. Food shortage in Somalia occurred as a result of natural and human factors. There are three major factors that cause this problem, which is dominated by human factors. First, Somalia has experienced civil war and political unrest as a result of the domination of an organization called Al Qaeda, which is led by Al Shahaab. Al Qaeda prohibited any deliveries of food aid from any organizations and agencies (Erdenemunkh, 2013). Second,...
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...WORLD WAR 1 PARTYWhere? The National WWI Museum and Memorial Where? The National WWI Museum and Memorial Please come and celebrate ALL the countries that fought in the war! Come and see historical displays that commemorate the impacts of areas including Turkey, the Ottoman Empire, Middle East, China, Japan, India, Pakistan and Africa! We want this party to emphasize that World War 1 was a GLOBAL event, and it impacted areas more than just Europe! Here is a sneak peak of what you will see about Africa…Over 100,000 men in East Africa and 65,000 men from French North/West Africa lost their lives. Caused by World War 1, Africa subsequently had stronger political tensions and frustrations, which led to mutinies and uprisings. A primary political result of World War 1 was the passing of control of German East Africa to Britain and Belgium. Africa saw rising inflation while trade with Europe was disrupted, causing sharp effects on their economic state. It was believed that Africans earned independence through wartime sacrifices, which led to growth of nationalism. World War 1 brought an end to German colonial rule in Africa. Many major public works projects such as construction of roads and buildings in Africa were postponed. A large amount of African civilians were used as porters, who carried weapons and provisions. 100,000 porters died, which shows that many African civilians were negatively affected. Over 100,000 men in East Africa and 65,000 men from...
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...Famine Case Study 2011 Shohei Morita 3 November 2011 Examine causes and consequences of a recent famine. Since July 2011, Somalia has been hit with East Africa’s worst drought in 60 years, with over 12 million people in east African region needing food aid, according to the UN. They have also warned that this drought and famine could cause death of over 750 000 people in Somalia. As it can be seen on Map 1, other countries around Somalia such as Djibouti, Kenya, and Ethiopia have been affected as well. The key on the map shows that the areas marked with dark red are areas affected the most. The UN officially declared famine on 20 July 2011 in southern Somalia. Since then, 4 more regions including the entire Bay region in Somalia were declared famine. Somalia has been affected by constant drought for the past 30 years, while having civil war causing destruction to its rural and urban economies. Somalia has been categorized as a “failed state”. So what has caused them to become a failed state? Causes of this recent famine can be categorized into social, economic, and environmental. Somalia is also known as a failed state, a country without government. Besides the civil war they have had for the past 20 years, corrupted governments and lack of infrastructures. Firstly, Somalia has a corrupted government and lack of infrastructure. This prevents any form of aid group or government from transporting food and any other aid items. Also, the Somalia ordered 700 tons of...
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...Piracy Off the Horn of Africa The horn of Africa had long been a region of significant economic and its waters had facilitated trades between north east Africa, south Arabia and Asia. Today that region of Africa is devastated by lack employment, environmental hardship and insecurity. Many of fishing communities along the coast of Somalia see their means of livelihood stripped and joined the ranks of the pirates out of the need to survive. While the profitability of piracy appears to be a primary motivating factor, one can argue poverty is the primary cause of the crisis. Today the horn of Africa is one of the continent most unsecured regions. There is no way one can truly understand the piracy problem without looking at the causes. Civil war and famine have fueled lawlessness and anarchy in Somalia since the Somali government collapsed in 1991. Somalia lack of government and recurrent civil wars have created a flood of refugees and thousand of somaliens had fled the region with no jobs, and no prospects for the future. In addition to the lack of stable government, the famine and drought, there is also thousand kilometres of coastline unguarded. This has atracted some foreign commercial fishing fleets that have plundered the Horn of Africa for valuable fish and the situation has left the local fisherman depleted with their survival means . According to the united nations “ United Nations estimates $300 million worth of seafood...
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...beginning and end of slave trade. However, when the Europeans migrated over to Africa and Asia, they colonized and conquered territories. During the 18th century, migration of the European people into the Americas was mostly based around imperialism. European countries felt the need to expand and colonize, such as Great Britain, which had many colonies along the east coast of North America. Additionally, Spain colonized the Caribbean and also areas in South America. However, when the Africans came over to the...
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...The aim of this essay is to define famine and also to identify the underlying causes and possible solutions. To begin with, major concepts will be defined followed by a discussion, thereafter a conclusion shall be drawn. Famine has been defined differently by many scholars. In terms of food supply based, Brown and Eckholm (1974) have defined famine as sudden, sharp reduction in food supply resulting in widespread hunger. In food consumption based, famine is defined as lack of food over large geographical areas sufficiently long and severe to cause widespread disease and death from starvation (Chamber’s Encyclopedia) and in relation to mortality based, Ravillion (1997:1205) defines famine as an unusually high mortality with unusually severe threat to food intake of some segments of a population. In general terms famine is a complex process, usually arising from a combination of factors over an extended period. Famine is caused by a number of factors. The immediate causes are drought, flooding and low levels of crop planting. In addition, chronic poverty and inadequate policies in developing countries are also contributing factors. These conditions have combined to result in severe shortfalls in food production and in turn high prices for maize, the staple food of most developing countries. According to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (the standard used by the UN), famine occurs when the following conditions occur; 20 percent of population has fewer than 2...
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...1. Challenges facing Africa union a. health issues- such as combating malaria and the AIDS/HIV epidemic b. political issues- such as confronting undemocratic regimes and mediating in the many civil wars c. economic issues- such as improving the standard of living of millions of impoverished, uneducated Africans d. ecological issues- such as dealing with recurring famines, desertification, and lack of ecological sustainability e. Legal issue- unfinished decolonization of Western Sahara. In response to the ongoing Darfur conflict in Sudan Critics of the au peacekeepers, including Dr. Eric Reeves, have said these forces are largely ineffective due to lack of funds, personnel, and expertise. Monitoring an area roughly the size of France has made it even more difficult to sustain an effective mission. Current conflicts that has caused a big impact for the au include; the Casamance conflict in Senegal; the Ituri conflict, an extension of the second Congo war; the Ivorian civil war; and the Somali civil war, associated with Somaliland's claim for independence. There is still political fall – out from the Chadian - Sudanese conflict, north - south conflict in Sudan and the Ugandan conflict with the lord resistance army. Zimbabwe is also facing a political crisis. Rapid spread of HIV and the AIDS pandemic, which has affected over 25% of the population of southern Africa. The effect on South African, which composes 30% of the AU's economy, threatens to significantly...
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...The Somali Conflict: Finding a Solution for Lasting Peace in the Horn of Africa The Civil War in Somalia History of the Somali Conflict The colonial territories of Somalia and Somaliland joined to for m the Somali Republic under the East African nation’s first constitution in 1960, marking the first time that the territories enjoyed independence from foreign colonial rule since the 1880’s. Unfortunately, political strife and tension was present even at the time of the country’s formation. Prior to colonial rule, the two territories were governed by a highly decentralized form of pastoral rule, consisting of large clans of nomadic and agricultural familial units (Ahmed 1999, 114). It has been argued that the incompatibility of such a decentralized form of governance with a highly centralized Western-style governmental structure is the fundamental driving force behind the ongoing political conflicts, formations of factions, and civil war in Somalia (Ahmed 1999, 115). Indeed, centralized government was not successful in the fledgling African country. By 1969, less than a decade after its inception, the Somali government was taken over in a swift and virtually bloodless military coup led by the commander of the Somali Army, Major General Mohamed Siad Barre (Linke 2011, 47). Upon seizing power, Barre quickly dissolved the country’s parliament and court system, suspended the constitution, and constructed a military dictatorship based largely on Marxist principles (Linke...
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... Dr. Donna Robinson Sunday, February 01, 2015 Africa: Somalia Somalia has a population of about 1048,043 this evaluation was produced from the official census system taken by the Somalia government calculated in Somalia by the Nomads and refugee’s movements in reaction to famine and world clan warfare. (July 2014 World Fact Book) This region is made up of 85% Somalia, 15% non-Somalia including 30,000 Arabs and Bantu people. Somalia has generally been allocated into three regions – Somaliland, Puntland and South Central Somalia. Resulting in the collapse of the SiadBarre regime (1969-91) the country descended into civil conflict with overwhelming consequences. These results has made gross domestic products and human development between the lowest in the world .Out of 170 countries Somalia is in the middle of the five least developed countries measured by 2012 Human Development Index. The pre-eminence of accustomed Clan- based system obstruct social cohesion and inescapable traditional practices, such as polygamy and forced marriages, exclusion of women from education and employment opportunities. In which will results in some of the worst gender equal opportunity indicators in the world. (World Bank.org 2015) Effects of war and Peace have the clan categorize with major resources for political power. Anyone who claims a clan would have the rights to claim some...
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...AFRICAN POVERTY Duncan Kennedy* Abstract: African extreme poverty is probably a function (although not solely) of the balkanized post-colonial geopolitics of Africa. It is also probably a function (although not solely) of the income distribution generated by a typically perverse African political economy, through its effect on the allocation of resources to development. As between these two causes, the second is probably much the more important. This reinterpretation puts considerably more of the blame for African poverty on the Western great powers than does the “poverty trap” analytic that is a common contemporary way of thinking about the African economic situation. INTRODUCTION This essay, which really is an essay rather than a sustained scholarly encounter with the problem, proposes an alternative to the “poverty trap” analytic for understanding extreme poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. The poverty-trap idea is well instantiated by the following quotation from Jeffrey and Lisa Sachs, and it is common among liberal Western commentators on African economy. For the world’s poorest people, daily life is a struggle for survival, with millions of impoverished people each year losing that struggle to famine, disease, environmental catastrophes, and violent conflicts that arise in conditions of extreme deprivation. . . . One basic point, not always remembered, is that impoverished countries lack their own budgetary resources needed to supply vital—indeed life-saving—services such...
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...Relations Somalia Presentation Paper When I walked into the presentation tonight I had no idea what to expect. I thought for a second it might be another presentation that just simply bores the audience with listing statistics of bullies in schools or dealing with discrimination that I would never come across or face. It was not though; the presentation was a real experience. In a sense, it could have been too real. Somalia is a country that is located on the far east of Africa. This country is in a region known as the “Horn of Africa”. Somalia is in the center of what is said to be the worst drought in Africa in over 60 years. With most of the country side being couple empty and home to absolutely nothing, the region has been officially declared as one of the few famines areas in world history. There are currently over 10 million men, women and children that are desperate need of food and water. Over 600,000 children are in despair as their country fights poverty, drought, and civil war. There is no more grass in the fields. Farms are no longer filled with animals. There is no longer food for parents to provide to their children. There is no more water in wells. The countryside people are forced to abandon their homes, their cities, and their farms to make the treacherous voyage towards a refugee camp. They leave because they have absolutely nothing left. They leave on a path on foot that is faced with dangerous obstacles of facing wild dangerous animals and desperate...
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...collection of immigrants include refugees, people came for higher education, those in diplomatic services, skilled labors, athletes, efficient scientists and physicians. What are the factors that encourage or compel people to join the deluge of migration is a vast subject for research. Unlike the other countries the growing number of immigrants from African countries is entering the stream of immigration to United States. The history of African migration begins with slavery. The post war political economy considerably promoted the African immigrants to prefer United States as their major destination. United States has been highly benefited for decades by the African immigrants to gain all its achievements. The nation today includes people from all parts of the world, with a variety of race, complexion, beliefs and ethnicity which have made the nation an agglomeration of various cultures. The noteworthy reasons for this inundation could be categorized as historic reasons, globalization, civil wars and human rights violations, labor shortage in The US, immigration policies, and economic instability in home land. Historic elements contribute to migration The condition that brought Africans to the land of America was entirely different from that of today. The first Africans were not influenced by ‘the push pulls’ factors but they were taken by force as slaves. The arrival of African slaves greatly impacted the socio, economic culture of United States. “By the mid 1800s people of...
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...he Current Problem of Famine in Africa This paper is about two African third world countries that have serious problems with hunger, Ethiopia and Sudan. Looking at the people, the land, and the history in each country, a comparison will be made about the causes and effects of famine. Famine in Ethiopia and Sudan is apparently due to ethics, politics, and global weather patterns, but the specific causes of famine in these two countries differ greatly. Famine has stricken both Ethiopia and Sudan very harshly, with many people dying of starvation and others just waiting to die from the horrible hunger. Starvation threatens 365,000 people in Sudan, with the numbers just increasing, with no sign that they will stop increasing either (Nelan, 20). The whole country of Sudan is going through these troubles, but the famine is having its biggest impact in the Southwest and the Northern areas of Sudan (Nelan, 22). Throughout the whole country, 2.5 million square miles of land are empty, without crops that could hold valuable food for the starving people in Sudan. Those numbers are almost nothing compared to the country of Ethiopia though. It is estimated that in Ethiopia there are 4.6 million people starving or currently dead (www.news). Part of this is due to the fact that their crops became stunted drastically with the elongated dry season and an exceptionally short rainy season (www.news). All of these things make people miserable so they are forced to focus on other things to...
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...Understanding Famine: Entitled failure, Food Availability Decline or something else? Famine is defined in the dictionary as “extreme and general scarcity of food, as in a country or a large geographical area, any extreme and general scarcity, extreme hunger; starvation.” (Dictionary.com) Famines happen as a result of things such as Natural Disasters, Lack of rain/drought and not much money. Most droughts happen in the developing countries (Third world countries), which aren't economically successful and also near the equator (latitude), as their climate is very different. Amartya Sen’s paper “Ingredients of famine analysis: availability and entitlements” looks at other approaches of famine. The paper looks more into the command of food and the legal means in society more then the shortages and availability’s of food. Firstly Amartya Sen looks at the Availability approach: This looks directly into the availability of food. He highlights the main increasing problems with lack of food and confesses his concern on the continuation in famines. Sen seems to question the traditional definition of the Famine “extreme and general scarcity of food….”. Sen believes that starvation is directly as a result of people not having enough food and not the there is not enough food available to eat. If there is enough food available surely means that famine should not exist. Unluckily this is not the case and Sen’s paper continues and looks at the “Entitlement Approach”. The Entitlement...
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