The Daily Cow

Before I begin, I apologize to Andy in advance for picking on you (I really am not!), but I just had to say something when I saw, on the index page of Facebook, that you joined the "cause". In all honesty, this entry has nothing to do with you, your character, or your poor judgment (Just kidding on the last part).

Back to the topic--What a loaded name, isn't it? I mean, ask anyone "Do you want global poverty to be eliminated?" (the passive form of "Do you want to end global poverty?") and, if the person has any human qualities, he* will surely say "Sure, why not?" But what he isn't saying is: "If we have the means and will to do so."

Certainly, what the "organization" advocates--giving more aid to poor countries and canceling their debts--is not the remedy to international poverty. Just ask any (real) economist. Putting them on welfare only increases the strains on the developing world and reduces their incentive to be productive and self-sufficient. Canceling their debts will only negatively affect their credit ratings, making it even more difficult for them to get loans later on; plus, the skills acquired in managing a national debt would prove useful in the long run. (Did you hear that, Mr. President? Stop wiretapping the guy next door and listen up.)

So if those solutions don't work, what will? Like I've said, the first and foremost is increasing productivity among those in third-world countries. Let's take the continent of Africa for example. It is a disease-stricken block of land with soil so thin, food cannot be sustainably grown without modern agricultural methods. So what are the solutions?

1. Teach them how to farm sustainably. Set up fertilizer-producing factories there. Give them seeds of high-yielding, durable foods. Once they can farm sustainably and productively, the first problem is solved.
2. Now that you have food, what do you do? Worry about your sickle cells, your grandma's malaria and your grandpa's ebola, namely national health; I apologize if that sounded a bit crude and brutish. Set up distribution centers for mosquito spray and mosquito nets, and teach the natives how to use them. Give them mosquito fish and put them in ponds and lakes (and other places with still water). Simultaneously, work on developing vaccines or cures for malaria. (Thank you, Bill Gates) (Sickle cell anemia is somewhat difficult to deal with, so I won't discuss that) As for ebola, there just needs to be better hygiene and disease-prevention in Africa; if your dad caught ebola from a monkey, don't attend to him without proper medical protection--you will spread the disease to the whole village. Instead, get a nurse with the right protections to help out. (Where the nurse comes from? Don't ask me)
3. For once, you and your mom have food and are without malaria. What do you worry about now? Financial and economic sustainability. This is where fair trade comes in. So Joe (obviously a natively African name) can grow crops with pretty good yields and is relatively healthy, but he doesn't have the money to invest in better equipment. By viewing this problem from a larger screen, you would realize that the same is true for the whole continent: there is no money for investment in Capital, so the continent will be forever dependent on aid from the developed world.

   Currently, both Europe and the United States provide domestic agricultural subsidies so high that Africa cannot compete globally. Clearly, that is not the way to solve global poverty. Africa needs money in order to become truly independent and self-sustaining, but the two largest economies (Europe being considered as a single entity in this case)--those that profess their intent to end global poverty--are paying annual dividends to PREVENT that. Eliminating agricultural subsidies would save the developed world hundreds of billions of dollars annually and will contribute to Africa's path to independence. It would do wonders more than simply shelling out money to the warlords who control food and money distribution.

4. So Joe finally has money to spend and time to relax; what can the developed world do to help him further? Give him things to spend his money on, such as better hoes and horse-shoes. This is where multinationals come in. It would not only benefit their bottom line but also people like Joe, whose money is useless without things to buy. These multinationals should also invest in infrastructure (roads, bridges, business buildings), capital (factories, trading ships), and other social institutions (health clinics for their workers and locals). Certainly there are more that can be done to alleviate poverty pressures in the developing world, and there is never a "perfect" formula--one that eliminates all cases of poverty.

So what do you think? Make poverty history? Sure, we can try.

EDIT: Tricia mentioned that reducing political tension, war, and violence is also a point at which to tackle global poverty, but I believe the resolution in that department only follows from the four points I listed above. If everyone is well-fed, relatively healthy, can buy/sell goods on the market, and has access to decent infrastructure, why would anyone opt for war and violence over peace? In such a society, those who wish to disturb the peace would not survive long--at least this was the logic behind America's foreign policy in Europe following the end of the second world war.

* English needs a singular pronoun that does not indicate a sex ("he" used to work, but all you feminists ruined that).