Let them eat mud cookies
PORT-AU-PRINCE: It was lunchtime in one of Haiti's worst slums, and Charlene Dumas was eating mud.
With food prices rising, Haiti's poorest can't afford even a daily plate of rice, and some take desperate measures to fill their bellies. Charlene, 16, with a month-old son, has come to rely on a traditional Haitian remedy for hunger pangs: cookies made of dried yellow dirt from the country's central plateau.
In places like Cite Soleil, the oceanside slum cookies made of dirt, salt and vegetable shortening have become a regular meal. "When my mother does not cook anything, I have to eat them three times a day," Charlene said.Though she likes their buttery, salty taste, Charlene said the cookies also give her stomach pains.
Food prices around the world have spiked because of higher oil prices, needed for fertilizer, irrigation and transportation. The problem is particularly dire in the Caribbean, where island nations depend on imports and food prices are up 40% in places.
The global price hikes, together with floods and crop damage from the 2007 hurricane season, prompted the UN Food and Agriculture Agency to declare states of emergency in Haiti and several other Caribbean countries. Caribbean leaders held an emergency summit in December to discuss cutting food taxes and creating large regional farms to reduce dependence on imports.
We see and hear about these kinds of things often and we think, "Oh, those poor people OVER THERE." Wake up. We're all in the same boat, the same planet. The problems you read about "over there" are a crystal ball, a look into your own future (unless you're part of the "tiny elite.")
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