just seen on gmtv that certain tribes have to walk 30km a day to get water,so why don't they move:confused: :confused: :confused: :confused: stopping have kids would help too....not rocket science is it:|

Kirky,

that's a bit controversial even for you. :shakes:

This is a complex subject with no easy answers.

Loops.:shocked:

why not move 30km? maybe where the water is there's hardly any food... hmm... carry water... or carry dead animal bodies for 30km... or rice... I think water would be easier :P

think yourself lucky you can turn a tap and out pops water, we have things pretty damn easy in this country!

stop having kids? why? so that their entire population dies out? geez some people, I mean really... did you think before you posted this? lol

Actually,

This is a really good question - seriously.

There may well be a damn good reason why these folks can't get closer to water, or why they can't get irrigation in. The reason may be politics, land access, tribal history, whatever.

We in the West are being asked to help out in various ways and one of the first things to do surely must be to look at what's happening on the ground and why.

Unlike the bods in Star Trek, with their 'non-interference' Prime Directive, we're being asked to interfere to help these people through getting shut of debt repayments, etc. So why not go further and find out WHY these people live 30 clicks from potable water? If we're being asked to step in and help, why not ask people to meet us half way?

And as for moving - well, Capitalism has insisted on people doing that for centuries, so we're not asking anything of these folks that we don't do ourselves.... :) Look at the Industrial Revolution - thousands of people were expected to move to areas around 'the factory' to help the process of making money easier.

And I promise that I won't Mod this thread now I'm involved in it! :)

Joe

it could be like this:

water ........ 30km ......... village ......... 30km .......... food

I think 2 lots of 30 for water, and 2 for food are easier than 2 lots of 60km for food.... who knows why they don't move, as Joe said, there could be any number of reasons...

I think one point to take on board is, do these people actually want help? I think a lot of the time we "westerners" with our money and out "intelligence" think we can solve these peoples problems without ever really seeing the full picture... I'm sure these people aren't stupid, if it was as simple as getting up and moving, they'd have done it... and there are lot of people out there that would prefer to do things themselves, than have a set of brittish people come in, move their village and build them a well and rice fields etc...

I didn't see it but I am guessing that the reference probably came in the Born Free item and was to the Masai people.

The Masai Mara, where they live (in Kenya) is an area of rain and drought and the springs, streams and rivers that they depend upon come and go.
Historically, the Masai survived very well here as nomadic herdsmen and moved with their cattle and families around the 'Mara' following the water.
With time came higher population, development, game reserves and "land ownership" and the Masai are being pressurised into settling.
(some comparisons can be drawn with the North Americans)

They have (and have had for a long time) permanent villages but today when the water dries up for a while, they cannot move to the areas with water ... and so the walking starts.
Incidentally, one pressure for not moving is the revenue they earn from tourism at their permanent site.

Some poorer ones may be locked into it, but we are not talking "Ethiopean starvation" here.

It is inconvenient, ideally the time could be spent improving lives in other ways, and is responsible for health problems.
People are helping them to look at water conservation/dams pipelines etc. but at some point the question has to be asked "is this really a suitable place for people to live?" and "what alternatives are there?"

They are not walking 30km every day. They take the donkeys and containers once or maybe twice a week, and the richer ones pay others to do it. This only goes on during the dry spells when their local wells are dry.

perhaps it came across a bit bluntly but i was being serious,if i couldn't feed or water my kids i wouldn't have had them,its ok saying do i expect them to let the population die out but thats whats happening anyway but this way they are dying out in poverty and pain.

so what we should do kirky is get durex to send millions of condoms to africa! you cant expect these people not to have sex, it goes against human nature... and its not like they have the pill or condoms to easily get hold of unless they live in or near the major african cities!

Originally posted by xafier
so what we should do kirky is get durex to send millions of condoms to africa! you cant expect these people not to have sex, it goes against human nature... and its not like they have the pill or condoms to easily get hold of unless they live in or near the major african cities!

condoms are cheaper than food i reckon,would also stop the spred aof aids..common sense innit

right... we'll organise something...

SEXAID! we'll get celebrities in and everything, stripping for money, doing live sex shows... the worlds biggest porn-fest :hihi: all the money raised goes to buying tons of condoms for the 3rd world!

of course, it'd have to be pay-per-view... but I'm sure there would be plenty of us willing to pay to watch it if it meant helping 3rd world people :hihi:

didnt they put the condoms on sticks outside the tent where they were having sex?

silly people

All of these ideas are not going to change the fact that whilst we have our own little castles, these people have very little yet what they do have is dignity. This has to be kept at all costs.

However to make suggestions that they ought to stop breeding is wrong, albeit well meaning. I can see Kirky's point of view and agree that if I couldn't have fed my kids I wouldn't have bred them.
I agree that if it is a long way to the water move closer to it(if that's possible) or look at ways of moving the water to them. Surely this is what Water Aid http://www.wateraid.org.uk/ have been trying to do.

I am now going to say something very controversial,and please do not think this is me being racist,that is not how it is meant.

I have a friend who is from Senegal and he always says that a lot of the problems with his countrymen stem from the fact that they only want to work when their belly is empty, so when the times are good and the food is plentiful they party, when times are hard they starve. He says "The African is meant to party not work"

How we can change that mentality is something that the western world has been trying and failing to do for many many years.

I think I must be part african :suspect: I only ever want to work when I'm royally skint... lol

owdlad, you've said basically what I've been trying to say... they need help, but we shouldn't force it on them, and we shouldn't make the decisions for them as to what needs to be done...

if they come to us and say "we dont have the tools to build a well, could you maybe lend us the tools and advice how to do it?" then we should help...

what we shouldn't do is send in 5000 engineers to build a massive dam and water system!

Originally posted by kirky
just seen on gmtv that certain tribes have to walk 30km a day to get water,so why don't they move:confused: :confused: :confused: :confused: stopping have kids would help too....not rocket science is it:|
No TV - No playstation - No XBox or t'internet... what else are they gonna do for entertainment?

xafier, owdlad,

Spot on.

Appropriate Technology has to be the way forward - but that might, of course, mean that rather than big gestures that get lots of publicity like 'scrapping debt' the stuff that delivers is £2,000 and a drill on hire from a nasty oil company to drill for water.

Joe

As for why they keep having kids... it's because the mortality rate is so high. A major reason why they have lots of kids so they can ensure that a few will survive through until the parents are old, so there are still kids around to support them.

This isn't unique to Africa. In this country, 100 years ago it wasn't uncommon to have families of 10 children (my grandma was one of ten). But time and again it has been shown that if you reduce mortality rates, birth rates come down as well. So if you think Africans are having too many kids, the best way to get them to have more kids is by helping to make their lives better and safer.

Only 150 years ago in this country 25% of all deaths were those of infants due to infectious diseases and poor living conditions. People would have more children per family because the chances are most or some would die and they wanted to ensure they passed on their genes.

Originally posted by Twiglet
Only 150 years ago in this country 25% of all deaths were those of infants due to infectious diseases and poor living conditions. People would have more children per family because the chances are most or some would die and they wanted to ensure they passed on their genes.

P.S. Ooops sorry you pipped me to the post