Jobless adults falling behind in the UK

A new study from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation focuses on unemployed adults in the UK. The study says that jobless benefits for adults without children have not increased in 20 years.

Meanwhile, the study also had good news for Scotland, the foundation says that part of the UK is doing better.

According the BBC the number of jobless adults now is greater than the number of poor seniors.

The research, carried out by the New Policy Institute, suggested the number of working age adults without children in low-income households had risen in recent years, to about 220,000.

"As the rest of society has got better off, so this group has sunk ever further behind," the study said.

The study also suggested that Scotland's child poverty rate was one of the lowest in the UK.

The proportion of children living in poverty has remained at 25% for the last three years, with about 250,000 in low-income families, according to the report.

Child poverty in Scotland has fallen by a fifth since the late 1990s - similar to the reduction in Wales and some parts of the north east and south west of England.

The report said: "The reason why Scotland's performance exceeds that of great Britain as a whole is that the fall in other English regions has been negligible.

"As a result, the Scottish child poverty rate is now among the lowest of any part of Great Britain."

Lack of money can alter genes

I know that the above title is hard to believe, but it is what a group of medical researchers are saying. A group of Canadian researchers just completed a study on cells and genes related to asthma. One of the conclusions they made, is that negative perceptions about ones life can effect one biologically.

A story in the US News and World Report mentions some of their findings.

The researchers studied immune system cells called T-lymphocytes in 31 children, aged 9-18, with asthma. T-cells play a role in the airway inflammation that occurs in an asthma attack.

Half the children in the study were from disadvantaged families and half from privileged families. The researchers found that genes regulating inflammatory response were more active in poorer children than in those who were from richer families. Genes with increased activity included those involved in producing inflammatory chemicals called cytokines, which induce stress response and wound healing. The poorer children also had more severe asthma.

The University of British Columbia researchers also identified differences in signaling related to pathways that control immune cell activity and which are targeted by asthma drugs. The children from richer families had an excess of genes that help control inflammatory responses.

While the design of the study precluded definitive conclusions about cause and effect between socioeconomic status and gene/asthma activity, "...the findings are consistent with the hypothesis that the larger social environment can get 'under the skin' at the [genomic level]," the researchers said.

Traveling troupe of Ugandan orphans

The organization World Help sponsors a group of Uganadan children who travel the states to bring awareness of the conditions of Sub Saharan Africa. The group called the World International Children's Choir comprise of 13 orphans from Uganda.

The children of the choir will return to Uganda after the tour. When they come home, the orphans will be placed in homes sponsored by World Help.

Mark Eades of the Orange County Register posted a story about the choir's visit to California.

Children's voices sang out loud at Cypress Church on Sunday, but instead of youngsters from the regular congregation it was the 13-member Children of the World International Children's Choir.

Christa and Mike Hahn live in an RV that travels with the children across the country to each appearance during the choir's 10-month tour of America. They direct the choir at each performance.

"My husband and I saw the group eight years ago and were so touched by them we decided to join up with them," said Christa.

Hahn said that three of the children's parents were dead, and the others had no fathers and their mothers had abandoned them. The children are ages 8-12, and although they are in a new country, Hahn said they are still kids.

"They saw High School Musical 3 and caught on very quickly to the songs," said Hahn.

As they travel across the country, the kids stay with sponsoring families associated with the churches they visit.

Video: Read to Succeed in Buffalo

The Buffalo News has a great video today about an educational program that helps poor children get a head start on reading.

Read To Succeed Video

This is part of the Buffalo News special series on Children of Poverty

Platinum brings money to the Bafokeng people of South Africa

A tribe of people in South Africa have riches under their feet. The Bafokeng tribe in South Africa have land above the huge deposit of platinum, and mining of the mineral brings jobs and money to the tribe.

This story from the Independent On Line shows how this tribe has flourished and eliminated poverty thanks to the land they live on.

The Bafokeng's homeland, near the Sun City casino about two hours north-west of Joburg, lies on the world's richest reserve of the "white gold" and produces about 55 percent of global output of the highly sought-after metal.

Platinum reached record prices of over $2 000 an ounce this year, and even though it has now dropped to $850 an ounce, the Bafokeng remain bullish about the future because of the mineral's use in car manufacturing.

Full of confidence and pride, Bafokeng leaders signed a R16-billion joint-venture deal on Thursday with Anglo Platinum to sink a new mineshaft. This will more than double output at the Bafokeng Rasimone Platinum Mine and create 2 000 new jobs.

"The Bafokeng used to be passive, receiving royalties from mining companies on our land," the tribe's 40-year-old King Kgosi Leruo Molotlegi said at the inaugural ceremony. But now his 300 000-strong people have become shareholders, directors and active economic players, he said.

The last decade has seen about R3-billion ploughed back into the community. In contrast to many parts of South Africa, the neat houses in the nearby town have electricity. There are tarred roads, schools and clinics, and cranes tower above the new stadium being built for the 2010 World Cup.

The Bafokeng now lease land or conduct joint mining operations with some of the world's largest mining companies, such as Impala Platinum, Anglo Platinum and Xstrata.

"Mining has changed us. It has had a big impact," said Joseph Rapetsana, chief of one of the Bafokeng villages. "We have managed to service our people," he added.

But the Bafokeng are not immune to the massive poverty and unemployment facing millions of South Africans.

There is little employment other than on the mines, and many Bafokeng have to leave to look for better jobs in big cities such as Joburg.

"People say we are the richest tribe in Africa but there are still Bafokeng people who are poor and not educated," said Rapetsana, who praised the king's modern leadership and vision to make the Bafokeng self-sufficient by 2020.

Poverty simulations help to show what the poor go through

Poverty simulations are often held here in the states to give those who work for the poor some perspective. Social workers, teachers and others get a peek into the lives of the poor by playing the part of fictional characters who are down on their luck.

In a story filed by Amy Flowers Umble for the Fredericksburg Free Lance Star, the participants of the simulations gave in to stealing, or selling drugs as the simulation progressed.

Participants lived a month in an hour, with each week divided into 15 minutes. They had to navigate the world of pawn shops, payday loans, utility companies, schools, banks, social services, child care, the homeless shelter and the grocery store.


"I felt like I lived my life in a line," said Stephen Batsche, president of Rappahannock United Way.

Others who took part in the simulation said that throughout the fake month, they felt fearful, hopeless, depressed, stressed, frustrated and empty.

Carolyn Saunders, who works at the Thurman Brisben Center and spent her hour as Ben Boling, said she felt "overwhelmed."

Those who volunteered as social service workers, directors of interfaith services and homeless shelters, said they, too, felt frustrated.

"I wanted to give them money out of my own pocket," said Victoria Clark, who portrayed the social services receptionist.

Linell Swader, an eligibility worker for Stafford County's Department of Social Services, said her hour of poverty gave her more empathy for the people who come to her.

That number has tripled in the past month, she said.

Liberalizing trade

A good interview in IPS today about trade liberalization to help cut poverty. The interview is with Peter Draper, head of the Development Through Trade Programme of the South African Institute of International Affairs. Draper tells Kristin Palitza of the IPS that combining domestic and regional trade polices can be a big help to fighting poverty.

IPS: What are South Africa’s core regional trade policies aimed at creating growth?

Peter Draper: South Africa subscribes to the Southern African Development Community (SADC) free trade agreement, which has been in place since 2000. Its core aim is an asymmetrical phasing down of tariffs to liberalise trade.

Another growth-creating strategy is the building of regional infrastructure, through spatial development, to build productive capacity with the region. This means that money is invested to improve transport corridors, building roads and railways and putting in electricity and telecommunications infrastructure, because there is a realisation that the absence of transport links between cities and countries is a key blockage [to economic growth] within the region.

IPS: Does the South African government link trade liberalisation to sustainable development and poverty alleviation?

PD: Those are undoubtedly underlying objectives. Trade liberalisation can be linked to poverty alleviation from two perspectives: a) the prices consumers have to pay for goods and b) potential benefits of high tariffs for producers protection.

In South African trade policies, I don’t see the consumer perspective coming through. Policies are purely concerned with producers. South Africa generally follows an industrial policy approach without a sustainable development perspective. That is a problem, because the average South African loses out.


IPS: What has been the impact of the recent food crisis on agricultural production in South Africa?

PD: The impact on farmers will be positive in the medium-term, because they will produce more food and make more money due to higher food prices. This is key to regional development.

However, an increase in food prices has a negative impact in the short-term for consumers, particularly the urban poor. In addition, constant, serious fluctuation in food prices will create uncertainties that could destabilise the markets.

IPS: What kind of trade policies could incentivise food production, entrepreneurship and poverty eradication?

PD: That’s a difficult question. It largely depends on developed countries, especially European agricultural policies and subsidies, and how this distorts global food prices. This makes it difficult for African farmers and this needs to be addressed.

In terms of South African domestic policies, to give just one example, the land tenure issue needs to be resolved. If commercial agriculture is the way to go, land tenure needs to be addressed, because farmers will need larger plots and more security of tenure to get finance to boost food production.

Muhammad Yunus, interviewed along side a junk bond trader

The Charlie Rose Show recently interviewed Muhammad Yunus along side Michael Milken about the credit crisis. Michael Milken was a notorious junk bond trader in the 1980's

Bill Strickland speaks on how to conquer poverty

As a boy, Bill Strickland was turned onto art. An art teacher inspired him to use art as a way out of poverty.

He has since returned that favor to hundreds, by building an Arts and Cultural center in Pittsburgh. He has helped to develop similar institutions in other inner cities.

Bill Strickland recently spoke in our home state of Michigan. Alex Nixon of the Kalamazoo Gazette caught the speech.

"I suffer from a form of depression," Strickland said. "So I'm up at three in the morning watching CNN and see all these children in Africa with flies around them ... or the children standing outside homeless shelters at Christmas time with no hope. And I can't block out the images. Which I suspect is a condition the president-elect of the United States might share with me."

Strickland, a seemingly tireless pitchman for his community and the work of his organization, Manchester Bidwell Corp., addressed an audience organized by Leadership Kalamazoo, a program of the Kalamazoo Regional Chamber of Commerce that works to develop people to serve Kalamazoo's nonprofit organizations.

The Pittsburgh native, who says he was saved from the streets by a public school art teacher, has spent the past 40 years trying to surround poor people with the best the world has to offer.

Remember one point from this speech, Strickland told his audience: "Environment drives behavior."

"If you build prisons, you get prisoners," he said. "The only thing wrong with poor people is they don't have any money -- and that's a curable condition."

Strickland's Manchester Bidwell Corp., which started in 1968 as a pottery class in the basement of a Pittsburgh row home, today is a 62,000-square-foot arts and training center that also runs a jazz recording label and a 40,000-square-foot greenhouse.

Philippine government accused of giving outdated reports to the UN

A human rights group from the Philippines is accusing it's government of giving outdated reports on poverty to the United Nations.

The group called the Philippine Alliance of Human Rights Advocates says a report about to be given to a UN committee should have been presented three years ago. This concerns Non Governmental Organizations in the country because the report may not reflect declines that have occurred due to the food crisis.

The ABS CBN's Lilita Balane reports that what the coalition of NGO's will present to the UN is quite different.

The government will send its representatives to Geneva, Switzerland to present a 2006 report, a combination of three reports which the government was unable to submit in 1995, 2000, and 2005.

“ [The government] is most likely to say it has implemented policies and programs to satisfy social and economic rights such as access to food, employment, housing, education, and health services,” said the NGO-PO Network for Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, an alliance of non-government organizations who came up with an alternative report for the UNCESCR.

In the 2006 report, the government boasted of an average three to five percent growth in key sectors of the economy from 2001 to 2004.

Moreover, the official report said that poverty incidence in the Philippines has gone down to 30.4 percent in 2003, which according to Bernie Larin of PhilRights is not the real situation of the country at present.

He said the country landed fifth among the world’s most hungry nations with 4 out of 10 Filipinos admitting that they experience hunger in the past year based from the recent survey of Gallup International.

“Almost one-third of our school age children are not in school, 1.84 million for elementary age children and 3.94 million of our youth with ages 12-15. The poor are most likely to drop out of elementary grade compared to the rich families,” said Celia Soriano of Education Network Philippines.

Medical Actions Group, Inc added that despite the government’s recognition of the Right to Health, access to quality and affordable healthcare continues to elude the poor families and vulnerable sectors in need of medical aid.

Unlike the claims of the government that the country’s labor force increase from 29.674 million to 34.571 million since 1998 to 2003, Atty. Joselito S. Calivoso, Jr, Unit Coordinator of Sentro ng Alternatibong Lingap Panligal (Saligan) said that unemployment in the Philippines has been a perennial problem.

Survey says that most Cambodian people don't know what the MDGs are

I thought that this was only true for the US.

A survey released today by an economic think tank says that a majority of Cambodian people don't know what the Millennium Development Goals are. The survey from the Economic Institute of Cambodia says that 59 percent of the countries people have never heard of the MDGs.

Nguon Sovan a writer for the Phnom Penh Post, reports on this analysis of the survey.

"The study found that the awareness about the CMDG at the local level was remarkably low, as most respondents were either not aware of them or had only a limited understanding," the survey said.

"Fifty-nine percent of respondents had never heard of them."

The survey also found that "only two percent of respondents could correctly explain the CMDG and their purpose". While awareness was low, almost all participants in the survey agreed that the program was important in guiding the development of the country, and that the media played an important role in spreading awareness about it.

EIC President Sok Hach told the Post the three-month study involved 317 people (30 percent of them women) comprising commune council officials, educators, health officials and monks from Phnom Penh and from Kandal, Kampong Cham and Battambang provinces.

Chea Chantum, director of the Planning Ministry's Social Planning Department, accepted the survey's findings but said there were problems in the study's methodology.

"The sample size was relatively small and could not fully represent a given province or the whole country, though the results seem to indicate they do represent the whole province or country," he said.

The year of the potato

While many food staples have gone up in price, the potato's price has stayed relatively the same. The United Nations has been promoting the potato in what they declared the "International Year of the Potato 2008" The UN feels that spuds can play a huge role in providing food security to the under developed world.

In this story from the Voice Of America, reporter Lisa Schlein show how the potato can help draw us closer to the Millennium Development Goals.

To many people, the potato is an object of fun. Couch potato comes immediately to mind. But, the United Nations thinks the spud is a stud as far as it's ability to feed and preserve the planet. It goes so far as to say that the potato can help save the lives of many of the world's poor and hungry.

Paolo Garonna is Officer in Charge of the U.N. Economic Commission for Europe. He noted the U.N. General Assembly resolution that launched 2008 as the International Year of the Potato stressed the link between the potato and the Millennium Development Goals.

These, he said, include food security, poverty eradication, health and safety.

"It is really a hidden treasure," said Garonna. "It is a hidden treasure from the point of view of the long-term objectives of the U.N. It is the most widely grown tuber crop. It is the fourth largest food crop after rice, wheat and corn. It is a global food staple…Potatoes are easy to grow, even in harsh environments. They have a high-energy content. They can be produced from a very small area of land. So, I think small peasants and poor families can grow potatoes. They are rich in vitamin C," he said.

Before the food crisis began, 800 million people suffered from chronic hunger and under-nutrition. The United Nations reported that figure has now risen to 923 million. While the price of most food commodities has skyrocketed, the U.N. noted the cost of potatoes has remained relatively low.

The U.N. said it is important to boost agricultural production and productivity in a sustainable manner. It said the cultivation of potatoes is very much part of comprehensive efforts for greater food security through productivity gains.

Commentary on the lack of research funding

A lot of people are writing/blogging advise for our new President. Out of all of the many, many that we have sifted through, we found this one interesting.

David Dickson, the director SctDev.net, says that he would like to see more funding of science breakthroughs that could aid development of poor nations. In this commentary that we found at Business Daily Africa, he gives several recommendations to our new President.

The Bush administration’s efforts to promote science for development have also suffered the same ideological pressures as its domestic science programmes — from opposition to stem cell research (for example, a bid to promote a ban through the United Nations) to reluctance to accept scientific evidence on climate change.

The new administration will not lack suggestions for improvements. Sensing the possibility of a significant change of tack, with the election of a Democrat, several recent reports have proposed how the US can better manage its international scientific affairs.

For example, the national academies of science, medicine and engineering have argued for a chief scientific adviser with cabinet status, charged with promoting science in foreign policy. As the US foreign secretary, Michael Clegg, points out, “attitudes towards US science are more positive than towards any other aspect of US society”.

Others recommend improving collaborations with developing countries. Alan Leshner, chief executive of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, claims that the US refusal to fund international partners means that for many poor countries “collaboration is doomed before it has begun”.

He has argued for new funding mechanisms to get round this problem, pointing out that the European Commission’s 7th Framework Programme allows non-European institutions to apply for research funding.

Others have suggested a US$100 million annual research and development fund, based on the Defense Department’s Defense Advanced Research Project Agency.

Hopefully, the new president will seriously consider all such recommendations. There should be little political disagreement on the vital role of science and technology for development policy.

Two former US Senators receive World Food Award

Senators Bob Dole and George McGovern each worked in the Senate, each ran unsuccessful campaigns for President, and each launched a program that helps to feed thousands of poor children around the world.

The two former senators were recognized with the World Food Prize today for their launch of the George McGovern-Robert Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program.

The Delta Farm Press gives us a history of the program.

In the late 1990s, McGovern and Dole worked with President Bill Clinton to establish a pilot program to provide poor children throughout Africa, Asia, Latin America and Eastern Europe with school meals.

A two-year pilot program, the Global Food for Education Initiative, was established in 2000. Based on the success of the pilot, in 2002 Congress passed and President George W. Bush signed into law the George McGovern-Robert Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program (known as the McGovern-Dole Program).

The McGovern-Dole Program has spurred increased commitments from donor countries for school feeding and has renewed support from development leaders. The G8 and the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) have listed school feeding as a specific intervention in their action plans for poverty alleviation, and the UN Millennium Project included school feeding as one of its 10 key recommendations for achieving the Millennium Development Goals by 2015.

Because hungry children have difficulty learning, the McGovern-Dole Program has had a remarkable educational impact, said Quinn. In addition to increasing school enrollment, school-feeding programs have been shown to improve cognition and overall academic performance and overcome gender inequalities in literacy and access to education. While young girls in developing countries are often kept out of school to work in the home, they are much more likely to be allowed — even encouraged — to enroll in schools with feeding programs.

The success of the program has led to dramatically increased international support for the expansion of school-feeding operations in developing countries around the world. As one example, the UN World Food Program’s school-feeding operations have nearly doubled since 2001; in 2006 alone, it fed more than 20 million children in 74 countries.

“Senators McGovern and Dole are tireless champions in the battle against hunger, and are an enormous inspiration,” said Josette Sheeran, executive director of the World Food Program. “They have given millions of children a chance to dream — and to live healthy lives — through school feeding.”

Since 1986, when the World Food Prize was conceived by Borlaug, it has honored outstanding individuals who have made vital contributions to improving the quality, quantity or availability of food throughout the world. Previous laureates have been recognized from Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Denmark, India, Mexico, Sierra Leone, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United Nations and the United States.

33% of Ontario immigrants in poverty

A specific region in Ontario receives a lot of immigrants. The cities of Mississauga, Brampton and Caledon have seen their largest population growth through immigration. A study released today finds that those newcomers have trouble finding jobs in the area.

As Nicholas Keung writes in the Toronto Star, signs of prosperity in the area can be deceiving to those who have just arrived.

A snapshot of the recent immigrants arriving in the region, released yesterday, paints a gloomy picture of the municipality's 118,220 new arrivals between 2001 and 2006 – a demographic that represented 70 per cent of Peel's net population growth. It followed an earlier report in York Region which found similar, worrisome trends.

According to the Peel Newcomer Strategy Group – a consortium of government officials, and representatives from the business, non-profit and education sectors aiming to help immigrants integrate – 33 per cent of the region's recent arrivals lived in poverty. This is almost 2.5 times higher than that of the general population.

On the positive side, 39 per cent of new immigrants between 24 and 65 have a post-secondary education, compared to 23 per cent of Canadian-born Peel residents, yet they still face a 10 per cent unemployment rate, much higher than the total population. Newcomers' median income is $15,000, compared to $28,000 for the total population.

"I've been in settlement services in Peel for 22 years. Things are getting worse," said Effat Ghassemi, settlement program director of Peel Adult Learning Centre. "These numbers are good information to have, but we ... need everyone to work together to address them."

[..]
The report rated each neighbourhood with a social risk index, identifying six out of 26 Peel wards as high-need areas. Mississauga's Ward 7, which covers the Hurontario and Dundas St. corridors, topped the list by having the highest number of total recent immigrants (11,535) and a newcomer poverty rate of 23 per cent.

$35 million in food aid misused in Cambodia

An emergency food aid project in Cambodia has been tainted by corruption. The Asian Development Bank says that 35 million dollars (US) in aid has been abused. Many poor Cambodians have complained that rice from the food aid program has not been given out fairly.

In this "breaking news" story found in The Straits Times from Malaysia, the people blame village chiefs for giving it out to better off friends.

The Straits Times November 6th

Up to three hundred Cambodians complained to the ADB that they had not received rice handouts while village chiefs have registered relatives and political supporters for the project, the bank said.

'I think that some people have been left out. Some of the village chiefs have not followed procedures properly,' the ADB's Piseth Long, implementation officer for the project, told AFP.

'Procedures need to be followed for the targeted people - the 20 per cent poorest should receive aid,' he said, adding that the bank was reviewing how many complaints were genuine and attempting to get aid to those who deserve it.

Cambodian human rights groups have said more than 1,000 poor families in several provinces have complained of corruption by village chiefs in the rice distribution project.

Mr Piseth Long, however, stopped short of saying that fraud had been found in the process and noted that 'to a certain extent the project has fulfilled its goal' of handing out rice to the poorest of the poor.

The project began last month to help hundreds of thousands of impoverished Cambodians in rural areas and slums over the next three years amid soaring inflation, food and fuel prices.

Finding a way out of Africa's food crisis

Africa is still trying to find it's way out of the food crisis. Even though increases in food prices has eased in developed nations, the rest of the world is still trying to find solutions.

A story today in the Harvard Political Review points out that food shortages haven't improved yet in Africa. Because the continent depends so much on food aid the way out is trickier.

Shreya Maheshwari of the Harvard Political Review asks an expert of international affairs on what might help the continent.

Harvard Political Review November 4th

Robert Paarlberg, an associate at Harvard's Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, told the HPR that even though higher food prices last year made news due to their impact on developed countries, the real fight against hunger is still very much centered on Africa. “It’s not the price that causes hunger,” Paarlberg noted. “The most vulnerable countries do not get their food from the world food markets. Hence, price changes in the global markets do not affect them strongly. Instead, they mostly rely on foreign aid for their food supply.”

[..]
Dependence on Aid
Due to systemic problems in food sufficiency, these regions have become heavily dependent on foreign aid for supplying their populations with food. In many African countries such as Botswana, Cape Verde, Mauritius, and Mauritania, food aid makes up more than half the food available for consumption. Since African countries rely so heavily on international aid, a decline in donor pledges will impact the least developed countries the hardest. With the recent downturn in financial markets hitting the world economy, development agencies are worried that donor countries such as the U.S., which pledges approximately $2 billion every year, may adopt protectionism and reassess their commitments to international development aid.

So far, aid has been used primarily as a stopgap measure: There has been little progress in implementing long-term solutions to the chronic problem of food shortage. According to Brain Wright, a professor in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics at U.C.-Berkeley, “Africa needs sustained investment in research and basic infrastructure, without which even minor changes in aid or natural conditions will have a substantial impact on the fragile production system in these countries.” However, Paarlberg worries that in times of financial stress, long-term investment might take a back seat for donors more concerned with feeding the poor now.

The way forward
Countries in the sub-Saharan region must look for alternatives to international aid in these times of economic distress and implement grassroots changes in agricultural systems if they are to survive the food crisis. Paarlberg believes that philanthropic organizations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation provide good models of targeting the correct variables. The Gates Foundation is focusing on the needs of poor small-holder farmers in Africa through the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, chaired by Kofi Annan. To meet short-term demands, the World Bank launched a $1.2 billion rapid financing facility to address critical needs. A balanced approach, not merely dependent on food aid but pushing for investment in agriculture, is required for achieving progress in the fight against hunger.

Sifting through garbage for something to eat

Wow! Another sad story from Zimbabwe.

A story in IRIN today depicts people who have so sift through garbage in find something to eat. Some of these people do have jobs, but their paychecks have been made worthless due to the 231 percent inflation rate.

Others have to resort to being dishonest to sell the food to other people. One example in the story is disguising leather as meat and selling it to drunks.

Our snippet of the story depicts the life of Saidi Arufandika, who forages the garbage for food for her grandchildren.

IRIN November 5th

The implicit health hazards of rotting food and fish are a secondary concern to Saidi Arufandika, 60, who regularly cycles 34km from the dormitory town of Chitungwiza to the capital, Harare, to sift through the garbage at Mbare Musika market, where the traders discard heaps of tomatoes, cabbages, carrots and potatoes as unsuitable for sale.

"I have joined many other people in scrounging for food at this dumping site, because that is my only way of ensuring that my grandchildren have food," Arufandika told IRIN. "For my age, cycling almost 70km a day is very taxing, but that is the only way of beating the hunger that we are facing."

At home he picks through the best of his harvest to feed his bed-ridden son and three grandchildren left in his care after his two daughters left home to become sex workers.

The excess food is dried in the sun to disguise its rotten state and sold in the neighbourhood, where he finds a ready market, as few people can afford to buy fresh vegetables.

"I have been coming to Mbare since February this year. I made the decision after my grandchildren went for two days surviving on water alone," said Arufandika, whose monthly pension has been made worthless by the country's official inflation rate of 231 million percent.

Poverty stats for Italy

The stats bureau Istat has released some numbers on the amount of people in poverty in Italy. Two weeks ago an the Charity Caritas said that 1 in 4 Italians were living in poverty.

As we find in this story from the ANSA.it millions live on less than 600 euros a month.

ANSA.it November 4th

Around 7.5 million Italians, or 13% of the population, are living below the poverty line on less than 600 euros a month, national statistics bureau Istat said Tuesday.

Around 170,000 people are considered extremely poor, living on a monthly income far below the poverty line, according to the report.

The figures for 2007 were largely unchanged compared to those for 2006, although families living in Tuscany improved their overall living conditions over the year.

Veneto remained the richest region, with just 3.3% of residents living below the poverty line, while Sicily was the poorest with 27.6% struggling to make ends meet.

Southern Italian families were four times more likely to be poor than those living in the rest of the country, according to the report.

Istat said a total of 11.1% of families were living below the poverty line while 4.2% were hovering just above. A further 3.7% were considered 'at risk', while 81% could be classified as not poor.

The bureau set Italy's poverty line at a monthly spending capacity of 600 euros for a single person, 1,607 for a family of four people and 2,637 for a family of six or more.

Fair Trade sale from Minnesota to help Paraguay

We like to plug these whenever we see them.

A fair trade sale is taking place in Minnesota to help people of Paraguay. A village in Paraguay wants to have sinks to wash in. So money raised from this sale in Winona, Minnesota will go to the village, and the Peace Corps volunteers stationed there, to help install sanitation and water.

Also, the fair trade sale sells the goods of craft makers from throughout the world. Goods sold at sales like these help to make sure these people get a decent wage for their work.

The Winona Daily News's Dustin Kass reports on the conditions of the Paraguay village.

Winona Daily News November 4th

Many of Tonya Turben’s neighbors walk half an hour for water, just to fill up a basket that the women can use to wash their family’s laundry, dishes or hands.

Most of their husbands work in nearby fields, toiling long hours for the equivalent of about $5 a day.

Turben helped raise awareness of the concept of fair trade last year as co-director of a Ten Thousand Villages sale in Winona. Now, the Winona State University graduate sees firsthand that paying fair prices for foreign products can help prevent poverty � the kind of poverty she deals with every day as a Peace Corps rural health volunteer in Paraguay. Later this week, local residents can support fair trade and help Turben improve the lives of her South American neighbors by buying items at this year’s sale.

The distance between Winona and the small village where Turben lives can be measured by more than just the miles between them. It can be measured by the luxuries U.S. citizens take for granted � and that those in Paraguay can only dream about.

Turben and her fellow villagers live without running water or indoor plumbing. Most families do not own an oven, so women cook their family’s meals hunched over small fires.

The women of the village recently made getting outdoor sinks a top priority, both for themselves and for the community school. The sinks cost about $15 each, Turben said, and she and the women discussed trying to put some in place before Turben leaves in April 2010.

Organizers of this year’s Ten Thousand Villages sale recently told Turben they will give that effort a huge boost. The third annual event promotes fair trade by featuring products made by artisans from more than 30 different countries, with the product’s creators assured a fair wage for their efforts. Ten percent of this year’s sales will be donated to Turben’s effort to bring sinks to her village. More than $7,800 in merchandise was sold last year.

WHAT: Ten Thousand Villages sale

FEATURES: Handicrafts from all over the world, including scarves, jewelry, stationery, holiday collectables, bracelets, kitchen and home d�cor, toys, games and musical instruments

WHEN: 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Thursday, noon to 6 p.m. Friday, and 9 a.m. to noon Saturday

WHERE: Student Union in Kryzsko Commons, Winona State University