Humanitarian Aid (3rd hi5)

EPIPHANY 2: HUMANITARIAN AID IS VERSACE!

This is one of my better ones yet. UN, and many other NGOs bitch like no other about the aid that a healthy amount of times fails to reach the ones it was intended for. (Notice, I say the ones intended for, not the ones that need it.) Let's look a bit at WHY that happens.
Well... it's rather easy: b/c miserable people like western shit. IT's CANDY TO THEIR HEARTS.

So picture this: a Serbian brigade, besieging a Bosnian village... UN flips out... but b/c of the nice little bureaucratic system in place, they fail miserably to intervene... But in order for all the member states to look good in front of their constituencies, they decide to send "humanitarian aid" to the ones in need (the Bosnians in this case). They will most likely send a truck-full of blankets, dry food, bottled water, and other great useless things that people under siege may need... like toys for kids and flip flops. Now... the truck full of goodies has to go past the Serbian besieging brigade... Surprisingly enough the village has been holding for a 3 days now. Mr. Serb soldiers are a bit unhappy with the food they eat, b/c its boiled potatoes and some cheap canned beans that the Serb army provides them with. They also sleep in the nice welcoming before-ww2-tents the army provides, and they are using the chronologically similar (probably brown) blankets. But they get distracted from their misery by this nice white Volvo (maybe even Mercedes) truck stopping at their road block. The driver barely speaks one or 2 words in Serbian, and they don’t know any more English... they check the truck, and surprise... they see that BIG FAT BUNDLE OF WESTERN GOODNESS... the RAMEN NOODLES, the FUZZY WUZYY blankets still smelling new, b/c it was only last year that they came out of this wonderful new Chinese factory, and even some BOTTLED water, and soda... And here is when confusion strikes!...

The driver tries to explain to the soldiers that this is not their gov sending them a care-package, but this truck is for the people they are trying to kill. The serbs are confused with the driver too, as they don’t understand why he is not helping them unload the truck faster. They need to save all the strength to fight off the annoyingly resistive Albanians. Now... had the nice white Volvo truck been loaded with cheap Yugoslav blankets, had it had some cans of beans and sausage in sick sauce instead of colorful packages of ramen and other cool vitamins stuffed instant foods, I am almost convinced our Serbian friends wouldn't have been THAT eager to empty the truck.

The point behind my anecdote is: why spend the money on aid from the west, IF you can acquire it from that country. Aid doesn't need to be a treat, aid SHOULD BE AIMED at maintaining people alive... and that can be done with beans and potatoes, and a lighter. That can be done with blankets bought from the one blanket producer or importer in the area... the bigger point is...

Why not re-think aid: instead of "west helping the third world and developing states", why not think of it as the "NGO's facilitating transfers that would keep people alive"... (or how some others call it, south-south transfers)

It seems so damn easy:

1. Needy get a minimum to stay alive in more humane conditions, as opposed to not getting anything at all,
2. Instead of 80% of the aid going to the side that already has the upper hand, it will be more like 40% (pulled out of the ass estimate... the idea is that they will manifest less interest in boring daily beans then in ramen and new western-like blankets)
   
3. It will help the local economy a little
   
4. It will most likely be more cost efficient, if such providers would exist, since transportation/distribution costs will be considerably reduced...
   

GOD, I am smart.