[news] Hunger Crisis in Niger: Starvation by the Market

[Mostly Water - mostlywater.org = news.resist.ca]

By Raymond Lotta

I was reading the conservative financial journal The Economist. They were reporting on the acute and widespread hunger in Niger, and a phrase popped off the page: "the market respects demand, not need." What they were saying was that famine is stalking Niger not because there is too little food. No. The problem, and this was freely admitted in the article, is that the poor majority of people cannot afford to buy the grain they need. And that grain is available! In short, market forces are responsible for the critical levels of hunger now affecting 3.6 million people in Niger.

URL: http://mostlywater.org/node/3811