[stop-imf] IMF and EU Are Blamed for Starvation in Niger + IMF response

[Robert Weissman]

1. IMF and EU Are Blamed for Starvation in Niger
2. IMF response

The Independent
August 1, 2005

IMF and EU Are Blamed for Starvation in Niger

As the first shipments of emergency aid reached feeding centres in
Niger, accusations are mounting that economic policies imposed on the
country from outside contributed to the food shortages affecting up to
three million people.

Some aid specialists blamed the International Monetary Fund and the
European Union. Their economic programmes have contributed to sharp
rises in the prices of staples such as sorghum and millet. Others said
the Niamey government had downplayed the emergency to protect local food
traders who are resistant to free aid because it undermines markets.

'Rock concerts are all very well,' said one of the more outspoken aid
experts, the former French socialist health minister, Bernard Kouchner,
the founder of Mdecins Sans Frontires (MSF), who visited the disaster
area last week. 'But while the bands were playing people were dying in
Niger because there is never enough planning.'

The French Foreign Minister, Philippe Douste-Blazy, clearly deeply moved
after a three-day trip from which he returned yesterday, denounced the
'sick avarice of rich countries, the lack of prevention and vision from
the international community'.

Niger, a large former French colony in the Sahara which is the world's
third-largest uranium producer, has, for climatic and demographic
reasons, one of the most fragile economies in the world. A Muslim
country situated north of Nigeria, it has a population of about 11
million people, many nomadic herders, and one of the highest birth rates
in the world.

Johanne Sekkenes, the mission head of MSF which is mounting the biggest
emergency exercise in its history in Niger, says the current emergency
could have been avoided. 'This is not a famine, in the Somalian way,'
she said. 'The harvest was bad in 2004 and the millet granaries are
empty. Yet there is food on the markets. The trouble is that the price
of the food is beyond anyone's reach.

'Given this situation, it was criminal of the UN this year to tackle the
emergency in a gingerly way, putting 'moderately priced' cereals on the
market. The UN should have immediately organised free food distribution.'

Ms Sekkenes said the International Monetary Fund and the European Union
had pressed Niger too hard to implement a structural adjustment
programme. 'No sooner had the government been re-elected [this year]
than it was obliged to introduce 19 per cent VAT on basic foodstuffs. At
the same time, as part of the policy, emergency grain reserves were
abolished.'

International agencies say the price of basic foodstuffs has risen
between 75 and 89 per cent over the past five years. At the same time,
the sale price of livestock " the main income source of the country's
nomadic herders " has fallen by about 25 per cent. Although the food
emergency in Niger has been pending since last autumn when rains ended
early and the towns of Agadez, Maradi, Zinder and Tahoua were hit by
successive invasions of locusts which devoured crops, it took until last
week for aid shipments to begin in earnest.

Last autumn, a first call for funds for Niger by the UN World Food
Programme (WFP) met with no pledges. On 8 July, hoping to capitalise on
the African focus of the G8 summit at Gleneagles, the WFP renewed its
call. But of the $30m (pounds 17m) it requested, donors came up with
only one third.

Forty-four tons of high-energy biscuits sent by the WFP arrived at the
weekend. France also pledged a EUR4.6m (pounds 3.2m) increase in its
food aid contributions. Mr Kouchner said his charity, Runir, had taken
in more than 64 tons of food aid in three weeks.

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*IMF is combatting Niger famine*
Letter to the Editor
By Thomas C. Dawson
Director, External Relations Department
International Monetary Fund
/The Independent/
August 5, 2005

Sir: I must take the strongest possible exception to the accusation that
the IMF contributed to the crisis in Niger ("IMF and EU are blamed for
starvation in Niger", 1 August).

The country is facing severe crop shortfalls because of a lengthy
drought, limited irrigation, and a plague of locusts. The IMF is working
closely with other international donors to mobilise additional resources
to address the food shortages. Niger's Fund-supported programme fully
accommodates famine-related government spending, and we are prepared to
increase Niger's access to Fund financing if grant aid is insufficient.
In addition, the IMF has been at the forefront in stressing the need to
increase investment in irrigation infrastructure to reduce Niger's
vulnerability to drought.

With regard to the specific allegations raised in the article, the IMF
has never supported or encouraged the abolition of government grain
reserves. In fact, the grain reserve is in place and has been used, to
the best of our knowledge, to relieve the current food shortage.

The expansion of Niger's poverty-reduction programmes requires a gradual
increase in domestic revenue to supplement assistance from development
partners. In 2003, the government and Fund staff explored various
options, including steps to expand agricultural production. This
January, the government introduced some revenue measures, including the
extension of VAT to milk, sugar and wheat flour. IMF staff specifically
recommended that a poverty- impact assessment of the proposed measures
be carried out. At any rate, the VAT extension was soon rescinded
because of public protests and could have had little effect on the
crisis, the causes of which are more fundamental.