Inside Lebanon's terroir: Lebanon's Slow Food Trail

In the summer of 2007 a group of students from the Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences at the American University of Beirut set out on a journey to explore their own food heritage in partnership with Slow Food Beirut. They studied 25 traditional Lebanese food products from all over the country. Follow their trail on Traditional Lebanese Food.

Badael-Alternatives

New issue of Badael-Alternatives in Al Akhbar: my editorial on creativity and innovation in Lebanon "Beyond the commemorative shield". Rajana Hamiyyeh reports on IBSAR's celebration of the International Day for Biodiversity and the Ibdaa` program. Rana Hayek on salt, the silent killer, and on akkub, a thorny edible wild plant, and Mohammad Muhsin on miswak, a plant used for teeth whitening.

New look. I love this picture I took in South Lebanon last week.

Water wars

"Which brings us back to the question: What constitutes a crisis? With all due respect to security issues, any crisis in that arena immediately receives additional funding and support. After the Second Lebanon War, the IDF embarked on a rigorous training regimen to bring itself back up to speed. It retasked itself within only a couple of years and we are, according to reports, once again capable of fighting any kind of war our enemies throw at us.

Well, there is no enemy we can fight here (except maybe polluters), but there is certainly a need to retask ourselves for this vital mission. We cannot continue to let the "urgent displace the important," as MK Avshalom Vilan (Meretz) put it so eloquently Monday morning. For once, this is a crisis that actually announces itself in forecasters' dire tones months and even years in advance, and we need to take advantage of that. Human beings landed a probe on Mars to search for water on Monday, but the essential search is for a coherent water policy, and that begins at home."

This is a Jerusalem Post analysis of the water crisis. Don't you just love the delicate analogy? Freud would have had a ball.

Scary stuff

"The University of Twente, in the Netherlands, has created a novel online calculator for water www.waterfootprint.org - able to calculate the impact of individuals and countries on global water reserves. The site brings to attention all the water we consume without realizing it. For instance, you can discover that a single cup of coffee requires 140 liters of water: the water required for the cultivation and processing of the coffee beans. A kilo of beef needs 16,000 liters of water: not just the water drunk by cattle but in particular the water for growing, harvesting and processing cereals and feeds.
And so on: an apple - 70 liters; a glass of beer - 75 liters; a slice of bread - 40 liters; one kilo of cheese - 5000 liters; a kilo of chicken - 3900 liters."

From Slow Food's Terra Madre Newsletter

Livelihoods under siege: Israel destroys farming in Gaza

Narratives Under Siege (12):Eighteen years of Work Destroyed in Less than four Hours

Nasser Jaber spent eighteen years building up his chicken farm in the southern Gaza Strip. Two weeks ago the IOF bulldozed his farm, killing 40,000 of his chickens, and destroying his business. “They came at four in the morning, with two bulldozers, and they left before 8am. I own this chicken farm with my three brothers, and we worked day and night for eighteen years to build up our business. The Israelis destroyed everything in less than four hours.” Nasser Jaber’s chicken farm was bulldozed by the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) ten days ago, in the early morning hours of May 16, while he was sleeping at home in Rafah, in the southern Gaza Strip. He still looks stunned. Wearily he guides us round the ruins of his eighteen-year business. “This was a lifetime project for me and my brothers” he says as we clamber over rubble, wire, shattered sheets of metal and thousands of putrefying chickens. “I have never belonged to any political faction, and I have never been to jail. I don’t know why they did this.” The farm workers who are starting to clear some of the rubble are all wearing facemasks. Forty thousand dead chickens lie smashed amidst the rubble and the stench is sickening.
When his workers raised the alarm that the chicken farm was being bulldozed, Nasser Jaber didn’t rush out to the farm, but stayed at home, waiting until the Israelis had finally left. “It would have been too dangerous to come to the farm while they were destroying everything” he says. “This is not the first time the Israelis have been here. The [Israeli] border is only two and a half kilometers away, and they invade this area every month. They had already destroyed one of our walls, and then the water tanks. But nothing like this.” One section of the chicken farm, a large barn containing 9,000 chickens, was spared the attack, though Nasser Jaber says the poultry are traumatized, and laying few eggs.
The farm used to produce 45,000 eggs a day – now production is down to 2,000 eggs per day, and Nasser Jaber is worried the Israelis may return to finish off what’s left of his farm. He estimates that between them, he and his brothers have already lost more than a million dollars. “I am a peaceful farmer” he says. “But they destroy our homes, our land - everything.” Abdul Halim Abu Samra, Head of Public Relations at the nearby Khan Yunis branch of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights, says the IOF is systematically destroying farm land in the Gaza Strip, especially in border areas. “We have good fertile agricultural land in Gaza, but Palestinian farmers have been driven off their land in these border areas by intimidation and attacks like this. The land is now almost empty a kilometer before the eastern border, because it is too dangerous for people to live and work there.” As we drive north east towards Sofa Crossing (one of the five crossings between Gaza and Israel) we see very few people, only an occasional elderly man leading a donkey and cart. These rural eastern border areas of the Gaza Strip are emptying, because farmers, many of whom have farmed here for generations, are now too frightened to live and work on their own land. The confines of the Gaza Strip, which is just forty kilometers long and ten kilometers wide, are being shrunk even further by relentless Israeli invasions.
The deliberate destruction of civilian property is illegal under international human rights law and humanitarian law, including the Fourth Geneva Convention (articles 33 and 53). Since the beginning of the second Intifada in September 2000, PCHR has documented the deliberate destruction of more than 40,000 donumms[1] of agricultural land in the Gaza Strip. This year alone, almost 3,000 donumms of agricultural land around Rafah and Khan Yunis have been destroyed by the Israeli military (including 500 donumms in the last seven days), ruining vegetable allotments and family owned farms, and contributing to the devastating economic destruction of the Gaza Strip.		Mohammed Abu Daggah's cement factory
Fifteen kilometers away from the remains of Nasser Jaber’s chicken farm, Mohammed Hamdan Abu Daggah is standing amidst the ruins of his cement factory, which lies four kilometers from Sofa Crossing, and was bulldozed by the IOF three days ago, on May 24. “I started this business in January 2007” he says. “My family invested everything in this factory. We managed to import good equipment under license, and we had lots of work from local clients, and the United Nations here in Gaza. But the Israelis arrived in three bulldozers, and they tore up everything.” Abu Daggah’s factory was employing forty local men who now have no jobs. Like Nasser Jaber, Abu Daggah says he has no idea why his business was targeted. “I have never been in any trouble and have never been arrested. They had absolutely no reason to do this – but now we have nothing left, except heavy debts that we cannot afford to pay.” I am posting this article taken from the Palestinian Center For Human Rights in Gaza. You can find more on their site. Here's the link to this article. (Thanks Riad)

Get real!

"The prospect of spending six months of the year knee-deep in brown paddy water for scant reward is encouraging rice farmers to abandon their land. About 2.5 million people, or a 10th of the state's population, work in the Middle East, where they help build apartments, hotels and offices.

The exodus has led to a tripling of wages for day laborers who stayed behind, and fueled a building boom on drained paddy fields as engineers, surveyors and construction workers send money back.

At least 60 percent of the land traditionally used for rice in the Palakkad district, about 110 kilometers northeast of Kochi, Kerala's largest city, has been lost to other crops and to the construction of homes, villas and shopping malls, said Jayachandran.

The share of agricultural land devoted to food crops, including rice, fell to 12.5 percent in the year ended March 31, 2006, from 37.5 percent in 1981.

``The younger generation no longer wants to dirty his feet and hands working in paddy fields,'' says Jayachandran. ``He prefers a job in a factory or a shop.''

Vasu may well be the last rice farmer in his family. His 29-year-old son, who earned a diploma in electronics engineering, works in a cement company.

Still, Vasu said he could be tempted to resume rice farming if the government increased subsidies above the 160 rupees an acre it pays, and provided cheaper fertilizer and pesticides.

``Rice is close to our heart,'' Vasu said. ``But we need to be practical.''"

Creating the food crisis

"However, an intriguing question escaped many observers: how on earth did Mexicans, who live in the land where corn was domesticated, become dependent on US imports in the first place?"

This is a great piece by Walden Bello in the Nation. This has been a question going on relentlessly in my head: How on earth did the Lebanese, Syrians and Egyptians who live on the land where wheat was domesticated, become dependent on wheat imports. I know part of the answer, which includes carrying capacity (there were far fewer people), possible climatic changes (less rainfall), and the abandonment of vast expanses of land, which used to be planted with grain and have now become derelict. Bello offers an additional element that has to do with free-market development policies, the destruction of peasant agriculture and speculations. The example he gives for rice in the Philippines is very thorough.

" That the global food crisis stems mainly from free-market restructuring of agriculture is clearer in the case of rice. Unlike corn, less than 10 percent of world rice production is traded. Moreover, there has been no diversion of rice from food consumption to biofuels. Yet this year alone, prices nearly tripled, from $380 a ton in January to more than $1,000 in April. Undoubtedly the inflation stems partly from speculation by wholesaler cartels at a time of tightening supplies. However, as with Mexico and corn, the big puzzle is why a number of formerly self-sufficient rice-consuming countries have become severely dependent on imports." (Thanks Rami)

Za`atar

My uncle's wife, Badi`a, teaches my daughter Suha how to make Zaatar in Sinai, Jabal `Amel, South Lebanon.

Harvest

This is the last one of the harvest series. My kids on the tractor.

Mr. Darling

An article defending supermarkets. One of the few.

"Food prices at the global level, notably dairy and wheat, are now beginning to dip after last year's huge surge and they could fall further. Unlike oil, the supply response to grain price increases can be rapid, as quick as the next harvest.

That will take several years. It requires huge investment, in farms, in infrastructure and in agricultural technology. Without high food prices, the investment will not happen. It will take time for the world to compensate for the past three decades of low investment in food and there is little that the supermarkets or Mr Darling can do about it."

"The report, based on missions to the region earlier this year, indicated that about half of all Palestinian households are dependent on food assistance from the international community, especially given the recent worldwide spike in the price of many basic foods."

A movable defeat

"Food has moved around the world since Europeans brought tea from China, but never at the speed or in the amounts it has over the last few years. Consumers in not only the richest nations but, increasingly, the developing world expect food whenever they crave it, with no concession to season or geography.

The European Union, the world’s leading food importer, has increased imports 20 percent in the last five years. The value of fresh fruit and vegetables imported by the United States, in second place, nearly doubled from 2000 to 2006.

Under a little-known international treaty called the Convention on International Civil Aviation, signed in Chicago in 1944 to help the fledgling airline industry, fuel for international travel and transport of goods, including food, is exempt from taxes, unlike trucks, cars and buses. There is also no tax on fuel used by ocean freighters. " (Thanks D. and Yaz)

It's a bit old (one month) but this is a very current issue. There are 2 important issues here:

1. It is often claimed that limiting access of products from the South into Northern Markets through environmental taxation will reduce the income of Southern farmers. But the question must be: who benefits from this trade? Is it poor, small farmers? The workers in the tomatoes production system in Morocco for instance are exploited and abused. That's why the products are so competitive. If these tomatoes have to be taxed, it should be because of the inhuman treatment of workers.

2. The article (and many others like it) addresses mainly fruits and vegetables. In Southern countries, these account for a small share of the total food bill. Stables, canned foods, prepared foods, staples such as wheat and rice, and cooking oil constitute the main components of the food bill. In Lebanon for instance, we are self sufficient in fruits and vegetables, but we import almost everything else, 80% of our food needs. These are not luxury, seasonal items. An environmental tax on these imports may have dramatic impacts on the lives of the poor.

Honoris causa

I found someone who likes Fuad Siniora, Jihad Azour and Sami Haddad NOT for sectarian reasons: the cartel of meat importers, who congratulated them on their decision to reduce the duty on imported frozen meat from 70% to 20%. Why do they like them? Because according to the frozen meat cartel, this historic decision will protect the poor consumers from the monopoly of the poultry production cartel (read the last part of the Arabic article). Messieurs les importateurs, ces sentiments vous honorent.

Harvest

Sinai, Jabal Amel, South Lebanon

Badael- Alternatives

Badael-Alternatives came out yesterday when I was still in Cyprus. My editorial: Akkar is occupied by poverty, liberate it before someone else does. Rana Hayeck's article on IBSAR's biodiversity projects (I have linked IBSAR's blog a few days ago-wild edible plants project). Muhammad Muhsin on "the poor person's alternative to going out at night" or life without electricity in Beirut's suburb's. Samer Tutunji wrote a short piece about the uses of carob, and Rana a short article about stress alleviation.

General Cluster

"The United States is trying to bully its allies into weakening a treaty banning cluster bombs, Jody Williams, who won the Nobel Peace Prize for leading a campaign against landmines, said on Friday.

The United States said on Wednesday the treaty could jeopardise U.S. participation in joint peacekeeping and disaster relief operations by "criminalising" military operations between countries that signed the ban and those that did not.

Cluster munitions open in mid-air and scatter as many as several hundred "bomblets" over wide areas. They often fail to explode, creating virtual mine fields that can kill or injure anyone who comes across them -- often curious children." (Thanks akhuy fil-mahjar)

I have written about cluster bombs in South Lebanon before, and one of my students did a thesis on the subject, which remained unfortunately unpublished (what is it with students? They seem to lose interest once they get their MSc) . I often go for long hikes in my little Southern village, and there is an area I usually avoid as I was told that the Israelis had dropped little presents for the children a few hours before the end of the bombing in August 2006, 48 hours AFTER the cease fire had been agreed. But recently, I have started walking there again as many hunters and wild plant gatherers have assured me that the bomblets had all been removed by the demining teams. I went for a motocross ride in that area today, a gorgeous valley with thick oak coppice and rocky slopes. Back in the village after a fantastic ride, my cousin stopped by my house to warn me to avoid that same valley. He told me he found there yesterday an unexploded Israeli 2 tons bomb as he was picking wild thyme. He called the Lebanese army and they came and removed it but no one thought about cordoning off the area. And if they miss a 2 tons bomb, how can I trust them with 1 kilo bomblets? There will continue to be victims for decades, and you can be sure that the Western press will not mention them.

Off to Cyprus till Saturday to give a talk at a Slow Food workshop on "Local Economy and Mediterranean Products: Sustainable Agriculture, Biodiversity Protection and Fair Trade- Together Against Poverty."

Party-pooper

Everybody is celebrating in Beirut today. The newspapers headlines wire filled with truce (not a typo), and a general feeling of elation engulfed the city this morning as the opposition started to dismantle its 17 months old sit-in complete with tents and food stalls. The reason for the festive mood is simple: Loyalists and Opposition seem to have come to a compromise in Doha: the election of army chief Michel Sleiman for President, a government in which the Opposition has veto power, and an electoral law that gives each side a bit from Lebanon, and keeps Beirut predominantly Haririan.

But leftists are killjoys, everybody knows that. Look how Khaled Saghieh refuses to join in the fun. In his editorial today (which I summarize and translate very freely) he calls on us to be ashamed and to commiserate. He asks: "What are the politicians, and the Lebanese people happy about? About electing a president who has no program and of whom we know nothing except that he stayed neutral when he was forced to do so? The military is not the best school of diplomacy, and we remember what happened in Nahr el Bared.

And we are going to have now a new government, in which the Opposition got all it wanted: veto power. This may prevent or correct the marginalization of some confessions, but what about the socio-economic programs? Neither Loyalists nor opposition have ever taken any position on that, except to use the poor and the workers as political pawns.

As for the last achievement of the Doha accord, the electoral law, all this has achieved is to anchor sectarianism further and deeper, in order to impose elections in which independent voices can never be heard.

There is nothing to rejoice about in these agreements, only more shame."

I told you he was a party-pooper.

Last Bite

"Schlosser asked his readers to consider the chain of consequences they set in motion every time they sit down to eat in a fast-food outlet. Roberts wants us to consider the “chain of transactions and reactions” represented by each of our food purchases—“by each ripe melon or freshly baked bagel, by each box of cereal or tray of boneless skinless chicken breasts.” This time, we are all implicated.

Driven by our bottomless stomachs, Roberts argues, the modern economy has reduced food to a “commodity” like any other, which must be generated in ever greater units at an ever lower cost, year by year, like sneakers or DVDs. But food isn’t like sneakers or DVDs. If we max out our credit cards buying Nikes, we can simply push them to the back of a closet. By contrast, our insatiable demand for food must be worn on our bodies, often in the form of diabetes as well as obesity. Overeating makes us miserable, and ill, but medical advances mean that it takes a long time to kill us, so we keep on eating. Roberts, whose impulse to connect everything up is both his strength and his weakness, concludes, grandly, that “food is fundamentally not an economic phenomenon.” On the contrary, food has always been an economic phenomenon, but in its current form it is one struggling to meet our uncurbed appetites. What we are witnessing is not the end of food but a market on the brink of failure. Those bearing the brunt are, as in Malthus’s day, the people at the bottom." (Thanks to Akhuy fil-Mahjar)


This is one of the most comprehensive and readable articles on the global food crisis from the New Yorker.

The Middle Eats

"But the global food crisis has carved out new opportunities for the Brotherhood and other hard-line groups across the Muslim world. Increasingly unaffordable prices underscore criticism of autocratic governments and drive more people toward fundamentalist groups. Though the Brotherhood fared poorly last year in municipal elections, it has been steadily gaining ground in recent months, sweeping votes for the leadership of Jordan's professional associations.

"America is being held responsible for what is happening," said Arshid, of Jordan's Islamic Action Front. "It's supporting these corrupt regimes."

Privatization efforts and free-market slogans have only fueled perceptions of corruption, giving teeth to claims that the region's pro-U.S. governments are corrupt lackeys serving only the elite.

"The economic team doesn't believe in the poor," said economist Kamhawi, who often confers with ranking Jordanian officials. "They only care about the rich. They say, 'The poor are failures. We have no interest in helping failures.' ""

So the media is now starting to realize that the Middle East, in addition to being a powder keg with a lit fuse is also one of the most food dependent places on earth. And how true it is that economic teams affiliated with the Arab regimes do not believe in the poor. I have worked with many and can vouch for that. Wake up!

The two Arab Worlds

"Egypt also got outside help from the United Arab Emirates, which donated a million tons of wheat to the country last week, said the Emirates state-owned news agency WAM.

Egypt is one of the world's largest importers of wheat, and prices shot up by more than 50 percent over the last year.

The Emirates is also struggling with rising food prices. The government has signed agreements with supermarkets to keep prices on more than 30 basic commodities at last year's levels.

Rising food prices have been more difficult for Mideast countries that lack significant natural resources, such as Jordan, which has raised food and fuel prices multiple times since the beginning of the year because the government lacks the cash to continue expensive subsidies."

The Arab divide: rich and poor.

Ten Things

"When 250 diners sit down to an £85 feast called Ten Things to Eat Before They Die this week, they plan to send a message to the mass market.

What's on the menu

· Lancashire asparagus The Formby crop is down to a few farmers after the loss of the transatlantic liner market.

· Herdwick mutton Staunchly produced since Beatrix Potter's day but confined to the Lake District.

· Ballobar capers Introduced to the Aragon region of Spain by the Moors but long since gone wild. Costly to harvest and outpriced by Andalusian and Moroccan rivals.

· Huehuetenango highland coffee From Guatemala. Needs forest shade and laborious depulping and bean-raking for its famed flavour.

·Raw milk cow's cheese Traditional process reintroduced by Irish artisan producers in the 1970s to international acclaim, but a small market.

· Herat raisins Known since the fourth century AD but the 120 varieties are struggling against Afghanistan's disruption and more lucrative crops such as poppies.

· Perry pear juice Unsuited to mass production and now limited to Gloucestershire, Herefordshire and Worcestershire.

· Imraguen mullet botarga Mauretanian caviar confined to the Banc d'Arguin national park, whose nomads with motorless boats are the only people permitted to fish there.

· Saxon village preserves Based on berries and other fruits from Transylvania, made by Romanian women to supplement low farming incomes.

· Saint Flour golden lentils Thin skins absorb sauces well but livestock has taken over much of the French land used in its early 20th century heyday." (Thanks Rania)

Syria, Lebanon and the Corleones

"Under the 'tutelage' of the Ottomans, Syria was a largely self-sufficient agrarian and trade-based economy (Lesch 1999: 94). 'The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, as well as the continuing economic problems of the Ottoman Empire in general by the 1870s (climaxing with its bankruptcy in 1875), forced a downturn in the Syrian economy that lasted into the early twentieth century' (Lesch 1999: 94). According to Beinin (2001: 16), 'the Ottoman agrarian regime was neither an Asiatic nor a feudal mode of production', although it shared a number of characteristics with both. The Ottoman state administered the largest share of the land. Interestingly, the 'Ottoman peasants who farmed state administered lands had more rights than European feudal tenants because they could not be evicted so long as they maintained cultivation and paid taxes' (Beinin 2001: 15).

Aoude (1997: 191) writes, 'by 1970, Syria became a net importer of food stuffs, which eventually, along with industrialisation and consumer goods imports, increased the trade deficit and developed a serious foreign exchange crisis'. The ruling class decided to use this crisis to restructure Syrian capitalism. Once Asad felt secure, he launched the first attempt at liberalisation in 1973. Pretentiously referred to as 'the infitah [opening] of abundance' (1973-1981), the measure was intended to increase the rate of exploitation by restructuring both rural and urban environments. In the countryside land reform allowed middle-ranking peasants to forge a profitable alliance with wealthy farmers and agribusiness at the expense of small peasants and rural wage-slaves (Aoude 1997: 192). Since the state bourgeoisie (meaning Asad, the Baath party, high ranking military officers and the trade union hierarchy) still had the upper hand within the ruling class, they managed to draw a red line around nationalised industries such as banking, mining, oil, insurance and manufacturing of strategic goods. Entrepreneurs would have to wait many years before gradually resting these segments of the economy away from the state bourgeoisie. However, Asad was more than willing to use the 'infitah of abundance' to create a mixed economy in areas such as tourism.

The reasons they moved into tourism are not very different from the Corleone family seeking interests in the tourist industries of Cuba and Las Vegas. 'First', explains Gray (1997: 58), 'the potential for tourism to generate foreign currency is important, all the more so in states ... suffering balance of payment problems. Second is the fact that tourism is labour intensive, and creates employment throughout the economy; tourists spend money on hotels, transport, and meals, but also on a wide variety of goods and services. Third, is the fact that the tourism industry does not, on the whole, require expensive or complex technology or a highly skilled workforce [with the exception of the need to operate an airline]'. Syria, by all accounts, has a whole host of tourist attractions, spread across the country and easily accessible. Traditional industries in the countryside (bedrock of the Syrian ruling class) could potentially benefit. Finally, and this is very significant for a regime as paranoid as the Syrian state, 'tourists themselves pose little threat to the stability or popularity of the regime' (Gray 1997: 60)."

From a long, fascinating article from libcom.org signed by Melancholic Troglodytes on class struggle in the Syrian-Lebanese relations. Very radical class analysis, read at your own risks. Take for example this paragraph from the conclusion:

"We feel those proletarians in the 'West' who wish to assist our 'Middle Eastern' counterparts in escalating the social conflict can do so on a number of fronts: First, we should step up the struggle against those sections of the bourgeoisie we have an impact on (this is sometimes the bourgeoisie 'at home' and sometimes vulnerable pockets of the ruling class 'abroad' and sometimes both at the same time); Second, we should acknowledge, demarcate and foreground the qualitative class divisions within 'our movement' by articulating the distinction between middle class 'anti-globalisers' and working class anti-capitalists. Middle class 'anti-globalisers' represent a neo-libertarian trend paralleling the ideology and structures of neo-liberalism. Tourist summit-hopping and joint-activities between some sections of the 'anti-globalisation' movement and reactionary scum like Hezbollah are merely the most obvious and superficial manifestation of this symbiosis; and finally, we should establish better channels of communication with our comrades in the Middle East, learning from their experience whilst informing them of ours."

For how long?

"With the army deployed throughout key areas, Lebanese citizens once again resumed their everyday activities under the more familiar conditions of a devastated environment, massive traffic jams, unregulated construction and urban planning, electricity and water shortages, state-sponsored theft or abuse of public lands and resources, rising poverty, inflation and unemployment, and one of the worst budget deficits per capita in the world. The illusion of normalcy, in other words, has returned returns for the time being but the real question is: for how long?"

Karim Makdisi's excellent analysis of the Lebanese crisis.

Haves and Have-Nots

"``The problem is Egypt doesn't have the money to pay for food subsidies,'' said Simon Kitchen, an economist and strategist at Cairo-based EFG-Hermes.

In Saudi Arabia, which has an economy three times the size of Egypt's and a third its population of 81.7 million, the government cut duties on wheat imports and lowered tariffs to 5 percent on frozen chicken, eggs, vegetable oil and canned food. That cost 6 billion riyals ($1.6 billion) a year in revenue, Okaz newspaper reported on April 3. Saudi Arabia, the world's largest oil exporter, is also planning to boost welfare payments and acquire farms abroad.

The U.A.E., which stashed away about $875 billion in its sovereign wealth fund as oil more than quadrupled, is considering purchasing farms in Cambodia, Thailand and Africa because ``the weather doesn't help us grow items in the country,'' Mohammed Ahmed bin Abdul Aziz, undersecretary of the Planning Sector at the Ministry of Economy, said in a May 13 interview."

The New Arab World of failed food systems.

India...

"This introduction of "free market forces" into food production and distribution has amounted to, in fact, murder. At first, as was inevitable in a market system subjected to strong deflationary pressures from World Bank, IMF and governmental authorities, prices shot down and small farmers lost in sequence their profits, their lands and their lives. Then as world market prices for essential foods shot up -- the result of the U.S. exporting its inflation to the rest of the world to finance its aggression in Iraq and the U.S. provision of vast subsidies to turn foodgrains into fuel -- masses living in hunger are driven to the verge of starvation while foodgrains they cannot afford to buy accumulate in the warehouses. We know that no long-term solution is possible absent revolutionary land reform, but neoliberal policies have brought the nation to the point where the vagaries of climate could produce famine not experienced in two generations." (Thanks Daniel)

Cash is king in a failed world

"So," says the Wisconsin dairy farmer, "they finally figured out, after all these years of pushing globalization and genetically modified [GM] seeds, that instead of feeding the world we've created a food system that leaves more people hungry. If they'd listened to farmers instead of corporations, they would've known this was going to happen.

The current global food system, which was designed by US-based agribusiness conglomerates like Cargill, Monsanto and ADM and forced into place by the US government and its allies at the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization, has planted the seeds of disaster by pressuring farmers here and abroad to produce cash crops for export and alternative fuels rather than grow healthy food for local consumption and regional stability. " (Thanks Rami)

Strong words from The Nation

Cut back

"This is a stark example of the many problems that are coming to light in the world’s agricultural system. Experts say that during the food surpluses of recent decades, governments and development agencies lost focus on the importance of helping poor countries improve their agriculture. Vital research programs have been slashed. At the rice institute, scientists have identified 14 genetic traits that could help rice plants survive the plant hopper, which sucks the juices out of young plants while infecting them with viruses. But the scientists have had no money to breed these traits into the world’s most widely used rice varieties." (Thanks D.)

Good article in the NYT commiserating the cut backs in research aimed at improving the lot of poor farmers. I'm expecting the big seed corporations to take over the ailing international research sector anytime now.

Wild edible plants

Check this FABULOUS site about wild edible plants from Lebanon and their culinary and therapeutic uses by IBSAR, an AUB interdisciplinary group.

Sunbula, Fair trade group from Palestine

"We are a Jerusalem-based nonprofit Fair Trade organization that supports Palestinian craft producers -- women's groups, artisan cooperatives and disabled people's organizations. By promoting traditional handicrafts locally and internationally, we support economic self-help efforts of those living in difficult conditions in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, and the Palestinian minority inside Israel." (Thanks Muna)

Harvest

No blogging today, I'm too tired. Just got back from a long day in South Lebanon, where we are entering the wheat harvest season. These are magical days.

Who are they?

It's not that I'm in a gloomy mood, but I cant help thinking about it all the time. In the past week, there has been nearly 100 dead and twice as many wounded, people who may never see or walk again. Many were killed by stray bullets and artillery. Others were killed in battles. But a significant number were civilians who were cold-bloodedly murdered. There are reports with pictures and videos about men who were tortured and executed. No one was arrested for these murders.

Who are the butchers?
Where do they live?
Does any one know their names?
Why are they still free?
Do they go to a family every evening and play with their children?
Do they think about what they have done? Does it haunt them?
Do I meet them without knowing who they are? Do I buy grocery from them? Do they fix my car?
Do they have a little life with a little wife and a little house and a little car and little children?
Do they remember it? Do they talk about it? Do they brag about it?
Do they fear the law? Do they think someone's going to come and get them and take them to jail and then condemn them for torture and murder?
Do they know that their deeds will be placed in a big box called "war activities", the box closed and then buried?
Do they see the eyes of their victims, do they hear their screams?

Burma

"Normally, at this time of year, Burmese farmers in the southern delta of Myanmar would be draining their rice paddies, plowing their fields with their water buffaloes and preparing to plant new seeds for an autumn harvest.

But two weeks ago, Cyclone Nargis did away with all that. The storm's timing could not have been worse. Tens of thousands of farm families lost their draft animals, their rice stocks and their planting seeds. Now the harvest is in doubt as well." (Thanks D.)

Nervous regimes

"The success of the strike moves in Egypt and Lebanon would not have been possible without an event unimaginable until two years ago : Hizbollah's victory in the war against Israel. From the very moment that the Arab peoples, from Morocco to Iraq, realised that a political-military movement's daring and determination could breach imperialist strategy, fear began to run up the backbones of the area's regimes, making their nervousness ever more obvious to their peoples."

Egypt's and Lebanon's workers strike seen by Alberto Cruz. The strike in Egypt might have been a success, albeit qualified. In Lebanon, the strike was quickly dissolved in the war over the governmental decrees delegitimizing Hizbullah's communication and surveillance network. But the regimes are nervous, that's for sure.

Lebanese coffee

You know how the last bout of Lebanese civil war was started because of two unfortunate decrees? You remember how the government was reluctant to withdraw the 2 decrees because, it said it would make the government look bad? Well read this: In the same ill-fated ministerial meeting in which the 2 decrees were taken, the government backtracked on another decree barely one month after it had taken it.

Apparently, the government had imposed a tax duty of 5% on imported green coffee beans, and no duty on roasted beans. The 2 largest importers, Sinno and Bsat, pleaded their case with their friend PM Sanioura, who found no problem in backtracking on the 2 decrees without the government losing face in the process.

But that's not the best bit. In a TV interview yesterday, Finance Minister Jihad Azour was asked about the elimination of the tax duty on green coffee bean. He looked extremely surprised, and did not seem to be aware that this decision was taken in a Council of Minister in which he participated.

This is not the first time I hear of such decisions being slipped at the last moment in the minutes of the council of ministers. As Mohammad Zbeeb asks: was it really worth going to war for such a corrupt government?

Badael-Alternatives

The new issue of Badael in al Akhbar: My editorial: Israeli biopiracy. The main article, on seeds and bioporacy: when corporations go hunting. Rana Hayeck writes about alternative medicine, Intellectual Property Rights and rosemary...

High level

A high level conference on World Food Security is to be held by FAO in Rome 3-5 June 2008. The agenda and the background papers are posted here. They appear to be interesting.

Why are patents on seeds dangerous?

"Monopoly control of crop genes is a bad idea under any circumstances. But in the midst of a global food crisis with climate change looming, such control is unacceptable and must be challenged. Patented gene technologies will concentrate corporate power, drive up costs, inhibit independent research, and further undermine the rights of farmers to save and exchange seeds. Globally, the top 10 seed corporations already control 57% of commercial seed sales. A handful of transnational seed and agrochemical companies are positioned to determine who gets access to patented genes and what price they must pay." (Thanks Steve)

Really serious

"UN alert: One-fourth of world's wheat at risk from new fungus

The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) warned in March that Iran had detected a new highly pathogenic strain of wheat stem rust called Ug99.

The FAO warned stated east of Iran — Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan to be on high alert.

Scientists and international organizations focused on controlling wheat stem rust have said 90 percent of world wheat lines are susceptible to Ug99. The situation is particularly critical in light of the existing worldwide wheat shortage." (Thanks Steve)

This is REALLY serious. It could easily spell the eradication of traditional wheat farming in the countries of the Levant, where wheat originally came from. It could also mean further dependency on imported grain, but also on new breeds of wheat, GMO or otherwise, which would be protected with strong patents and therefore out of reach of small farmers. I have blogged about it earlier, latest here. For more, search the blog under wheat rust.

Stop Press

The Council of Ministers just declared the cancellation of the 2 decrees. Hopefully this will come as a first step towards a resolution of the stalemate.

Round up

Nothing new today on the security front: precarious calm. The Arab league envoys are here and they have spoken to Berri, Hariri, Jumblat Gemayel, Geagea and others. The government is still undecided whether or not to cancel or the infamous decrees. According to the media, the ministers are divided over the matter. That's the news till now.

Akkar

Akkar is the poorest district of Lebanon: a recent UNDP report found that 63% of the families are deprived and face serious poverty. Located in the extreme north of the country, Akkar is an agricultural district, with an estimated rural population of 80%, the highest in Lebanon.

The landscape of Akkar is breathtakingly beautiful and extremely diverse. There are 3 principal physiographic zones: the plain (al Sahl), the mid-elevation plateau, and the mountains (al Jurd), which reach up to the tallest peak of Lebanon, the Qornet al Sawda. Akkar is home to the Qammou`a fir forest, a unique environmental treasure, and to vast expanses of oak and pine forests. The plain is endowed with rich, fertile soils and generous water resources. On the coast, small scale fishing and vegetable production are a major source of income. Besides farming and fishing, enrollment in the Lebanese army is one of the few livelihood options open to the poor of Akkar.

Akkar was under quasi-feudal rule till recent times, and the current social and economic relations are still heavily impregnated with this history. As in all feudal societies, resources, especially land, was in the hand of a few. This has resulted in tremendous social and economic inequality: Akkar has, according to the UNDP, the highest level of inequality in Lebanon. The Lebanese state bears much responsibility for this situation: public investments in basic infrastructure and services such as health and education but also in agricultural development and small industries have been minimal.

Poverty and inequality lead to extremism and to political violence. Major investments are immediately required in the basic sectors, such as health and education, but also in the productive sectors, such as agriculture, in order to help the poor construct sustainable livelihoods. Akkar’s natural resources endowment combined with a significant rural society offer a tremendous potential that must be captured. In light of the dramatic increase in world food prices, this is the moment to do so.

Photos by Tanya Traboulsi

Small carrots and big sticks

As Egypt continues to guide Lebanon towards normalization, its own backyard is in flames. Mustapha Basiouni, writing in Al-Akhbar (in Arabic), offers his analysis of the current socio-economic situation in Egypt, after the increase in food prices of about 100% and the promised rise in salaries of 30%. Below is a summary of selected sections of the article.

The Egyptian regime has traditionally addressed the demands of the population with a combination of small carrots and big sticks. While repressing the demonstrators with live ammunition and leaving many dead, a rise of 30% was promised, but not yet enacted. The raise translates in a wage increase of about $15 for most employees. And while the raise is not expected to be effective until the end of the month, the 100% increase in food prices that was also determined by government came into effect at the beginning of the month, leaving the people one month short. The salary increase will cost the government 12 billions Egyptian Liras, but the increase in food prices will save them 15 billions Egyptian Liras. Thus, the government, largely made up of business men found a way to make money off the people. The new rallying cry of the workers unions is "Take back the raise and the price increase".

Hidden cost

War is an opportunity to make money, and not only for Haliburton. In Beirut, the price of local fruits and vegetables has increased by 100% as disaster capitalists of all sides and sizes have seized the opportunity to make a quick buck. A large number of people live hand to mouth in Lebanon, and they have not been able to work in the past week. This article (in Arabic by Rasha Abu Zeki in Al Akhbar tells many stories, like that of the old woman trying to cook a meal for 5 persons with only 5,000 Liras ($3) to spare. This is the real sadness of Lebanon.

Round up

The situation today is calmer than yesterday. I went around today, and saw that the army has taken position where I had previously seen armed men from the SSNP in Hamra and Rawcheh, although there were unarmed youth, sometimes in military fatigues, hanging about.

In the mountain, the situation is also calm, and the Lebanese Army has taken position in many locations previously occupied by Jumblat’s PSP. However, I believe that the situation remains very fragile, and that this is at best a wait-and-see period. There are 2 reasons for that:

1. The Lebanese Army appears to be disempowered. Whether this is a temporary tactic in order to preserve the unity of the last major state institution, or because it is really powerless is not important at this stage. What is relevant is that the army will probably vacate any position it occupies if it is asked to do so by the militias, because it is avoiding confrontation.
2. Waleed Jumblat represents the vast majority of the Druze. Figures of 90% are often quoted. The Druze are believed to constitute just 5% of the Lebanese population, but their strategic location in the mountain gives them the advantage of the terrain, and they are also thought to be well armed. They will not easily give in.
   

In the North, the situation has also quieted down, and peace agreements are being signed between the belligerents. But the issue of the SSNP militants executed in Halba might still have repercussions, although this will probably happen at a later stage.

The Council of Ministers was expected to meet today to cancel the two ill fated decrees, as it was requested to do so by the army. PM Sanioura seems to have backed down on this as he declared that he will wait for the Arab Foreign minister’s delegation sent to mediate before calling for a meeting of the council of ministers. This is understandable: why give the cancellation for free, let it be a negotiating chip in a general settlement.

Most roads in and out of Lebanon are closed or dangerous. The Damascus highway is closed in Majdel Anjar by masked men belonging or close to the Future movement, although there are rumors and press reports that they are closers to Salafis than to the Future. In any case, all the hotels of Damascus are fully booked, and travelers will have to spend the night in the airport if they find seats of a flight. The airport road is still closed. A new luxury yacht transport system has been initiated from the Dbayyeh and Jounieh ports by seafaring entrepreneurs. The yachts are fully equipped with satellite TVs and cell phones and will take you to Cyprus in 6-7 hours for $1,500 per adult. One way. They take 14 passengers. Do the math: that’s a quarter of a million US$ in a week’s work.

I’ll stick around.

Behind the Sport City

Najwa cleans the houses of the rich in Beirut. She lives with her son in the limbo spreading between the Stadium (Cite Sportive) and the Sabra Palestinian camp. Sociologists often refer to the Palestinian camps in Lebanon as a "space of exclusion": the laws governing life in the camps are different from those governing life in the rest of Lebanon. Najwa's neighborhood is an exclusion from the exclusion: no laws apply there.

Najwa's one-room house has been put together from various materials: a bit of cement, some wood, and a couple of glass windows. Electricity and running water are occasional guests. There is a small platform in front of the house where she keeps plants in old powdered milk containers. She sits there sometimes in the evenings, after a day's work and talks to her neighbors.

They have drifted in from all over the place. Some are Shi'a from the Bekaa, some from the South, some are Sunni from 'Aarsal, in the Bekaa, and others are settled nomads. There are also a few houses built from wood, plastic and corrugated iron, where Nawar (Roma or Dom) people live. They were all brought here by poverty and the need for shelter.

The area is known as "Behind the Sport City". For the past 3 years, its inhabitants have been living in tremendous tension. The sectarian parties of Lebanon have found fertile ground among the poor. There are many reasons for that: occasional payments and aid, the need for protection when the bulldozers will come to clear the illegal settlement, but also fear. An irrational perhaps, but very powerful fear from "the other", a state that was cultivated by the various sectarian media in the past 3 years.

"Behind the Sport City" sits in the middle of an explosive cauldron: The Future Movement's Tariq al Jadidah stronghold to the north, Jumblat's PSP-controlled Wata Mussaytbah to the west, the Palestinian camp to the east and the Rihab neighborhood dominated by Amal to the south. Around Najwa's house, everybody was armed, but the Future movement's militias were the most powerful. They became bolder after the events of the Beirut Arab University last year, when organized shooting took place between Amal and Future supporters and resulted in several dead and wounded.

On Wednesday, Najwa told me, the Future militia established armed presence around her and shot at the houses of opposition supporters. Many left. When the skirmishes started on Thursday afternoon, the neighborhood filled up with armed men. She looked out of her door and saw her neighbors sitting outside the house. Their 17 years old stood up and walked towards the street. He was shot and died there.

Najwa and her son left the house in a hurry and ran down the hill to seek shelter in Sabra. The Palestinian camp was boiling, filled with armed men. Hamas and Fateh supporters were eying each others menacingly. Hama's people support Hizbullah, and Fateh are sympathetic to Hariri and the Future movement. But when the night fell, they all joined rank as the camp began to tremble. As the sound of explosion and gunfire increased, a rumor had spread through the camp: Samir Geagea men, the Lebanese Forces, were coming back to massacre everyone, as in September 1982. Najwa tells me that as of this moment, the camp established serious guard rounds till the morning, and only relaxed when the news came that the Opposition had taken over the city.

When she went back to her house, Najwa found the neighbors in mourning. Being Shi'a, their grief and anger had been adopted by the Amal militiamen. These had gone around shooting and terrorizing some of the known Future supporters. The Nawar people, she told me, paid the price. But her neighbor's son was dead.

The poor, regardless of color, race or creed, always pay the price.

Perspective

I know we are all immersed in the Lebanese crisis, but lets get some perspective here: an estimated 100,000 have died in Burma in the aftermath of cyclone Nargis, and agencies estimate that the death toll could rise to 1.5 millions if clean water and sanitation are not provided. A 7.8 Richter earthquake hit south-east China, and the number of victims is still unknown. Elsewhere in the world, the food crisis is still unfolding, and the number of people who are hungry keeps increasing by about 5 millions a year. That's 10 persons becoming hungry every minute.

Now back home. West Beirut is fully paralyzed, there are road blocks everywhere (see previous post) and, in spite of what the Opposition has declared, there are still armed elements in the streets. The ones I saw were very young, and did not really look like the seasoned fighters who can control a city or even a street. They were hanging out at short distances from their headquarters.

In the mountains, the fighting that took place yesterday afternoon had almost ended by last night. The army is taking over some of the offices and some of the strongholds of Jumblat's Progressive Socialist Party. No doubt that Jumblat did not want a war, although it is said that his militia, which used to be called the Popular Army- Al Jaysh al Shaabee, has kept some of its structure and much of its weapons. In 1991, Jumblat refused to surrender his weapons to the Lebanese Army, and preferred to give it to the Syrian Army, which may have allowed him to keep some. This was when Jumblat was still a close ally of Syria.

Negotiations between the Loyalists and the oppositions have of course already started. I say "started" and not "resumed" because we are in presence of a totally new balance of power, as if the last card game had been stopped, a new one has been started, and new hands distributed to the players. Now, before formal negotiations (euphemistically called "dialogue", al hiwar) take place the players are trying to consolidate their hand.

For the Loyalists, this means rallying as much external support as possible, from the Arab League to the Sixth Fleet. This is taking place concurrently with the establishment of physical control over regions that are traditional Loyalists strongholds: Tripoli where street battles are still going on, and Akkar, where several members of the SSNP were killed yesterday in what appeared to be an execution; Koura and the North, where the Lebanese forces moved to take control, which prompted some of the inhabitants to call for the Lebanese Army to take over.

For the opposition (and this refers mainly to Hizbullah) the most important goal is probably to preserve its ability to physically communicate with "its" regions: the South and the Bekaa. There are 3 main roads that are important for that purpose: 1) the Damascus road through Aley, 2) the Coastal road to the South through Shweifat, the lower Shuf and the carob district, and 3) the Mashghara-Jezzine road, which passes near the High Shuf, Niha and not very far from Barouk and Mukhtara, where Jumblat's palace is located. Yesterday's fighting took place around Shweifat, Aley and the Mashghara Jezzine road. While the Shweifat and Aley roads appears to have been secured by the Lebanese army, the situation in the high Shuf is still unclear.

Shut down

Below is the main text of an email sent by one of the UN agencies to staff in Lebanon. It indicates the streets that were closed yesterday and which are probably still closed today.


1- Mar Elias (blocked near Cornich il Mazra'a and Center Makassed)

2- Cornish il Mazra'a on 4 locations

3- Intersection of Verdun and Ramlit il Bayda and the Beginning of the
Cornish

4- Near Rawsheh on Cornish

5- Dinaweh and the road leading to Sodeco Square

6- Ein il Mrayesseh (may open later on)

7- High Bshara il Khoury (2 locations)

8- Airport Road as well as Msaitbeh, the tunel is completely closed, only
entrance is from those living on the bridge, roads leading to the bridge
are also closed

9- Sodeco square and the road leading to downtown Beirut, part of the
protective element of the Grand Serail

10- Ring Highway, both sides, 4 lines of blockade

11- The two streets on top of Hamra leading to LAU as part of the
protective element of the Hariri Residence

12- The Kroitem High Way, near britstol also as part of the protective
quadrant of Hariri residence

13- Tayyouneh Rondpoint completely closed

14- Shatila Rondpoint completely closed

Unsung heroes

Two days of mini-civil war were sufficient to drown the city in garbage: The Lebanese are a nation of consumers, and they produce large quantities of solid waste. During the 1975-1991 wars, Beirut's rubbish was all disposed of on the seafront and in the sea, near what used to be the Normandy hotel and the place came to be known as the Normandy dump. During times of heavy fighting, piles of garbage would be left to rot at street corners, and when the stench became too strong, these piles would be set on fire, smothering the city with the characteristic smell of burning rubbish and filling our lungs and houses with poisonous smoke.

After 1991, solid waste disposal became a priority goal of the new republic, but alas only in Beirut. The operation of solid waste removal and disposal was subcontracted to Sukleen, a private company whose owner is close to the top politicians of the country. The process for awarding the contracts as well as the costs of the contracts have all been severely criticized, and there were widespread accusation of corruption. The location of the solid waste disposal dump, in the Naameh area south of Beirut, as well as its design and its capacity have also come under fire. Yet, and while the rest of Lebanon's cities and villages are still awash with their own rubbish (because the state is not interested in anything aside from Beirut), the city (at least the central part of it) has become, in the past few years, cleaner than I have ever known it.

The system is simple and human intensive: People throw their garbage in large rectangular bins situated at street corners and the Sukleen trucks come and collect it on a very regular basis. But people are often careless, and throw their rubbish around the bins. Many do not close the bags properly. As a result, there is often as much garbage inside the bin as there is outside.

But the Beirutis have found another function for these bins: they use them to block roads whenever there are strikes or demonstrations. Their contents spill out, and the roads are closed to the collectors. Garbage accumulates again on street corners, and at these times, I can start smelling the burn again. This is what Beirut looked like yesterday.


West Beirut is still unsure of what to make of the latest political developments. Although the army is said to have taken over the whole city, people are cautiously evaluating the situation behind the safety of their TV sets. There are occasional sounds of gunshots, but we are told it is in mourning as people bury their dead. The streets are empty, but they are clean. Another, silent army has deployed, clad in bright green: the Sukleen cleaners. Many come from India, Bengladesh, or Sri lanka, and they are here, in the middle of this conflict, to clean the Beiruti's mess. Like an army, they follow orders. Fear or disobedience means the loss of a much needed wage. I spoke in a combination of broken Arabic and English with Asam this morning, as he and his 2 colleagues were cleaning an empty street in Hamra. The 3 of them are from Madras, India. Two of them have been here 2 and a half year and one just 6 months. They are given $200 a month (the minimum wage in Lebanon), and health insurance, and they are all housed together (I couldn't tell how many to a room) in common sleeping quarters. He did not seem to be aware that the government has decreed a 40% increase in the minimum wage.

To those unsung heroes.

Time zones

This is what I have to say about the latest series of political speeches in Lebanon: Nasrallah speaks as if there is no future, but Jumblat, Hariri and Sanioura speak as if there is no past. For Nasrallah, the past performance and actions of the Loyalists is the only reference point. The past (?) collusion of some of them with Israel, their current alliance with the US and the intersection of some of their positions with the Israeli agenda, as well as the incapability of the Lebanese state to liberate the South and to protect the resistance appear to be the only unit of measure. On the other hand, the trio JHS has been delivering speeches and addresses as if the past did not exist, as if the resistance was not under threat of physical elimination by the Loyalists very allies, as if members of the Loyalists had not destroyed Beirut many times and invited and supported the Israelis when they invaded it, as if there had not been a number of youth killed by the thugs of the Future movement in Tarik al Jadideh and Ard Jalloul, as if there was no Future movement militia in Beirut brought from the North (seen by many on TV and in the streets before the fighting) or PSP (Jumblat) militia (which has murdered Druze political opponents in the mountains), and as if the State was all powerful, belonged to all its citizen, and capable of extending its authority onto the 4 corners of the country and to fend off Israeli agendas. When you start so far away from each others, the next stop is Xanadu, as my friend Anna would say. The first thing these guys should do is get into the same time zone. This is if they want to find a way out.

PM Sanioura gave a speech today from the grand serail. Besides the attacks and refutations of Nasrallah's rhetoric, he made the following offer: The fate of the contentious decrees (which, he said, have not come into effect) is to be decided by the Army; all armed presence is to be removed from the streets; the sit in and the strike are to be lifted and the airport re-opened, a new president is elected (I assume he meant army general Sleiman, but he didn't say that) following which a national unity government is created in which neither the parliamentary majority nor the opposition have veto power, and the new government will prepare for elections on the basis of the qada (district), with minor "demographic" (read sectarian) adjustment. He added that this offer can form a basis on which one can build to get to a compromise. I think so too.

Moments later, the army responded by taking positive steps and reinstating the airport chief of security. The Opposition accepted to remove all armed presence, but promised to keep the "civil disobedience" going. En passant, it reminded Sanioura that the decrees are as effective as can be, as they have been sent to the UN for support in implementation.

In West Beirut, and for a reason I cannot fathom, sand barricades have been erected, blocking traffic in almost all the main streets.

Walk through the city

I took a walk through West Beirut this morning to check on my parents who live in Moussaytbah (see the map below, my itinerary in yellow). On Sadat, near Smith's, and at the cross road with Hamra, there were a few damaged shop windows, but almost all shops were open. I encountered the first serious damage in the street perpendicular to Hamra, one that leads at one end to the Hariri residence-cum-bunker and at the other to the Ministry of Economy and Trade, where there was heavy Future Movement presence. There are signs that a battle took place in this street, and one of the shops and the floor above it have been hit with a Rocket Propelled Grenade (RPG). As I stood there, an army unit made up of several armored vehicles and a few 4x4 took position on Makdessi Street (army car in the picture, at the far end of the street). A bit further down Hamra, an unlucky shop owner was clearing his clothes shop that had been severely hit. The circulation in Hamra was not what I'd call "normal" for a Saturday morning, but it was pretty busy, and every other street walker was a foreign reporter, complete with multipocket vest and satellite dish-crowned van.

The rest of Hamra was normal bar the mounds of rubbish that had accumulated over the past 3 days. This city won't last one week if Sukleen stops collecting the rubbish. Luckily, the ubiquitous green trucks are back in action.

I walked up towards Zarif from the intersection near the old Al-Nahar building. I passed Zarif, and then got to Aisha Bakkar. This is an old, middle class, traditionally Sunni neighborhood, one of the oldest in the city. Most shops were open and trading. There were some signs of fighting, mostly bullet riddled cars. Further down, in Zaydaniyyed is where I started to see more damage: a couple of burnt cars, and a lot of bullet holes in walls and shop windows. At the intersection with Mar Elias street, a couple of unarmed men clad in Amal flags superman-style were closing the road with the (multi-purpose) rubbish disposal containers. I asked one of them why he was closing the road and he said, slightly startled, that there were skirmishes in Zarif (!).

I came back through Moussaytbah. The road was blocked near the house of the late Saeb Salam (old prime minister) and I took the street that runs from Sodeco-Bechara el Khoury, all the way to Mar Elias through the Malla area back to Zarif. This is where the fiercest battles took place: rubble, burnt cars, and broken glass all the way. I have marked it in thicker yellow on the map. In Malla, there was a Future Movement office: it has been burnt.

I had gone through all these areas without encountering one single person carrying visible weapons, although I did see a number of young and less young men grouped at street corners not looking particularity cool. By the time I got back to Zarif, there were two young armed men under a building where my friend lives. The same building has a Future TV relay antenna on the roof, and the top floor apartment belongs to the TV. My friend, who works for the TV told me that a group of armed men have taken over the apartment, that they caused damage to the installation, and that they questioned the 2 technical staff. They placed armed guards on the street, barely 200m from a Lebanese army field post. My friend tells me they are Hizbullah people. Another dark shameful spot on the Resistance's record. No one, NO ONE, has the right to shut down the media, and Hizbullah (or whoever, it is still Hizbullah's responsibility) is not allowed to occupy apartments, and certainly NOT in residential buildings.

Back in Hamra, cafes had opened and people were chilling out on the trottoir a couple of hundred meters away from the besieged Hariri guards in the Koreitem palace. I continued towards Rawcheh, and this is where I saw more armed men: SSNP militia. A group of 5 or 6 young men, with new guns and fatigues and clips, relaxing at a street corner, a few hundred meters away from their main office. Rawcheh looked desolate, dirty and damaged.

When I got home, I heard the bad news: Three men from Hizbullah had been kidnapped in Aley by Jumblat's goons and 2 of them had been executed. An armed man had shot at a group of mourners in the martyr's cemetery near Dahiyeh and killed 2. Members of the SSNP had been kidnapped in the North allegedly by Lebanese forces. By that time the streets where empty again

Time machine

The SSNP (Syrian Social National Party) has taken its flags out of the cupboards, dusted off the naphtalene, and hung them at 50 meters interval from street lights and balconies in Ras Beirut. With this simple step, it has created a time machine: we are back in 1978.

The Future movement supporters in Hamra have removed the Hariri pictures from streets and windows. They are timidly starting to come out of hiding and to hang out on street corners. Some are bolder and louder than others: one can see they are ready to shift their allegiance to the new street rulers. In the corner shop, there was a long queue and little fresh foods. We bought a few cans and as we were leaving, a bread delivery van stopped, and we also purchased fresh bread. There were young students wearing keffiehs walking around the AUB area. Then a black SUV with dark windows stopped and armed men with talkie-walkies came out in that very-important-fashion men develop when they are given a machine gun. They looked around and everybody instinctively made way. They bought bread and cigarettes and left. They were dressed in Internal Security Forces uniforms, but their car's number plate was civilian.

I don't like armed men (or women) in general, not in city streets, and certainly not when normal people are coming out of two days of armed battles. These ones looked like para-security forces, which makes me like them even less. I hope we won't be seeing more of this type in the "new era". But somehow, I don't think so. This is the price Hizbullah (and Hasan Nasrallah in particular) might have to pay for the take over of West Beirut. Even if they give the control of the city back to the army, the latter has been weakened because it has watched all the events take place without intervening. I do not particularly like armies, and a lot of criticism can be poured on the Lebanese army, not least because of its actions against Palestinian civilians in Nahr el Bared, but it is an institution that can maintain some form of order and rule of law. And when you weaken it you leave void that has to be filled. Unless Hizbullah wants to step in (and I don't think it does), it will have to deal with the repercussions of having strengthened goons and parasites.

There are signs that things might slip: One of the old Future TV's building , the one adjoining the Saudi embassy in Rawcheh, was set on fire today, allegedly by SSNP militants. It may be true that the building served as a barrack for Future Movement thugs. It is also true that over the past 3 years there has been tremendous tensions between the thugs in there and those at the SSNP central office, which is around the corner. But setting a building on fire, and especially a media-related one, was a pointless act of vandalism which reflects very badly on the opposition and its leadership. The same can be said for silencing Future TV by sabotaging its installations. There were also motorcades going around the streets today shooting in the air for no other purpose than showing off and celebrating the take over. This is not what Hizbullah did in the South when it kicked the Israelis out. In Beirut, the stakes are even higher.

The evening is quiet. Uneasy quiet.

Grief

There are no clean wars and no intelligent deaths, but civil strife certainly takes the prize for dirtiest and dumbest. Anything -anything- is better than civil strife.

I just came back from the funeral wake of my neighbor's son. He was 16 and he and his friend were shot this morning in my street. His family owns a bakery and a cafe in my neighborhood. They are also very involved in the local mosque. He and a bunch of other kids always hang out between the bakery and the cafe. They are Hariri supporters by default, like many other Beirut Sunnis. At around 10:30, when the fighting intensity was beginning to decrease, they went out to have a look. The sniper caught them both.

Fools plus

In the same ill fated meeting in which it took the decision to outlaw Hizbullah's communication network, the council of minister also decided to stop the Export Plus program for one year "to save money". The program is one of the few agricultural support programs, and it has come under criticism for targeting exporters and middle men by subsidizing cost of freight. The government had decided to amend it and continue supporting it. Not anymore, apparently.

Kids in battles

My children and their cousin hiding after coming under fire in our house this morning.

Now what?

We found another bullet in our house, in my daughter's room, right over her bed. But the fighting has subsided in Ras Beirut, although we still hear explosions and gunfire. The TV news reports say that the whole of West Beirut has fallen to the Opposition. I say Opposition, not Amal and Hizbullah because apparently, Hamra and the rest of Ras Beirut are in the hands of the SNP (Syrian Nationalist Party, Qawmiyyeh). SNP is a secular party with members from all sects, and, during the 1975-1991 war it was in control of Hamra and Ras Beirut. But I am not 100% sure about this, and I'll confirm later. There are also news that the large contingents of fighters that had joined the ranks of the Future Movement from Akkar and the rest of the North have surrendered. The army is taking control of many "sensitive" areas, but I think this does not mean much as the army is avoiding engaging in confrontation and is only playing the role of the neutral moderator. But then again, this might be what is needed at this stage: a "moderating" army in Beirut.

Now what?

It is too early to say anything, but there is no doubt that, as Nasrallah made it clear yesterday, this is a totally new epoch. I assume Berri will be in charge of negotiations with the loyalists. Whether a compromise that will safeguard "Lebanon" is still possible at this stage is difficult to predict. The Lebanese politicians have a history of wiping the slate clean and starting again as if nothing had happened, with a quick prayer for the unlucky dead. But these are new times, and the situation in Iraq and Palestine is worse than ever, and the Arab countries are themselves divided and aligned with opposite sides. The US has now much more at stake in the region. And there are new players: Iran, Al Qaeda who thrive on instability in Lebanon, and who possess a loaded agenda. On the more local level, what will be the response of the local population to this take over especially that for the past 3 years the Lebanese have been relentlessly hammered with a sectarian discourse? Will they consider this to be an "occupation" and respond to it as in Iraq?

I know I may be sounding over dramatic. Blame it on lack of sleep and being shot at. But I cant help thinking that all bets are off.

Baptism of fire

I live in Ras Beirut, between Hamra and Manara. We woke up this morning to the sound of machine gun shooting. I looked from the window and there was a few young armed civilians running in all directions. The kids were startled and we did what everybody does at times like these: seek the news. I sat at my computer and logged into the usual websites, then left the laptop to go to the tv, in the same room. The kids came in the room. Suddenly there was a small explosion, like a firecracker, with a cloud of dust and smoke. My 10 years old was the nearest to the source and we all looked towards him. There was a little hole in the glass door of the balcony, and another one in the wall a meter or so away from him. A bullet had come through the balcony, passed between the children and removed a small chunk of the wall, a meter or so away from my kid. We are now all huddled in a small room with no windows, waiting for the storm to pass. As I write, the fighting and shooting is still going on.

My kid had his baptism of fire at 10.

Return of the Dragon

It has been smoldering for 150, 50, 30, or 17 years, depending on who you read. This week, the sleeping dragon woke up, infuriated by 3 years of relentless drumming. The civil war is upon us once again. As I write, there are sounds of explosions and automatic weapons fire in my neighborhood. There is fighting in most of West Beirut: Ras el Nabeh, Mazraa, Barbour, but also Rawsheh, Sakiet al Janzir and Ayn el Tineh, near the official residence of the speaker of the parliament and the head of the Amal movement, Nabih Berri.

A quick round up of the latest events: out of the blue, and just when we thought they were going to come to some sort of agreement, the belligerents increased the pressure. The Siniora government took a decision that will go into the annals of the nation, famously or infamously, depending on who wins the round and gets to write history. It declared illegal the communication network of the Resistance (led and dominated by Hizbullah) and called for the army and the internal security to implement the decree. It also sought support from the UN security council on this issue.

Communication is the backbone of war and without it both resistance and resistants are exposed. Hizbullah's command and control is impressive, and this is what allowed it to fend off the Israeli attacks in July and August 2006. It was specifically mentioned in the Winograd report as the Resistance's main strength, and the report also called for its destruction. For Hizbullah, giving up the communications network is tantamount to disarming. This, of course it will not do, especially that the party is listed as a terrorist organization in the US, and that there is a death warrant on its leadership. They are convinced that the Israelis will hunt them down one by one, and will eliminate them, as they have done with many before them, latest being Imad Mughniyyieh.

This governmental decision came on the morning of the Worker's Union strike to protest the high costs of living. The Union is close to the Opposition led by Hizbullah, which used the opportunity to make a show of strength in Beirut. The airport road was closed, and tens of neighborhood thugs, mostly belonging to the Amal movement, an allied Shi'a party were unleashed . They went on a rampage called "civil demonstration". The thugs on the other side, mostly from the Sunni Future movement, met them in the streets, and stone throwing quickly became AK47 rapid fire. After a while both sides upgraded to rocked propelled grenades. That was last night.

Today was quiet, everybody was waiting. Hassan Nasrallah, Hizbullah's leader maximo had promised a press conference at 4 pm. What he said, we expected to hear: that this had been the last straw, that targeting the communication network is the same thing as targeting the Resistance's weapons, that those who dare to touch the weapons will be treated as traitors, and we all know the fate of traitors. He also gave an ultimatum to the government: either withdraw its decrees or face the consequences. Another important thing he said is that he does not fear the Shi`a-Sunni strife anymore, and called on the loyalists to stop using this issue to blackmail Hizbullah. Yet, he made Waleed Jumblat, the Druze leader, the target of his attacks and did not mention either Saad Hariri or Saudi Arabia. I am sure the speech will be dissected and deconstructed ad infinitum tomorrow, so I'll leave it at that.

Saad Hariri, the head of the Future movement, appeared on TV a few minutes ago and read from a prepared statement. He derided Hassan N. a little bit and defended the government's decisions. His discourse was very "islamist" and "arabist" and contained a lot of one-upmanship, especially on Israel and Palestine. He attributed the position of Hizbullah towards the decrees to a "misunderstanding", but whoever wrote the speech for him could not resist the urge of the insulting bon mot and said also "lack of understanding", in other words stupidity. This won't go down very well.

Hariri gave a 3-steps plan to diffuse the tension and stop the hostilities: first, the government's decrees will be considered as "misunderstood" and given to the army to deal with. If the army decides not to follow up on them, then this decision would be accepted. He then asked for a complete withdrawal of all armed elements, the removal of the barricades and the opening of the airport. And thirdly, he asked for the immediate election of Army General Michel Sleiman as the new president. Sleiman will then lead the new rounds of dialog between the different parties, in order to find a compromise over the future of Lebanon.

Since then, there has been more fighting, and there were also several very loud explosions. It doesn't look like Hariri's offer will be readily accepted.

Street violence and frozen chicken

In spite of the obviously sectarian nature of the violent events that have taken place in Lebanon yesterday, the fact that they were associated with the general workers strike is highly symbolic. As elsewhere in the food-dependent countries of the Middle East, but also in Asia, Africa and the Caribbeans, the poor and the slightly less poor in Lebanon have been protesting the tremendous increase in food prices. The cost of living was never cheap in Lebanon, but it has now become prohibitive. I won't go into an analysis of the causes, as I have many previous postings about that and the world is awash with economic hindsight experts telling us what we already know. In Lebanon, a combination of laissez-faire economy of the worst kind, corruption, self-serving policies and worship of the market gods has led to the disintegration of the productive sector. To be fair, while farming has been left to die slowly, there has been some investment into industrialized agro-foods. By industrializing agriculture, definite economic gains are made because of the economy of scale and also because large investors have more political clout and can sway policies and legislations their way. The price is paid by small producers who do not have the investment power, the access to knowledge and to technology of the industrialists. This forces them out of business, their lands are purchased and consolidated, and they end up as wage laborers on their lands or they drift to the outskirts of the cities. This is what happened (on a much larger scale) in India and has led to the suicide of 150,000 farmers in the past 10 years. This is also what happened in Lebanon, but the farmers did not kill themselves, at least not directly. Some of them emigrated, but most migrated to the outskirts of the cities where they became fertile ground for radical movements of all kinds, and where they became clients of the sectarian politicians. This of course, is more like mass suicide.

I understand governmental policies on farming and agriculture. They are simplistic, like a lot of neo-classical economic policies. They are growth-oriented, and use lumped growth (GNP) as their basic indicator. GNP is important, but it is not the only measure. Indicators of development (such as equity) are at least as important not least because the more equity, the less the danger of revolts and violence of the kind we are seeing. It is also important to keep people into farming when governments do not have the slightest idea about how to address unemployment. I am all for the concept of economic efficiency, but it has to be done in a way that preserves the country and its society in the medium and long terms. Improving the efficiency and the return from farming by modernizing it is the way to go, but a big challenge remains: how to modernize without reducing the number of rural people from 12% (or 25%, or 40% depending on where you are) to 2% and 3% and end up with a food system exclusively managed by absentee landlords and bookkeepers? The social and political outcome of this demographic shift will be dramatic, and the environmental impacts cataclysmic. This is what we are witnessing in all developing nations, but more so in the countries that have adopted the full liberalization packages.

To illustrate, look at the situation of the poultry farmers in Lebanon. This morning's paper ran, alongside the frightening accounts of yesterday's street wars, a news item about the poultry producers threatening to close business because the government, in the same fated meeting which lit the fuse of the current troubles, also took the decision to remove import duties on imported chicken. This will have the immediate result of reducing prices, which will please consumers. But this will also annihilate the production sector, plagued with import duties on feed and high fuel prices. The large scale poultry industrialists will not suffer as much, because most of their production is contract-farmed to the small and medium producers, and they are vertically integrated: a large share of their profits come from adding value to poultry meat (nuggets, frozen, etc...). They still have the option of using the cheaper imports to manufacture their products. Those set to profit most are the meat importers. Now, of course, it is a pure coincidence that the head of the union of poultry producers is close to the opposition, while the head of the union of meat importers is a staunch loyalist.

If the government is intent on liberating prices, then it should do it for all imports, including feeds. More importantly, this and subsequent government must realize that they need to help farmers improve their efficiency. It has been shown repeatedly that, in spite of the economy of scale advantage, small, family producers can be just as efficient as big ones, especially if social and environmental costs are internalized. To confront the food crisis, populist measures are insufficient. Commitment to equity and development is needed, especially in countries that are torn by inequalities.

Global famine

"There are two interrelated dimensions to the ongoing global food crisis, which has spearheaded millions of people around the World into starvation and chronic deprivation, a situation in which entire population groups no longer have the means to purchase food.

First, there is a long term historical process of macroeconomic policy reform and global economic restructuring which has contributed to depressing the standard living Worldwide in both the developing and developed countries.

Second, these preexisting historical conditions of mass poverty have been exacerbated and aggravated by the recent surge in grain prices, which have led in some cases to the doubling of the retail price of food staples. These price hikes are in large part the result of speculative trade in food staples. " (Thanks A)

Rosemary's baby

There are skirmishes everywhere in Beirut today. The strike declared by the General Workers Union, and supported by the Opposition, did not pass very well, although the morning was quieter than expected. The airport workers declared a strike till pm and everybody is waiting to see if it will reopen at 3 pm as initially planned. There has been street fights with automatic weapons and rocket propelled grenades in the districts of Ras el Nabeh, Mazraa, Nweiry, Barbour, Fakhani, Tarik al Jadideh and Msaitbeh. Media organs in Lebanon are all partisan, and so it is nearly impossible to have a clear view of what is going on. But it does not really matter who starts what and where, because what is happening is the result of the sectarian build up, practiced by politicians of all sides over the past three years. No doubt that this was precipitated by the decision of the government (and therefore the loyalist camp) to dismiss the airport's security chief and to expose and complain to the UN and therefore delegitimize the resistance's communication network.

At the end of the day, it is the civilians who suffer the most. My kid's friend just called him. He was in tears. He and his mum have been hiding in the bathroom (the least exposed room in the house) for 4 hours, while gunmen exchange views and opinions in his street. He is 10 years old.

On TV, the pictures of the fighters look like a re-run of the civil war, but with better resolution.

What did Condie call it again? Birth pangs. Rosemary's baby.

This land is Palestine

"One recent warm afternoon, Jamal Abdulhadi Mahameed drove past kibbutz fields of wheat and watermelon, up a dirt road surrounded by pine trees and cactuses, and climbed the worn remains of a set of stairs, declaring in the open air: “This was my house. This is where I was born.”

He said what he most wanted now, at 69, was to leave the crowded town next door, come to this piece of uncultivated land with the pomegranate bushes planted by his father and work it, as generations had before him. He has gone to court to get it.

He is no revolutionary and, by nearly any measure, is a solid and successful citizen. His children include a doctor, two lawyers and an engineer. Yet, as an Arab, his quest for a return to his land challenges a longstanding Israeli policy.

“We are prohibited from using our own land,” he said, standing in the former village of Lajoun, now a mix of overgrown scrub and pines surrounded by the fields of Kibbutz Megiddo. “They want to keep it available for Jews. My daughter makes no distinction between Jewish and Arab patients. Why should the state treat me differently?”

The answer has to do with the very essence of Zionism — the movement of Jewish rebirth and control over the land where Jewish statehood first flourished more than 2,000 years ago.

“Land is presence,” remarked Clinton Bailey, an Israeli scholar who has focused on Bedouin culture. “If you want to be present here, you have to have land. The country is not that big. What you cede to Arabs can no longer be used for Jews who may still want to come.”"

NYT article: This is Zionism. (Thanks Anna)

A failed state does not mean failed people, not failed creativity, not failed hopes, not a failed culture, just failed politics. (Thanks Marcy)

Thanks Leila!

Small farmers to remain poor?

"Even though rice prices are high at the moment, farmers' profits are low due to the high cost of fertilizer and the low prices farmers still receive for their crops from millers and other middlemen who often pocket most of the profits.

"Our children's children have other things in mind. They're no longer interested in farming because our rice paddies are not producing enough even for our own consumption. We still have to buy rice from the low lands.""

That has been my fear: that the small farmers wouldn't be able to improve their income even after the increase in food prices. This would require governments to invest in infrastructure and in farming, and they won't do that. As long as decisions are taken by urban politicians and capitalist investors, farming as a livelihood will continue its free fall. But not food production as an industry. I am looking forward to hearing more about the $100 millions program of Bolivia, Nicaragua and Venezuela and Cuba to promote the development of agriculture. It sounds like a lot but this is really very little money for a task of this size.

Rice and foreign policy

"Never before in history has hunger become a global threat in a period of plentiful harvests. Global rice production will hit a record of 423 million tons in the 2007-2008 crop year, enough to satisfy global demand. The trouble is that only 7% of the world's rice supply is exported, because local demand is met by local production. Any significant increase in rice stockpiles cuts deeply into available supply for export, leading to a spike in prices. Because such a small proportion of the global rice supply trades, the monetary shock from the weak dollar was sufficient to more than double its price.

It is not only rice, of course, that the cash-rich countries of the world are buying as a store of value; the price of wheat, soy and other grains has risen almost as fast. This might deal the death-blow to America's hapless efforts to stabilize the Middle East, where a higher proportion of impoverished people eat off state subsidies than in any other part of the world. Egypt has been the anchor for American diplomacy in the Arab world since the Jimmy Carter administration (1977 to 1981), and is most susceptible to hunger. Food prices have risen by 145% in Lebanon and by 20% in Syria this year. Iraqis depend on food subsidies financed by American aid.

Reduced to essentials, America's foreign policy sought two unattainable objectives: to stabilize the Middle East and destabilize China. That is an exaggeration, of course, for Washington hoped not to sow instability, but only to put China in its place over the Tibetan affair.

The George W Bush administration might as well have used the State Department as a set for the Jackass reality show. American arrogance has eroded the ground under many of the governments on which its foreign policy depends. It is hard to characterize what will come next, except, like the stunts on Jackass, that it is going to hurt."

From a very good article by Spengler in Asia Times.

Inflation in Lebanon ran at 10 percent year-on-year in March, driven by the higher price of oil and food and a weaker dollar, central bank governor Riad Salameh said on Friday.

Endangered food

"But not Gary Paul Nabhan. He has spent most of the past four years compiling a list of endangered plants and animals that were once fairly commonplace in American kitchens but are now threatened, endangered or essentially extinct in the marketplace. He has set out to save them, which often involves urging people to eat them.

Mr. Nabhan’s list, 1,080 items and growing, forms the basis of his new book, an engaging journey through the nooks and crannies of American culinary history titled “Renewing America’s Food Traditions: Saving and Savoring the Continent’s Most Endangered Foods” (Chelsea Green Publishing, $35)."

Gary is of Lebanese descent, from the village of Kfarzabad in the West Bekaa. He will be visiting with us in mid-May. Amazing guy.

Agribusiness profits

From the WSJ (Thanks Daniel)

The other side of the crisis

I have received today the "watch letter" of the CIHEAM (Centre International de Hautes Etudes Mediterraneennes). This is an incredibly good center, very progressive in its analysis, but mainstream enough to be able to have an impact on policies. It is funded through contributions from member countries. The site is www.ciheam.org.

The current watch letter is sent as a pdf file, and I cannot link to it. The topic is (unoriginally) "Rise in agricultural prices: what repercussions for the Mediterranean?". I like this section from an article by Giulio Malorgio, Professor at the University of Bologna (Italy) about speculations, one of the neglected causes food crisis.

"Mariann Fischer-Boel, the European commissioner for agriculture, observed that it should not be automatically assumed that the increase in retail prices is closely tied to the increase in basic product prices and that a whole range of other factors need to be taken into consideration.
In the case of bread, for example, given that the price of wheat accounts for just 4% of the price of the final product and that a kilo of flour makes 1.4 kg of bread, the increase in the price of bread – 10 to 40% on average depending on the country or region – is not always justified. Many other factors have a role in determining the final price, as is easily ascertained from a simple comparison of the price of bread in the North and South of Italy. The same is true of the increase in the price of dairy products, which is due to a combination of factors related to inefficiencies in the economic organisation of the sector and the distribution processes."

How to obliterate nations

This is a long excerpt from an older article (2005) by Ghali Hassan. Read on. Food crisis? What food crisis?

"Just before announcing his departure from Iraq and handing "power" to the U.S.-installed band of discredited quislings (the so-called "transfer of [fake] sovereignty"), U.S. proconsul and head of the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), Paul Bremer issued "100 Orders" to transfer Iraq's economy and legal ownership of Iraqi resources into the private hands of U.S. corporations.

Order 81 deals specifically with Plant Variety Protection (PVP) because it is designed to protect the commercial interests of corporate seed companies. Its aim is to force Iraqi farmers to plant so-called "protected" crop varieties 'defined as new, distinct uniform and stable', and most likely genetically modified. This means Iraqi farmers will have one choice; to buy PVP registered seeds. Order 81 opens the way for patenting (ownership) of plant forms, and facilitates the introduction of genetically modified crops or organisms (GMOs) to Iraq. U.S. agricultural biotechnology corporations, such as Monsanto and Syngenta will be the beneficiaries. [4] Iraqi farmers will be forced to buy their seeds from these corporations. GMOs will replace the old tradition of breeding closely related plants, and replace them with organisms composed of DNA from an altogether different species, e.g., bacterium genes into corn. In the long run, there won't be a big enough gene pool for genetic viability.

Upon purchasing the patented seeds, farmers must sign the company's technology agreement (Technology User Agreements). This agreement allows the company to control farmers' practices and conduct property investigation. The farmer becomes the slave of the company. Like U.S. farmers, Iraqi farmers will be "harassed for doing what they have always done." For example, Iraqi farmers can be sued by Monsanto, if their non-GMO crops are polluted by GMO crops planted in their vicinity. [5] The health and environmental consequences of GMO crops are still unknown. GMO-based agriculture definitely encourages monoculture and genetic pollution. Moreover, this will further increase the already polluted Iraqi environment as a result of tens of thousands of tons of 'depleted' uranium dust, napalm, chemical weapons, and phosphorous bombs.

Farmers will also be required to buy fertilisers, herbicides and insecticides, against plants disease. Iraqi farmers will be required to pay royalties for the new seeds and they will be forbidden from saving seeds. In other words, Iraqi farmers will become agricultural producers for export, a recipe for the introduction of hunger in Iraq, not unknown in many developing countries. Unless an independent sovereign Iraqi government repeals these edicts, they will override Iraq's original patent law of 1970, which, in accordance with the Iraqi constitution, prohibited private ownership of biological resources.

Furthermore, Order 81 ignores Iraqi farmers' old traditions of saving seeds, and using their knowledge to breed and plant their crops. It also brutally disregards the contributions which Iraqi farmers have made over hundreds of generations to the development of important crops like wheat, barley, dates and pulses. If anybody owns those varieties and their unique virtues, it is the families who bred them, even though nobody has described or characterized them in terms of their genetic makeup. If anything, the new law -- in allowing old varieties to be genetically manipulated or otherwise modified and then "registered" -- involves the theft of inherited intellectual property, the loss of farmers' freedoms, and the destruction of food sovereignty in Iraq.

Iraqi traditional plant varieties, which were kept in Iraq's gene bank at the town of Abu Ghraib -- the town where the Bush administration used the prison to abuse, torture and murder Iraqi prisoners and detainees --may have been looted and lost during the invasion. There is hope that the Syria-based Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) and the affiliated International Centre for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas (ICARDA) still holds accessions of several Iraqi varieties in the form of germplasm. Evidence shows that Western "bio-prospectors" have been using indigenous genetic material taken from their traditional owners. [6] It is this kind of looting or "biopiracy" that is contributing to the destruction of farmers in the developing world, because they have lost control of what they sow, grow, reap and eat.

The man who is in charge of dismantling Iraq's agriculture is Daniel Amstutz, formerly an executive of the Cargill Corporation. Cargill is well known for having the reputation of being one the worst violators of the rights and independence of family farmers throughout the world. Amstutz appointment is designed to undermine Iraqi farmers and destroy Iraq's ability to produce food to feed its people. His service has been to advance U.S. agribusiness corporations. [8] For his task, Amstutz will be assisted by no others than Cargill, Monsanto, Dow and Texas A & M's Agriculture Program and its subsidiary the Arizona-based agriculture research firm, World Wide Wheat Company. All are known to have innately unjust records doing business in developing countries and enslaving farmers there.

According to Focus on the Global South and GRAIN report: "Iraq has the potential to feed its people. But instead of developing this capacity, Washington is shaping the future of Iraq's food and farming to serve the interests of U.S. corporations." [7] The aim of the U.S. is to undermine Iraq's food security, and remove all the contributions Iraqi farmers have made to development of agriculture and important crops like wheat, and barley. [9] Iraq's agriculture will be re-engineered to produce high yields agricultural products for export, and force Iraq to depend on importing food, and on Western "aid."

"If Iraq's new administration truly wanted to re-establish Iraqi agriculture for the benefit of the Iraqi people it would seek out the fruits of their knowledge. It could scour the country for successful farms, and if it miraculously found none could bring over the seeds from ICARDA and use those as the basis of a programme designed to give Iraq back the agriculture it once gave [to] the world," writes Jeremy Smith. [6]

Consistent with agricultural research, what Iraqi farmers need urgently is not GMOs and chemicals, but the opposite. Iraq needs ways to better control pathogens and pests by greater use of natural enemies and crop diversity. As accurately described by Vandana Shiva, "The miracle varieties displaced the diversity of traditionally grown crops, and through the erosion of diversity the new seeds became a mechanism for introducing and fostering pests." Shiva added; "Indigenous varieties are resistant to local pests and diseases. Even if certain diseases occur, some of the strains may be susceptible, but others will have resistance to survive." [10] Diversity of seeds is the best natural defence. Without diversity, plants are very susceptible to disease.

Famine in Palestine

"As 1.5 million Gazans are crying out to the world to pressure Israel to lift its scandalously callous blockade of the coastal territory, another 2.5 million Palestinians in the West Bank are struggling to cope with an unprecedented economic crisis that is further impoverishing and exhausting them.

The crisis, the harshest in recent memory, stems from a host of local and global factors, including soaring food and energy prices, sagging currency value, rampant joblessness and draconian Israeli restrictions on the movement of people, goods and services.

Further exacerbating these conditions is a devastating drought, unseen for decades, and which has nearly destroyed this year's grain crops upon which many Palestinian families depend for their livelihood. And the drought is not just affecting farmers. Coupled with a phenomenal rise in temperatures, it is also expected to cause a serious water shortage crisis in most localities, especially in the summer months."

Khaled Amayreh for Global Research

New blog

Barbara Masaad writes about Zaatar Zawtar and Abou Kassem in the latest Lebanese food blog.

The new report: International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development.

Rice cartel

"The prime minister of Thailand, Samak Sundaravej, said Wednesday that his government would try to create a cartel of rice-producing countries in partnership with Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos.

“We don’t aspire to be like OPEC, but we hope to be just a group of five to help each other in trading rice on the world market,” Mr. Samak was quoted as saying in The Nation newspaper.

But if successful, a cartel could have far-reaching consequences on the rice market, sustaining prices at their current historic highs and worsening a food crisis that is hurting Asia’s poorest consumers. The price of Thai B-grade rice, a benchmark variety, has nearly tripled in recent months and is now hovering at about $1,000 a ton." (Thanks D.)

Profits

"As inflation and shortages expose billions to hunger worldwide, agricultural giant Archer-Daniels-Midland Company revealed a 42 percent leap in quarterly profits. The announcement follows similarly skyrocketing earnings reports from half a dozen other agribusinesses and suppliers, as well as from major oil companies BP, Shell, and Exxon.

On Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal noted enormous profit increases for all of the largest agricultural suppliers and processors. The second-largest grain processor, Cargill, recorded quarterly earnings of $1.03 billion February 29, up 86 percent from a year ago. Third-largest processor Bunge reported $289 million, shooting up 1,964 percent over last year. Farm equipment manufacturer Deere & Co. reported a 55 increase in quarterly earnings over the year, to $369 million.

Monsanto, a company with a virtual monopoly on crop seed and herbicide production, reported $1.13 billion in profits for the latest quarter, more than doubling profits of the preceding quarter. Other corporations with significant agricultural operations, including Syngenta AG, DuPont and Dow Chemical, have also posted huge profits."

Worker's Day

There is no doubt in my mind that Al Akhbar is the best newspaper in the Arab World, and NOT because it tends towards the Lebanese opposition. Today's issue, on May 1, Workers' Day in Lebanon (not Labor Day as many in the Lebanese government would want it to be. This is the day we celebrate workers, not work!) was very rich. I will only cover a few items, all in Arabic (but some of the resources are in English):

1. In the local political news, ma7alliyat, Rana Hayeck writes about the history of the worker's movements in Lebanon, starting with the 17th century rebellions of Jabal Amel against the Shihab, through the Kesrwan communes, all the way to the sectarian divisions that have plagued the worker's unions of modern Lebanon.

2. In the economy page, Rasha Abu Zeki nails it again: a great report on the people who actually earn the minimum wage: $200. This is an issue of contention because the hawks in the successive Lebanese governments have always denied the fact that there are people who earn minimum wage in Lebanon, and have hidden behind this argument to refuse to raise the wages. Rasha interviews 3 people from different ages and family conditions, and the stories they tell are dramatic. The main point is: to live in Lebanon, families need closer to $800 a month, so increasing the minimum wage to $260 isn't going to do much. People are supported by the remittances of relatives working abroad. Note that the $60 increase has not been approved by the government in spite of the increase in cost of living.

3. News from Egypt: The president gave an address to a carefully chosen 1000 or so workers. His message was unclear: he said there will be a wage adjustment, but the government has approved nothing of the sort. There are rumors that this may be a strategy to diffuse the May 4 demonstration (planned concurrently in Egypt and Lebanon). In another item, the people of Dumiat, a low-income resort town on the Nile estuary are demonstrating against the implantation of a Canadian fertilizer factory ($1.2 billions project by Agrium, see linked Reuters update). The company had apparently obtained all the necessary permits, but the (poor) people do not want it in their backyards and ruining their children's health. Will they prevail? Here some news about the project (in English) from an Egyptian blogger.

4. A (long) article (and this is only part 2) by Ernest Khoury about the anthropologists working for the US army in the Human Terrain System Project (HTS). Here's the statement of the American Anthropological Association about the HTS program.

More Food Crisis Resources

La Via Campesina mobilises against the Food Crisis

Resources for the media

Background papers

• An Answer to the the global food crisis: Peasants and small farmers can feed the world

• Sustainable family farming can feed the world

• Small scale sustainable farmers are cooling down the earth

• Open Letter: Concrete measures are needed to strengthen peasant and farmer-based food production
  
  More on www.viacampesina.org

Farmer's leaders available for interviews (mobile phones)

• Ibrahim Coulibali, Mali + 2236761126 (en français)
• Alberto Gomez, Mexico + 525512955651(en español)
• Dena Hof, United States + 1 406-939-1839 (in English)
  
• Paul Nicholson, Basque Country + 34636451566 (español, English, français)
• Henry Saragih, Indonesia + 628163144441 (bahasa indonesia, English)
  
• Chukki Najundaswamy, India + 919448241401
  

More on request, please write to us: viacampesina@viacampesina.org

Via Campesina farmer's mobilisations

• « Peasant's agriculture creates biodiversity » : mobilisation during the Convention on Biodiversity Conference meetings in Bonn, 19-30 May.
• « Food sovereignty can solve the food crisis» : mobilisation during the FAO conference conference on world food security: the challenges of climate change and bioenergy, Rome, 1-5 June.
• « Implement peasant's rights to solve the food crisis": International Via Campesina conference on peasant's rights in Jakarta, 20-24 June.
• "G8 Governments: Stop corporate control over food, land and resources", mobilisation during the G8 summit in Hokkaido, 7-9 July.
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  For our media programme during those events, contact us: idelforge@viacampesina.org

Some external resources

• Annalyse critique des causes de la flambée des prix agricoles mondiaux
  (Jacques Berthelot, Solidarité)
• En la era del post –petrolera: Movilizándonos para rescatar nuestro sistema alimentario
  (Miguel A. Altieri, Alai-amalatina)
• Making a killing from hunger
  (Grain)