Only six years away from the 2015 deadline, world reports indicate that none of the Sub-Saharan African countries is currently on track to attain the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). 

The African continent is home to 20% of the world’s population which collectively, partakes in only 2% of global trade. This year, the impact of the global economic crisis is expected to slash growth rates on the continent down to 2.8 per cent, less than half of the average growth rate achieved during the past five years. 

A new wave of African politicians and journalists has been engaging in a debate that Africa’s salvation lies not with further infusion of aid but rather in stepping up trade. It is argued that western assistance to developing nations has given rise to dependency and created a suitable environment for corruption.

In the west, tax bases are shrinking and unemployment has reached record highs because of the global recession. Like never before, western purses are squeezed by the need to take care of their own people thereby reducing surplus resources and limiting generosity towards African problems.

By press time, the US national debt amounted to US $ 12 trillion and was increasing at US $ 3.85 billion per day – the largest national debt in the world. It is safe to assume that even the USA could use some debt relief and aid money to mitigate the risk presented by such debt on future generations.

Unfortunately for the US it cannot receive aid since it is perceived to be the most prosperous country on earth and while for decades, Africa, has been painted by the global media as a continent of desperation and suffering thus deserving of aid.

While aid is blamed for many challenges in Africa today, it is important to note that it was born of a need to defeat global health, administrative and social challenges and to balance inequitable global resources.

A case in point, in 2006, more than half the Uganda’s mostly aid funded annual budget was lost to corruption amounting to US $ 950 million. A considerable amount of the money that was stolen had been intended to provide vaccinations and treatments for tuberculosis, malaria and HIV – epidemics that are not in a recession.

In calling for an end to aid, African administrators epitomize the saying, ‘a bad workman blames his tools’, since it is them that are responsible for the mismanagement and misappropriation of aid money, given out of generosity by western taxpayers.  

True, aid monies bring forth several challenges – like setting rigid terms and failing to adapt to rapidly changing conditions on the ground. However, African administrators should behave like the good workman who will struggle to do a good job even with bad tools.

Trade and charity run parallel. The west will not donate trade to Africa in the same way that it donates aid and therefore the Aid vs. Trade debate does not hold. With trade, Africa simply needs to take action instead of calling out for help.

Where charity promotes generosity, trade presents competition – sometimes cut throat. In some sectors, Africa will have to compete with some of the very nations that have been offering it aid. Therefore, the continent Africa will need to marshal all her bargaining chips through continental integration and closely guard mineral and oil resources from exploitation by more powerful nations.

It is important for the continent to rectify its faulty policy making framework and build stronger institutions before it can engage the west as a worthy trading partner. Neither trade nor aid will amount to continental progress if institutions remain deficient of integrity.

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There is a significant increase in violence against the Zimbabwe’s remaining white commercial farmers as the country fast-tracks enforcement of farm takeovers. Farm invasions have been taking place since 2000, but the latest round is more vicious than ever before. At 94% unemployment cannot possibly get worse, as for hyperinflation, there can be no report more damning than the indefinite suspension of the national currency. It seems like Zimbabwe has no more surprises in store – for its people and for the global news audience. But then again it never runs out of surprises. At the dawn of independence in 1980, when the world was wobbling with optimism for Zimbabwe, Professor Abdul Rahman Babu authored an open letter that predicted this series of events that have come to unravel almost thirty years down the road.

When Januna Ali Jama, a spokesman for one of the groups demanded an $8m ransom for the return of a Ukranian ship his group had captured, in “reaction to the toxic waste that has been continually dumped on the shores of our country for nearly 20 years”– one couldn’t help but view the requisition as modest and justifiable.

I am starting to think you only have to be Rwandan, to fully understand what it feels like to repeatedly receive insults on your human conscience and intelligence. Only time will tell if Barack’s new policy on Darfur will bear fruit but one thing is for sure — General Gration will be surprised to find that Darfurians prefer the cookies to the goldstars.

Among the realities that this year’s Nobel prizes brought to light is the fact that the United States is a nation made up of immigrants who drive its innovation economy. Statistics indicate that foreign-born science and engineering students earn one-third of all Ph.D.s awarded in the United States. However, It is important for the prize to evolve in a way that enhances the contribution of scientists that are struggling to meet the most important challenges of the 21st century like climate change.

According to a 1999 World Health Organization (WHO) report, the total number of actual diagnosed AIDS cases on the African continent is about equal to the total for AIDS in America and yet Africa today is cited as the worst example of HIV/AIDS in the world. In order to successfully fight HIV, it is important to dispel the common myths and negative portrayal of the ‘developing world’ because gives the impression that Africa is world’s away from the west.

Africa is least responsible for causing the current changes in global climatic conditions since it emits the lowest greenhouse gases yet it is at the highest risk of facing the most dire effects of the changing climate conditions due this over dependence on natural resources. There is a need for the continent’s representatives to take a united and proactive stance at the December 7 Copenhagen summit that will lay down the global framework for climate change control beyond 2012.

High population growth rates make it difficult for low developed countries to provide adequate schooling, nutrition and immunization. Population pressure is currently one of Rwanda’s bigger challenges, which if not addressed aggressively will pose a significant challenge to economic advancement and the attainment of the U.N. Millennium Development Goals in Rwanda.

Myriad political and economic leaders tout energy independence as the solution to a plethora of America’s employment, defense, and environmental challenges. Today, even as Michigan is home to a high concentration of highly skilled and well-educated workers, it struggles to balance the harsh realities of the economic recession with the burden of national debt and President Barack Obama’s vision for an energy-independent America.