From Tom Barnett at his Thomas P. M. Barnett web log - Beyond Lies in American Food Aid: The Dead Bodies

ARTICLE: "As Africa Hungers, U.S. Policy Slows the Delivery of Food Aid," by Celia W. Dugger, New York Times, 7 April 2007, p. A1.

I've written before about this Congress-protected iron triangle of food producers, food transporters and aid groups.

This story just makes you want to scream at the greed of it all.

For two years Bush and Co. try to change this insane law that says only food grown by Americans and shipped by American vessels with American crews and distributed by American charities can be used for foreign food aid.

So despite the people going hungry right now in Zambia and USAID being more than happy to buy food aid locally--as in, right in Zambia when the harvest was bountiful this year--USAID cannot do so because of this law.

Also because of this law, our food aid will likely be held up in terms of delivery for as long as six months. So people will die needlessly, according to Oxfam. Maybe 50,000 in the next half year alone.

The Bush administration says American taxpayers could feed an additional million more Africans if Congress just changes this idiotic law...