Emily Greenspan is an extractive industries policy and advocacy advisor with Oxfam America.

Last week the International Council of Metals and Mining (ICMM) released a new mining and indigenous peoples position statement requiring its 22 member companies to integrate Free Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) into their practices around engagement with indigenous communities. ICMM is an industry association aiming to promote sustainable development in the mining sector. While certain provisions weaken ICMM’s statement, overall ICMM’s commitment to FPIC reflects a gradually turning tide which began to pick up momentum in 2011, when the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation (IFC) announced a similar FPIC requirement. Increasingly, companies are recognizing FPIC as a fundamental aspect of human rights due diligence that can help to create shared value for companies and communities and mitigate the risk of social conflict down the road.

San Andres gold mine in Honduras. Photo: Edgar Orellana / Oxfam America

ICMM’s commitment to FPIC is an important step, demonstrating that the mining industry is beginning to recognize that the terms of the debate have shifted. No longer should companies be discussing whether they need to consult communities, but rather whether and how they can ensure community consent. Indigenous peoples’ organizations (along with Oxfam and others) have worked many years to encourage the industry to embrace FPIC, and ICMM’s commitment will be useful to promote accountability among ICMM members and to encourage more companies to follow ICMM’s lead.

With its new position statement ICMM requires member companies to begin incorporating FPIC into their practices in over 800 project sites around the world, with commitments coming into full effect by May 2015. ICMM describes FPIC as both a process and an outcome and states:

The outcome is that Indigenous Peoples can give or withhold their consent to a project, through a process that strives to be consistent with their traditional decision-making processes while respecting internationally recognized human rights and is based on good faith negotiation.

Importantly, the statement recognizes that negotiations should be carried out in good faith and that in certain circumstances indigenous peoples may choose to withhold their consent to a project. The statement applies FPIC both to new projects and changes to existing projects likely to have significant impacts on indigenous peoples.

However, some of the FPIC language later in the policy could create confusion for companies. For example, the statement references a 2008 guidance document from the UN’s Department of Economic and Social Affairs which states that “neither Indigenous Peoples nor any other population group have the right to veto development projects that affect them,” so FPIC should be considered a “principle to be respected to the greatest degree possible in development planning and implementation.” ICMM does not elaborate on the difference between “withholding consent” and “veto.” Nor do they reference more recent guidance from the UN on FPIC which states, “Consent is a freely given decision that may be a ‘Yes’ or a ‘No,’ including the option to reconsider if the proposed activities change or if new information relevant to the proposed activities emerges.”

ICMM generates further ambiguity by stating: “In balancing the rights and interests of Indigenous Peoples with the wider population, government might determine that a project should proceed and specify the conditions that should apply. In such circumstances, ICMM members will determine whether they ought to remain involved with a project.” Effective FPIC implementation requires that companies be willing to respect the decision of indigenous communities regarding whether a project should be developed regardless of a government’s interest in pushing ahead.

Finally, ICMM limits the FPIC requirement to projects that impact indigenous peoples. However, community consent is also emerging more broadly as a principle of best practice for sustainable development in any community. Oxfam recognizes that FPIC is a right in international law specifically for indigenous peoples, but also believes that all communities affected by oil and mining projects must be able to participate in effective decision making and negotiation in processes that affect them.  When they say “no” to a project, companies and governments need to respect this.

As with all of the new policies I’ve written about in previous blogs (IFC, Peru’s Indigenous Peoples Consultation Law, and individual oil and mining company policies), the true test will be in implementation. ICMM’s members must prioritize good faith engagement and respect indigenous peoples’ decisions with regard to oil and mining project development. If policy commitments fail to move beyond mere lip service, rights violations will continue and the risks of violence and social conflict will only increase.

In recent months food scandals have hit the headlines across the globe with horsemeat being passed off as beef in Europe, rat dressed up as lamb in China and fish being sold as, well other kinds of fish. These may just be the tip of the iceberg.

Today’s high and volatile prices mean that concerns about food safety are on the rise too. More people are having to buy cheaper and poorer quality food to make ends meet. In Bangladesh for example people in rural and urban areas are growing their own vegetables because they’re worried that cheaper vegetables have been poisoned by pesticides.

Concerns about food safety are just one of the issues highlighted in new research published today by Oxfam and the Institute for Development Studies. The report, called ’Squeezed’, explores how five years of high and volatile food prices have affected 23 different urban and rural communities in ten countries across the globe. We’ll be updating the study by returning to these same communities over the next three years to see how they’re coping.

’Squeezed’ shows how high and volatile prices are not only changing what we eat but also how we work and relate to others. For instance, where men are struggling now to fulfill their traditional role as breadwinners for the family, we find there is often an increase in domestic violence and alcohol and drug abuse.

We also found that community life can begin to disintegrate in the face of higher food prices. People are being forced to put on hold expensive social events, such as weddings, in order to save money. Or else they’re having to leave home to find work in cities or abroad.

We see people leaving their farmlands too, to go into riskier but better paid occupations such as gold mining. And we find that more and more women are entering into the workforce and their grandparents or older daughters forced instead to step in to help with childcare.

This first report is a snapshot of a problem that reaches well beyond the dinner table. As our researchers follow the communities over the next three years we will build up a much better picture of what this new era of high and volatile prices means for people and for society. But there are answers to be had already, especially if policy makers start looking at the bigger picture.

Governments need to start tackling high and volatile food prices by better managing our food stocks and better regulating the global grain markets. Here in the US that will mean finally rethinking the corn-ethanol mandate which is failing to deliver on its promises and contributing to high and volatile prices. Over the long term it will also mean getting serious about climate change which is expected to lead to drastic spikes in food prices over the coming decades.

Ultimately, all governments and donors will need to start investing far more smartly in small holder agriculture and into social safety nets to help the poorest and most vulnerable.

Assistant Secretary of State, Thomas Countryman, made a statement last week that the US will sign the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) in the very near future. He made it during a panel I was honored to speak on hosted by the Atlantic Council entitled, “What’s at Stake in the UN Arms Trade Treaty.” The panel also featured remarks by Retired Major General D. Allen Youngman, who represents small arms manufacturers, and David Bosco of Foreign Policy Magazine.

Assistant Secretary Countryman chose his words carefully and made clear that he could not commit the US to signing the treaty the day it opens for signature on June 3. But the debate among us on the panel that day underlines why signing the treaty on June 3 is so critical.

The panel focused on the question of whether the ATT would actually change anything. The critique I heard went something like this: because the ATT leaves it up to State Parties themselves to determine whether an arms transfer is appropriate in the context of the treaty guidelines, the treaty is unlikely to change behavior.

I am not going to argue that this critique has no merit; the treaty offers the world great promise only if governments have the political will to follow its terms. My colleagues at the Control Arms Campaign recently published a document succinctly explaining what the treaty does. The treaty establishes high global arms trade standards and states that certain arms transfers are never appropriate. The treaty will stigmatize arms transfers that would facilitate atrocities or other human rights abuses. Governments, regardless of whether they are a party to the treaty, will be compelled to follow the treaty standards or face international condemnation.

In addition to the stigma placed on certain arms transfers, the treaty’s standards are enforced by a requirement that States “take appropriate measures to enforce national laws and regulations that implement the provisions of this Treaty” and that States meet to discuss implementation and raise concerns. Many States see international arms transfers as a legitimate means of protecting themselves, their allies, and civilians. Such decisions are considered a sovereign right and most countries were unwilling to delegate that decision to any other actor or court.

Given this reality, implementation and enforcement of the treaty is dependent on the political will of State Parties to the ATT. It is up to all of us—both civil society and governments who support the treaty—to ensure that countries implement the treaty in a way that helps save lives and serves as part of the foundation for greater prosperity. Responsible implementation of the treaty must be compelled through local civil society calling on their own governments to act, international civil society naming and shaming those who violate the treaty or fail to implement provisions, and by State Parties strongly encouraging other countries to abide by the treaty and providing leadership by example.

Because the success of the treaty is dependent on political will, the opening day of signature, June 3, is of immense importance. Many countries who are skeptical of treaty will be closely observing the events of June 3 to see which States are willing to demonstrate their intent to be bound by the treaty and champion its provisions.

The United States is the world’s largest arms manufacturer and exporter. It is also the country with arguably the most advanced system of arms export controls. As with most international norm building exercises, most eyes will be focused on the actions of the United States.

If the US government decides to sign the treaty, and clearly demonstrates in its words and deeds that the treaty is in US interest, other countries will follow. Yet, if President Obama fails to provide leadership and sign the treaty on June 3, I fear that other countries will get the message that the US is not interested in the treaty becoming strong international law.

The US provided strong leadership in March by taking the extraordinary step of co-sponsoring the ATT resolution in the UN General Assembly and breaking the block of Syria, North Korea, and Iran. But US leadership must not end there. I definitely agree with my fellow panelists that treaties without action are worthless words on a piece of paper.

So sign the treaty on June 3, Mr. President. Help the US take the first step towards the treaty living up to its ideals.

Gina Castillo is the Agriculture Program Manager at Oxfam America.

Most of us think that accidents are unforeseeable and not preventable. But that is not the case when it comes to why people who are poor are hit again and again by events that make it difficult for them to escape poverty.

Today Oxfam released a new report, No Accident: Resilience and the Inequality of Risk. The report shows that disaster risk is being dumped on to millions of people living in poverty because of climate change and because of unfair practices.

Take weather-related events as an example. Due to urbanization and climate change, there are increasingly more people living in places that are susceptible to disasters. Since 1970 the number of people exposed to floods and cyclones has doubled. Those are the “big shocks”—the ones that get media attention and galvanize donors and governments into action, as was certainly the case when Haiti suffered its devastating earthquake in January 2010. Yet, there are also “small shocks” such as illness, death, or a harvest failure, that can push a family that is just hanging on to destitution.

Consider this figure below, which shows how one family in Port-au-Prince, Haiti coped in the year after the 2010 earthquake, which sadly killed two of their youngest boys. The father lost his job and the family was heavily reliant friends and neighbors who provided them with most of their meals until mid-May, as well as emergency-related grants and services. After this, they were forced to sell their livestock. An Oxfam grant allowed them to pay off their debts and to start a small business, but their household income still dropped by 88 per cent. Unfortunately, the shocks continued. The family invested in a market garden, which was later destroyed by Hurricane Tomas in October 2010. They also bought food to sell, but some of this was looted during election violence in November 2010.

Figure 1: One family’s experience after the 2010 Haiti earthquake

We highlight this family’s story because it is not atypical.  People work hard to get out of poverty, as studies have shown.

So why is it so difficult for people to get ahead? In the aid world, we talk often of vulnerability. But we cannot talk about vulnerability as a random twist of fate. It’s about politics, power, and inequality. As a result, risk is dumped on poor countries and their inhabitants, asis certainly the case for climate change. 50% of carbon emissions are generated by 11% of people, the consequences of which are left to poor countries and the most vulnerable are the hardest hit. Women often face higher risks because of gender discrimination and cultural norms, yet shoulder the burden of managing families. They have fewer opportunities economically, resulting in lower income and fewer options when it comes to managing risk.

Why does this happen? Our research showed that while measuring vulnerability is difficult, countries with more vulnerable populations also tend to be those with greater income inequality. Governments need to tackle inequality and ensure that risk is better shared across society. Thankfully there is increasing awareness that excessive inequality is corrosive to growth.

Aid cannot fix inequality and disproportionate risk. Governments can. Targeted action to support society’s most vulnerable (basic services such as education health, and access to decision-making) is needed to even out inequalities, reduce risk, and build resilience.

Because some accidents are preventable.

I don’t know what Nora Schenkel was talking about in the New York Times on Wednesday in her personal essay, “I Came to Haiti to Do Good…,”. The former aid worker argues that Haitians are stuck in a cycle of dependency, fueled by inequalities perpetuated by the aid industry.

I don’t know what she’s talking about because I just came back from Haiti myself last week, and that’s not at all what I experienced. While I was riding around in a white vehicle, I was talking with Haitian farmers who are clearly in control of their futures and who are actively pushing back on the aid system.

In February, 118 farmers in Saint-Marc, Haiti gathered in a community hall to share their views of how well the US government’s Feed the Future program is working in their community. Over the prior six months, the Haitian NGO, Plateforme Haïtienne de Plaidoyer pour un Développement Alternatif (PAPDA), had been working with farmers groups in three communities in the Artibonite region to develop a report card based on The Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness to assess the WINNER Project in their area.

Frank Saint Jean of PAPDA (on right), speaking with members of the Fédération des Agriculteurs pour le Développement de Goyavier (Federation of Farmers for the Development of Goyavier) earlier this month. Photo: Jennifer Lentfer / Oxfam

Community scorecard processes have been used by many development agencies and aid organizations over the years to rate local services like clinics and schools. I was there to learn what happens when that process was utilized to report on the progress of a large, bilateral aid program. Franck Saint Jean, a PAPDA representative, explained why they got involved in the process, “It is important for us to speak up so that [aid] money doesn’t just go in circles.”

Reports from the farmers about improvements made since the February meeting where they gave their feedback, was underwhelming. Farmers in all three communities reported that they had seen increased communication with WINNER project representatives (employees of Chemonics). Especially from the perspective of farmers in Deluge, a communal section of Saint-Marc, they had not seen sufficient actions taken to address the problems raised in the February meeting.

Specifics of the project aside, what excited me during my time in Haiti was the fact that PAPDA’s efforts had obviously strengthened the ability and the resolve of the farmers to continue engaging WINNER and with other projects in the future, either from aid donors or the Haitian government. Farmers in all three communities encouraged PAPDA and Oxfam to continue this work throughout the country. One farmer in Bois Neuf explained:

“We have a glimpse of what to do next, when another NGO comes…People coming here have to come with a written document of what the project will look like to see if it’s what we need. We can offer alternatives and contribute our own resources. And we can ask for translation into kreyòl!”

Members of the Association of Irrigators in the Côte des Arcadins in Bois Neuf, Haiti. Photo: Jennifer Lentfer / Oxfam

I will say that such frank reflections about the difficulty of “doing good” like Ms. Schenkel’s are still too much of a rarity among practitioners in the aid industry and in the popular media. But if I had written a personal essay for the New York Times, I wouldn’t have wasted the opportunity reiterating tired, old criticisms of the aid industry. Rather, I’d talk about the Haitians in the driver’s seat and Oxfam’s latest report, A Quiet Renaissance, which demonstrates that changes to the US aid system are upon us. We can do better to support the Haitians who are bringing about development in their country.

How? Aid providers can invest in direct engagement with civil society organizations like PAPDA who are supporting local groups to make their voices heard. And they can strengthen tools to integrate priorities and feedback from people like those with whom I spoke in Haiti, who had clearly realized they no longer “have to be spectators to all this aid.”

Pa gen anyen pou nou, san nou. Nothing for us, without us.

Minh Le is the Associate Country Director of Oxfam in Vietnam.

Rice is life. It is true for me and for millions of farmers and families living in the riparian countries of the Mekong River.

Almost a decade ago, I got to know about the System of Rice Intensification (SRI) via a local organization in Cambodia. I was intrigued by its potential to not only improve rice production, but also to offer solutions to the complex problems and constraints faced by smallholder farmers.

The strengthening SRI movement has become a popular topic recently in development circles and with politicians simply because everyone cares about finding a way of feeding more people and, at the same time, improving environmental sustainability. SRI literature saw a spike of scientific and public interest in the last 10 years. Some 250 scientific articles have been produced in comparison to a few dozen in the previous decade. The March 2013 issue of the journal, Farming Matters, (published by ILEIA, the Centre for learning on sustainable agriculture) is exclusively devoted to SRI. I agree with the editors that SRI is indeed about more than just more rice.

In 2006, Oxfam initiated a regional initiative to support smallholder farmers in the lower Mekong basin, catalysing SRI innovations in rice production. In Vietnam “Simple and Effective” is the motor to promote SRI. Five year later, it was reported that one million farmers (some 10% of the total national farming population) have adopted SRI, following a partial or full set of its principles. It was reported by the Plant Protection Department under the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development that SRI adoption covered 16% of the rice land in the North and 6% of the rice land in the country overall. Though progress is being made, it is obvious that the task is not yet completed.

Vietnamese farmer Hoang Thi Lien, right, talks to Nguyen Van Do, at his SRI farm in Dong Phu commune, My Duc district, Ha Tay province. Lien is a core farmer that gives instruction for and help other farmers to cultivate SRI rice. Photo: Chau Doan/ Oxfam America

There are still millions of farmers in Vietnam and hundreds of millions elsewhere who should have the opportunity to learn about and gain confidence in agro-ecological methods such as SRI. Multi-institutional and multi-level collaborations have been the key to success of SRI scaling up in Vietnam and many attempts have been made to try similar farmer-centered approaches with other crops. I see the SRI movement as opening doors for more cooperation and genuine support for farmers, as research, extension, and practice make progress together.

So let’s move the SRI debate beyond right and wrong and focus our energy and scare resources on better addressing farmers’ risk horizons, their appetite for change, and their aspirations towards improved rice productivity. In Vietnam, finding local solutions to food production is essential to eliminating hunger and providing insurance against rising food prices.

Rice is life and it is at the nexus of urgent global challenges for meeting food needs with less land per person, diminished water availability, rising energy costs, and adverse climate changes.  It is not an over-dramatization that our planet’s future will be influenced to no small degree by how this essential grain is grown in the decades ahead.

Sandra Ascencio of the Justice Office of Peace and Integrity of the Creation Order of Young Friars in El Salvador. Photo: Jennifer Lentfer / Oxfam America

Sandra Carolina Ascencio has worked for more than ten years to protect the health of her people and her county of El Salvador from mineral mining, which is one of the most environmentally-destructive industries on the planet. Nowhere is this more apparent than in El Salvador where runoff from mining operations has polluted the San Sebastian River with dangerous levels of cyanide and iron.

As a member of the National Roundtable on Metallic Mining in El Salvador (La Mesa), Ascencio was part of a group of community activists from El Salvador who participated in a speaking tour in Canada and the US in March and April, entitled “Water is More Precious than Gold.” They shared stories from the frontlines and the ways in which the mining industry is bullying their way into Latin American communities. As part of the speaking tour, Ascencio appeared on an Oxfam-sponsored panel on land, natural resources, and food justice during Ecumenical Advocacy Days in Washington DC.

Ascencio serves as a pastoral agent with the Office of Justice, Peace and Integrity of the Creation of the Order of Friars Minor, supporting parish communities and environmental and human rights educators throughout El Salvador. Oxfam was fortunate to have Ascencio share her experiences with us in our offices.

***

Jennifer Lentfer: Tell us why you’ve come to Washington, DC.  

Sandra Ascencio: People doing advocacy work in Canada and the US want to know more about how we are organizing communities and what inspires them to resist mining. The message is the same no matter where I go. I want people to know why it is that we want open-pit, metallic mining to be banned in El Salvador.

We need real transformation in government policies of all developed countries. In the case of the US, for example, towards the kind of development the Millennium Challenge Corporation is promoting. As of now, these policies are supporting infrastructure development that benefits the mining companies, instead of looking at a true development that focuses on eradicating poverty and promoting a better quality of life in the Salvadoran population.

Lentfer: What will you remember most from your time in the US and Canada?

What I have found out in our visits to the US and Canada is that people want to know what they can do to help us and how we can work together in a global resistance movement. When I shared my experiences with the faith-based community at Ecumenical Advocacy Days, I saw how people got inspired and how they demonstrated their solidarity with us. It’s important to transmit those emotions into the work. For us, promoting everybody’s well-being remains the center of faith. Only that way, people can keep in mind that the most important things for humans to survive are water, air, and land.

Lentfer: Tell us more about the Justice Office of Peace and Integrity of the Creation of the Order of Friars Minor and the National Roundtable on Metallic Mining. What are these bodies trying to achieve?

Ascencio: The Office of Justice, Peace and Integrity of the Creation was founded in 1987 to continue spreading the voice of the church and build rapport with communities to promote justice, peace and the protection of the environment. The Mesa was formed in 2005. The Office joined the Mesa in 2007, when we realized that contamination from mining was a big issue to address when it came to our food and water and our health.

At the Order of Friars Minor, we try to maintain a spirituality based on St. Francis de Assisi, focused on serving others and relating to nature and the environment. It’s what motivates us to protect creation. The rights of the earth and the rights of human beings are one in the same.

Lentfer: Where is the national-level debate about mining in El Salvador today?

Ascencio: Currently El Salvador does not have a law to regulate water management and so that’s where the National Assembly is focused right now. Within the proposed law there is a provision that mining is not promoted. La Mesa is trying to include mining provisions in all laws.

The proposal to ban mining has been offered, but has not moved forward in the legislature. After years of remaining silent about this, the Industrial Association of El Salvador is now actively asking the government to think twice about importance of mining to the development of our country. The civil society is watching their next steps closely, due to the level of influence the Association has on the national policies, in particular in regards to the management of the use of water and land.

Lentfer: What do you say when someone tells you that mining is a “good option” for development?

Ascencio: From my spiritual perspective, mining is not a viable option. Millions of years have to pass for the equilibrium to be re-established following the impacts of contamination, and our generations will never see repair. There is already enough minerals/metals extracted that could be re-utilized. There is no need to keep extracting more. What matters most is our ways of consumption and demand for such things.

A community meeting on mining near Ilobasco, El Salvador. Photo: Jeff Deutsch / Oxfam America

Lentfer: What are some of the consequences of industrialized mining that you have seen at the community level in El Salvador?

Ascencio: In the Department of La Unión [in the north-east of El Salvador], there is still proof of contamination of a mine that operated decades ago. The river there is completely contaminated and potable water is now very scarce. After that experience, for everyone that struggles on a daily basis to get drinking water, to think of another mining project coming becomes an issue of life and death.

New mining projects are proposed in Northern areas, where there is a lot of poverty and the soils already need lots of fertilizers. These are the same areas that were very much affected by the civil war.

Lentfer: I’m sure that the environmental educators you work with are discussing much more than the environment when they meet with communities. How do you prepare them? What are some of the biggest challenges they face?

Ascencio: We educate them a lot about health problems from contamination and how to identify sicknesses. We also talk about the rights of people and the rights of the Earth and how to protect them so we have a better quality of life. If we protect the three basic elements—water, air, land—we will also have access to good food. We teach them how to open up these issues and talk about them with communities.

However, mining projects can break the social fabric of communities and divide them. Some people will always prioritize the so-called economic benefits of mining—employment and secondary businesses. What our educators must also share with the communities is the true price of mining—construction of dams that take their water, destruction of natural resources to make roads for big trucks, displacement of communities. For people with the hope of getting a job and having some security, it’s a big challenge weigh short- and long-term costs and benefits of mining. So we have to prepare our educators to talk frankly about the consequences of mining that people cannot often see.

Lentfer: So many people who have been fighting to protect their communities in El Salvador have been threatened, and even killed. Despite these risks, what drives you to continue?

Ascencio: A total commitment. My work is primarily spiritual and by conviction. God gives us each abilities to use according to our faith. When I die, I don’t want to go [up] there and think I didn’t do anything.

I’m preparing my two children to know that my work is for God. They also need to learn the values of service and discernment. I tell them that if something happens to me, then they know that it was worthwhile. But it’s better not to think of those things otherwise you could lose your energy and motivation.

Lentfer: What do policymakers in Washington DC need to know or do to best assist you in your efforts in El Salvador?

Ascencio: You are not the only country and the only generation of this planet. What they have is enough to exist in this world. We want to see a change towards solidarity in US economic and foreign policies.

Lentfer: What gives you hope for the future?

Ascencio: I think that every person is good, in their essence. My work is not because I’m a lawyer or a scientist, but because I believe in solidarity and harmony as the principles of life. We all are on a journey to encounter our common well-being.

Thanks to Sofia Vergara for assisting with translation.

It feels good to be productive. As a Kansas farmer and rancher, I like the fact that I help transform air, water, and minerals into wheat and meat that can help sustain people. And as an agricultural advocate for Oxfam America, being productive means supporting sisters and brothers around the world to farm as I do and help feed their neighbors.

A US wheat field in Kansas. Photo via Flickr http://bit.ly/16AoUvd

An Ethiopian wheat field in Oromia. Photo: Eva-Lotta Jansson / Oxfam America

That’s why the reforms to US food aid are so important to me. As a member of the Farm Bureau, it’s also why I am so disappointed that the Farm Bureau would distort the need for those reforms in a recent editorial.

American Farm Bureau Federation President Stallman calls in to question the accountability and efficacy of using cash, rather than shipping food, when he writes that:

“Shipping a cargo load of food, rather than the money to buy food (if it is available), is the best and most secure way to ensure that taxpayer-funded international food assistance actually makes it to hungry people overseas.”

Really?!? When the distance between the US and the country we are supporting means an average of 130 days between procurement and delivery, I find this hard to believe. When over half of those taxpayer dollars that could be helping to feed people are siphoned away into the pockets of middlemen before one hungry child is fed, I’m concerned that there are many a slip between the cup and the lip.

Yes, I like to know that what I do as a farmer can help people to be fed around the world. But I don’t think that way when I consider that my “feeling good” (Stallman uses the word “pride” here) hurts the ability of other farmers in developing countries to feed themselves and their communities.

Mr. Stallman is concerned about “good international relations.” So am I. Consider the effects on a Haitian farmer with rice to sell when the earthquake hit in 2010, as “free” commodities flooded the local market in Port au Prince. This same question arises for crisis areas in other countries and their neighboring regions, where food is available, transport is closer, and markets are functioning.

The proposed reforms don’t eliminate US-produced commodities from being used for aid. In fact the majority of emergency food aid will remain in that form. But, these reforms are something of which the Farm Bureau should be “proud”.  First, they follow the conservative principle that public money needs to be used efficiently and seeks to achieve the greatest bang for the buck. Second, the reforms hope to take of advantage of and support existing markets by purchasing food locally or regionally when feasible.

From where I sit, overlooking my land on the Great Plains, US support of international agriculture has undercut neither our farmers, nor our national security over the decades. Some of the biggest markets for US commodities are in countries that used to struggle with food security. While emergency food aid may be a band-aid for a day, our support of long-term agricultural programs and market development helps create stability, more food, and new customers for our own goods.

Now that is the pathway to friendship—something we can feel good about for years to come.

“Africa is suffering from a new AIDs crisis: ‘Air-conditioned Induced Decisions.’  Our leaders live in air-conditioned homes, travel in air-conditioned cars, work in air-conditioned offices.  And it affects the decisions they make.” ~Maiko Zulu, Zambian reggae music star and activist

I had a chance to meet Maiko Zulu last week.  He wears frustration and disappointment with his country on his sleeve (and in his music).  Zambia is a country that should be improving economically.  Driven by mining large copper and cobalt reserves, economic growth has been high for the last decade, not less than 5% per year and more than 7% as recently as 2010.  The Economist in 2011 listed Zambia as one of the world’s 10 fastest-growing economies. Since, 2000, average income per capita has grown by more than 40%, lifting Zambia from “low-income country” to a “lower middle-income country.”

But high economic growth and increased average income have not translated into reduced poverty or better conditions for most Zambians.  If Zambia’s national income was a dollar, the poorest 10% of Zambians receive less than $0.02 and the richest 10% control $0.43, making Zambia one of the most unequal countries on earth. Despite good news on growth and income, Zambia is becoming more unequal and poverty is actually rising.

This analysis comes from a very important report released last week, Equity in Extractives, launched by the Africa Progress Panel.  It looks closely at the 20 African resource-rich countries that depend on extractive industries and finds they are performing quite badly in converting their mineral and energy wealth into benefits for the public. A few factoids:

• Twelve of the 25 countries in the world with the highest child mortality rates are resource-rich African countries.
• Equatorial Guinea, rich with oil, is actually now classified as a high-income country with an average income of more than $27,000 a year, higher than Poland.  But Equatorial Guinea’s child-death rate is 20 times higher than Poland’s.

In general, the resource-rich African countries are badly under-performing on basic human development and poverty reduction, despite how much money they’re making.  This chart tells the story: on the left are the countries’ ranking on wealth (actually income), and on the right is their ranking on human development indicators.  That rightward slope means people aren’t getting the health, education, and opportunity that they deserve.  Most resource-rich countries under-perform in every indicator. (Tanzania and Ghana are notable.)

One of the most interesting bits of the report is a forensic analysis that shows that inequality is growing in resource-rich countries, or at least in those the report analyzed.  The data is hard to come by, but seems to show that not only is the economic growth and revenue from oil and mining boom not being shared, but the elite are capturing (stealing?) ever more of the money over time. This means less poverty reduction than there should be, and in some cases more poverty than there was.

More than that, revenues that rightfully belong to the people of these countries are diverted through poor governance, thereby robbing the majority of citizens from the chance to improve their lives via social services and government investment intended to diversify economies. By not widening opportunities away from dependence on extractives and creating more jobs, inequality is not addressed.

Gawain Kripke and Maiko Zulu in Cape Town last week.

The paper is important, and not only if you’re interested in extractive industries.  The analysis provides useful insights and ways to look at the issues that will interest anyone who cares about development and poverty.  The paper is studiously optimistic about the role extractive resources can play in benefiting development and poverty reduction.

Meanwhile, the truth of the inequality of growth is becoming more evident to the public in these countries.  As Maiko Zulu observes above, there is a disconnect between the public interest and those of the plutocrats and oligarchs who are running the countries.

“We can’t speak of economic growth when people are dying of poverty.”

Will disconnect eventually lead to discontent?  That’s a risky proposition that could lead anywhere…

To read the Equity in Extractives report, click here.

This is a cross-post from the Gates Foundation’s Impatient Optimists blog.

Aid does not cause development; people do.  I’m talking about the local leaders who can access and actually use that aid effectively towards development outcomes.  Oxfam is hearing that local leaders are starting to give the US government better marks for how the US invests its aid.

These local leaders are not telling us that the US government has fixed all its problems.  And they still have many criticisms of the US approach.  But they are observing positive changes in how the US government seeks to engage them and support local priorities.

For too long the aid that the US government provided was not a useful tool for local leaders.  Too often it actually undermined what they were trying to accomplish.  But over the past few years, as the United States has confronted the limitations of this approach, a number of US policymakers and political leaders have increasingly tried to reorient US development policies and programs to make them more responsive to and useful to local partners.

But have changes in US government development policies in Washington changed practice on the ground?

The beginning of the current reform trend can perhaps be dated to the establishment of the Millennium Challenge Corporation, but since then, it has gained momentum.  The US government now has a range of policies designed to support and leverage the leadership of local partners, such as:

• Millennium Challenge Corporation – investing in locally-defined priorities and rewarding good governance;
• Feed the Future – Increasing support for and investments in national agriculture plans, and engaging smallholders in an effort to boost their success;
• Country Development Cooperation Strategies (CDCS)  – restoring investment choices to the country level, and doing it via a deliberate process that begins with country priorities;
• Implementation and Procurement Reform (now called local solutions) – actually making direct investments in local leadership.

Oxfam has applauded these policy approaches along the way.  They are not all directly related or comparable, but they all have the same DNA; they are built around the priorities and agency of local leaders.

But we wanted to know:  Have changes in US government development policies in Washington changed practice on the ground?  Do local leaders see a change?  And do they like the changes they see?  So we conducted extensive field interviews with citizens, civil society representatives, business people and public officials in Bangladesh, Ghana, Malawi, Peru, the Philippines, Rwanda, and Senegal to find out.

The overwhelming response we heard?  YES: 83% of the local leaders we surveyed saw a significant, positive change in the US approach over the previous few years.

This is not to say that local leaders are completely happy with the behavior and practices of the US government.  In fact, we often heard continued frustrations about difficulties working with the US government, as well as demands for the US government to continue to improve partnerships.

Oxfam spoke to a narrow number of people in a group of countries where US reforms are most advanced.  Thus it would be wrong to generalize too broadly about how what we heard might apply in other cases and contexts and it is much too early to draw conclusions about the developmental impact of most of these still short-lived reforms.

But, what we can say is that we are getting early positive feedback on how local partners are observing changes in US approaches.  Those we interviewed overwhelmingly observe increased US alignment with partner country priorities, more stakeholder engagement, and ultimately, more opportunities for local leaders to build partnerships with the US government that they didn’t have before.

In particular, the US government has a lot more work to do to close the feedback loop with local actors.  While three out of four of the people we surveyed told us they were having more and improved communication with US government development personnel, two thirds still felt they lacked influence over US government decisions regarding development in their country.  This information can help inform how these steps in the right direction are taken forward and strengthened.

The fight now is not only to ensure that these reforms prevail politically in Washington, but also to help improve their implementation and accelerate their progress, in order to restore the United States’ historic role as a global development leader.

These US government reforms to support local ownership have been hard to implement, both politically and practically.  But Oxfam believes this remains the most direct path to supporting local leadership over the development agenda.  One civil society leader in Bangladesh framed the ownership challenge thusly:

“If you have a direct road or a diverted road, which way do you go?  You go the direct road.”

You can read the survey findings and Oxfam’s recommendations by clicking here.