One might think from the hullabaloo around the maize deal announced by the government last week that the problems of rising staple food prices have been solved at a stroke. This is very far from true — indeed some commentators see the announcement as little more than a public relations exercise. Other measures will be needed to alleviate the worsening plight of poor people.
The three private sector players who have undertaken to wholesale, mill and retail white maize at or near cost deserve praise. But the arrangement will only last until the end of the year, on the dubious assumption that prices will correct themselves. And the arrangement cannot take account of small distributors and middlemen, such as spaza shops and hawkers, who are likely to buy and mark up the discounted maize. Historically, two-tiered pricing systems have been open to abuse and are difficult to sustain. No means test is to be conducted. Deep rural areas in poverty-stricken Northern Province, Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, which lack supermarkets, fall outside the net. And, to be blunt, 80 000 bags a month will not touch sides.
Cabinet is, in addition, to ask Parliament to approve an increase in the old age pensions and other grants. This is to be welcomed, but the increases are minuscule, of between 2% and 8% on a very small base.
Minister of Agriculture and Land Affairs Thoko Didiza’s other announcements comprised a list of possibilities, and no immediate practical measures other than the formation of a committee to look into price formation in the food chain. The Competition Commission is “to continue with its monitoring of, and censure against, any acts of price collusion along the food supply chain”.
The government’s difficulties in coming to grips with price increases have to be recognised. Price controls only make sense in a command economy, and then only in conjunction with wage restraint. Britain’s experience of a prices and incomes policy under former Labour Party premier Harold Wilson does not inspire confidence. The price-wage spiral continued, together with mounting industrial unrest. Even the unions acknowledge that the declining value of the rand has been a key driver of price rises. Over this, the government has little control.
On the other hand, the state’s broad approach can be faulted. It seems determined to tackle price rises at the least possible cost to the fiscus, with the unavoidable consequence that the plight of poor people will continue to deepen.
There is merit in the idea of a strategic food reserve, which the state can distribute to the neediest in times of extremity. But the government’s first move should be to broaden the scope of state welfare grants — in particular by extending the child grant to all children — and increase them to levels that will make some impact on poverty.
If it has rejected the idea of a universal income grant of R100 a citizen as unworkable, the government is duty-bound to come up with an alternative that is more than a public relations palliative, and really makes a difference.
Cynical war talk
As the world voiced its outrage at the bomb attack that killed nearly 200 people on the idyllic island of Bali, Western leaders began drawing parallels between this attack and those on September 11 last year.
For Australia, whose citizens account for the majority of those killed on Bali, this was the greatest tragedy since World War II. But for other powers, particularly the United States, the catastrophe has provided timely and further ammunition for escalating war talk.
Therein lies the problem.
In the aftermath of September 11, all the US government could think of was revenge and payback. The American public bought into this and cheered loudly as President George W Bush rattled his sabre. They cheered even more loudly as their troops, with the docile support of allies and satellites, especially Britain, dropped bombs on Afghanistan and overran the country.
A year later we have to ask: what has the so-called War on Terrorism achieved? The stark fact is that tangible results are negligible. The only concrete outcome that the lengthy “War on Terrorism” can point to is the removal of the Taliban, undoubtedly one of the most despicable regimes of recent times.
But the “War on Terrorism” has also strengthened the hand of some of the world’s hard men. Pakistan’s Pervez Musharraf, for example, derived dubious legitimacy because he let the attack on Afghanistan proceed unhindered. And in last week’s election, he was allowed to invoke manifestly undemocratic powers to ward off any effective opposition — all without a murmur from the world’s superpower, supposedly the global guardian of democracy. As a result, hardcore fundamentalists have made significant gains in power, and the Middle East has become even more precarious.
The Bali tragedy seems to have given carte blanche to the securocrats in the Bush administration, who now appear set on riding roughshod over international protocols and waging war on Iraq. The world has become a very dangerous place indeed. Those who cynically exploit the Bali tragedy to endorse war talk — or decline to condemn it — will share the culpability if the world plummets now into military carnage.