Featured Article
A Paper Delivered by Jerry Okungu
At the USIU Black History Month Celebrations,
February 15, 2006 - USIU Campus, Nairobi, Kenya


Africa boasts the best tropical climate all year round. Our largest fresh water lake in the heart of East Africa feeds the waters of the Nile that in turn has made the desert nations of North Africa sufficient in food production since biblical times.

The Great Lakes region, the River Congo Basin, the Rain Forests of Nigeria and Cameroon and many more abundant natural resources make it unbelievable that Africa must suffer the indignity of perennial food aid concerts from European capitals from time to time.

New technologies and a little bit of vision have made the desert nations of the Middle East sufficient in food production since God gave the children of Israel manna from heaven on their way to Canaan, the land of milk and honey. Today, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Israel, Egypt, Libya and many more desert nations are able to feed their own people and export fruits and other vegetable to some of the most endowed countries in Africa.

In this day and age of advanced food production technologies, our nations cannot harvest rain water in floody seasons. We must watch helplessly as Mother Nature tears into our homes and sweep our animals, granaries and temporary humble dwellings into the Great Lakes for onward transmission to Sudan, Egypt and finally into the Red Sea.

So, as Mother Nature deals us deadly blows during our rainy seasons, we must wait for the rains to fail so that we suffer the double tragedy of death by scotching sun. The irony is that these scenes have been repeating themselves with agonizing frequency yet we never seem to learn anything from them. The failure of our crops, the death of our animals and our children due to floods or drought has become the annual rituals we must continue to expect from year to year!

The organizers of this year's Black History Month asked me to come and talk about Poverty and Hunger in Africa. Unfortunately for us Africans in this continent, these two words are both second and third names to Africa or, they are synonymous with the continent. Of all the continents in the world, no other continent has received as much world media attention as Africa has done. The pictures of women, children, the aged and the disabled and their animals starving to death while their open mouths and flowing noses are infested with flies are horror pictures that have moved the world o tears in the past. The question is how much longer will the rest of mankind continue to pity Africa? Not for long I'm afraid to tell you today.

It is true that there is rampant poverty and ravaging hunger in many parts of Africa. In 2005 alone, the continent witnessed devastating famine disasters in Niger, Mali, Chad, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Kenya. Right now, Tanzania is going through a similar situation after the rains failed in many parts of the country. As we talk now, Nairobi city and many parts of the country are going through serious water rationing due to lack of rains and therefore low water levels in our dams and reservoirs.

However, what are the mitigating factors for poverty and hunger in Africa? Are we too many for the resources available in the continent? Are we too technologically undeveloped to manage these twin enemies of mankind? In other words, why are we poor and hungry all the times?

Hunger in my understanding is a consequence of poverty. When we are poor, we suffer deprivation. When we suffer deprivation, we cannot afford the basic necessities of life.

To get rid of hunger in our communities, we have to eradicate poverty first. And there is only one way to eradicate poverty; by creating wealth. Wealth can only be created if there is conducive environment for productive engagement either as farmers, traders, industrialists and service providers.

A conducive environment means that there is a government in place that is preoccupied with the mandate to provide good governance as per the expectations of its citizens.

A good government is one which collects taxes and uses those taxes to provide services for the common good of all its citizens.

It is a government that gets its priorities right when it comes to spending taxes from its citizens.

What citizens need in a good environment is the ability to move freely and fast with goods and services without uncalled for or repressive and obstructive restrictions. It means that their government is incapable of unnecessarily harassing them.

It means that their government uses their taxes to build for them good roads, railway lines and bridges so that they can transport themselves and their goods with minimum hardships.

Yes, so that their movements and businesses should not rely on good weather to be transacted.

If this happens, we would not have the unfortunate situation where Kenyans in North Eastern Province can die of hunger while our silos in Rift Valley are rotting with grains for lack of markets to sell them to.

Civilized and well managed societies look at infrastructure in its totally as a strong component of poverty eradication.

Power networks, telecommunication systems, airports and water ways are critical infrastructure that governments should no longer see as privileges of the rich and powerful.

To own a mobile phone and have an electricity cable together with clear running water in our homes must be treated as standard basic services that our governments must help provide- because we pay taxes.

Rural communities that have water running in their homes throughout the year tend to be healthier all year round.

This is because they grow vegetables, fruits and subsistence croups throughout the year. They will feed themselves and sell the rest to generate income in local markets, towns, hotels and other consumers in dire need of their supplies.

With electricity in their homes, chances of conserving their environments are very high as they would see no need to fell trees for charcoal to cook their meals. More than that, they are likely to engage in poultry farming and other activities that require electricity.

With energy empowerment, our villages can be ready to enter into the Information Age where they can communicate with the rest of the world and seek help or offer some from one region to another.

We can get rid of poverty and hunger in Africa. All we need are a few good men and women with a vision to do it. The future of this continent lies in your hands, the young men and women waiting to take the leadership of this continent from the present generation.

Your time is now, not tomorrow!

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This article was originally published by:
We have re-published it with his permission

Jerry Okungu
NEPAD KENYA
Nairobi, Kenya
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