Oxfam has launched an appeal to prevent 13 million people starving in east Africa. The head of Oxfam Scotland explains what else the charity and the rest of the world needs to do to avert the crisis.
What are the underlying causes of gross inequalities of wealth in Africa?
Issues around how trade rules operate to benefit rich northern countries and to the detriment of poor southern countries. There is lack of investment in small-scale agricult
ure in developing countries and lack of global investment – the world needs six million teachers.
Why has Oxfam launched an appeal if we haven't reached 1984 levels of famine?We have an opportunity to prevent it happening again. The money we are asking for now is alerting the British public to the threat. We are planning on not letting it get to that point.
Why did the United Nations appeal to help Somalia only get 37 per cent of the funding it needed?The UN issues flash appeals when it identifies crises and asks member nations to contribute, so it appears the bulk of that funding has not materialised. We want to get across that people have a real desire to see long-term change and are willing to give to appeals like this, and that governments are not representing the will of the people by not responding to UN appeals.
What else can Oxfam do apart from offer water aid?Access to clean water underpins all our work, but we also do cash transfers, where we give people cash in return for work such as helping us to set up a water-supply system.
The full article contains 276 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
