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October 20, 2001
URGENT ACTION - HUMANITARIAN AID FOR THOSE SUFFERING FROM HUNGER
IN NICARAGUA
[A message from the Nicaragua Network, 1247 "E" Street
SE, Washington, DC 20003; Tel: 202-544-9355; e-mail: nicanet@afgj.org;
website: www.infoshop.org/nicanet]
CURRENT CRISIS
Three more children have died of hunger-related causes as the drought-affected
northern and western departments in Nicaragua face a crisis characterized
by the World Food Program as the "worst to hit Central America
since Hurricane Mitch." Though President Aleman continues
to maintain "There is no famine," in the region, thousands
of Nicaraguan coffee farmers are flocking to northern cities such
as Matagalpa and El Tuma - La Dalia, in hopes of finding some sort
of relief. [See end of message for how you can send relief.]
The country's current coffee crisis, caused by record low world
prices for the commodity, has produced a desperate situation for
Nicaraguan coffee farmers - one that is marked by debt foreclosures,
land loss, and bankruptcy for thousands. The social impact of the
crisis is made apparent by the increasing malnutrition among children
of the region, which has already led to a number of deaths.
Matagalpa's Ruben Dario Park and Monkey Park have been literally
transformed into shantytowns of make-shift shelters as more than
5,000 people have arrived in the city since January. Mayors of
the nine municipalities of the northern Department of Madriz have
declared their own state of emergency as the national government
has failed to address the crisis with serious attention. It is
anticipated that mayors in the departments of Matagalpa and Nuevo
Segovia will follow suit shortly.
As the crisis continues to worsen, government officials are acting
slowly in response, offering only minor palliative measures reminiscent
of their lack of support during 1998's catastrophic Hurricane Mitch.
Vida Luz Meneses, of the Federation of Non-Governmental Organizations
(NGOs), asserted that "the government should declare a state
of emergency right away, before things get worse and can't be controlled.
We NGOs are receiving increasingly dramatic reports, but we can't
get the government to listen. It has to declare an emergency now,
unless it wants to end up with another Mitch-scale disaster."
AN INDUSTRY IN PERIL
An estimated 300,000 people have been left without work in Nicaragua
due to the collapse of this year's coffee cycle. Coffee producers
in Nicaragua have witnessed a drastic dive in the price of coffee
beans from $120 to less than $60 per 100 lb. bag during the past
year alone. Other Latin American nations dependent on the coffee
industry could soon be facing similar crises, with some farmers
only receiving 15 to 25 cents per pound for beans
- half of what was earned in 1999. These amounts do not cover
the costs of production.
In April of this year, some two thousand coffee farmers joined
together for a march in Managua to bring attention to the imminent
crisis facing them. This action was later followed by President
Aleman's veto of the Coffee Moratorium bill, which would have suspended
all foreclosures due to debts and unpaid loans for all coffee growers
in the country for 300 days. Despite the bill having been approved
unanimously by the National Assembly in April, pressure from the
private sector, especially by the banks, as well as from international
organizations such as the Inter-American Bank (IDB) and International
Monetary Fund (IMF), led to the bill's eventual demise.
According to Mario Gonzalez, of the National Union of Coffee Growers
(UNICAFE), "27,000 small and medium producers are now left
with no financing of any kind to start work on the new coffee cycle."
Sixty-four percent of coffee farms in Nicaragua are small or medium
sized. Coffee is the country's largest export, accounting for approximately
$180 million of the $600 million annual exports.
According to Samuel Santos, FSLN international relations spokesperson,
who was recently in the United States and spoke to a group of NGO
representatives in Washington, DC, the government has the money
to alleviate the hunger of the coffee workers in the bank in a special
fund set aside just for that purpose. But Aleman has chosen to
spend only C$50 million cordobas (about US$4 million) in order to
leave C$150 million in the bank to show "liquidity" for
the international financial institutions.
THE WORLD COFFEE CRISIS
During the 1990s, Nicaragua was forced to privatize the financing
and marketing of coffee under the structural adjustment measures
required by the IMF in order to receive loans. Similar situations
have occurred in a number of nations of the Global South, in accordance
with the IMF's continued promotion of the development of cash crops
throughout the Southern Hemisphere. The result has been a dramatic
increase in production of coffee across the globe - from Vietnam,
to Tanzania, to Bolivia.
Coffee plays a key role in the livelihoods of poor people in approximately
50 developing nations. More than 20 million households worldwide
work in the production of coffee and are dependent on its revenues
as their main and sometimes only source of cash income.
The underlying cause of the crisis in world coffee prices is dramatically
apparent as coffee production consistently surpasses consumption
demands. While excess stockpiles of coffee continue to drive prices
down, transnational coffee retailers such as Tesco and Starbucks
are experiencing record profits. Over the past three years the
export price of coffee as a proportion of the retail price has fallen
by half, to less than seven percent. The corporate gains of some
are relegating a great number of the world's poorest populations
to extreme poverty.
CALL TO ACTION
Immediate response is needed to combat the humanitarian crisis
that is afflicting northern and western Nicaragua. Funds must be
raised to provide relief for hungry and out-of-work coffee farmers.
The current situation is dire and famine is imminent. See the end
of this message for how you can help.
Longer term support for both Nicaraguan coffee producers and world-wide
growers can be realized through the Fair Trade Coffee Campaign.
Fair Trade growers and their employees are suffering less from the
drop in prices than other growers. Global Exchange, a non-profit
organization leading the Campaign's efforts, states that in order
for importers to become Fair Trade certified, they "must meet
stringent international criteria; paying a minimum price per pound
of $1.26, providing much needed credit to farmers, and providing
technical assistance such as help transitioning to organic farming."
For information on where Fair Trade coffee can be purchased, refer
to Global Exchange's website at www.globalexchange.org.
Pressure must also continue to be applied on international financial
institutions such as the World Bank and the IMF so that their developmental
policies prioritizing the interests of transnational corporations
over the working poor around the world will be reevaluated and reversed.
SEND A DONATION FOR FOOD!
If you are receiving a tax refund, send as much of it as you can
to help Nicaraguans in this present crisis. Can't send $300 or
$600? Send $50 or whatever you can. Make your checks out to the
Nicaragua Network/AGJ. Be sure to write "crisis aid"
on the outside of the envelope and on the memo line of the check.
Send your donation to the Nicaragua Network at 1247 "E"
Street SE, Washington, DC 20003. We will send the donations that
we receive to a non-governmental organization in Nicaragua which
is working to provide food in the most hunger-stricken areas of
the country.
To subscribe to the Nicaragua Network hotline, send a blank email
message to nicalist@afgj.org
with "subscribe hotline" in the subject header
--
Deborah James, Fair Trade Director Global Exchange
deborah@globalexchange.org
415.255.7296 x245
415.255.7498 fax 2017 Mission Street #303, San Francisco, CA 94110
http://www.globalexchange.org/economy/coffee
Buying Fair Trade Certified coffee is a simple, easy thing you
can do on a daily basis to support fairness for farmers around the
world. At least when it comes to our daily brew, there is finally
an independently monitored alternative to sweatshops that sets a
standard for Fair Trade in the global economy.
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