Why does there appear to be so much widespread pent up rage against
the US in the Arab world, even in country considered a long time friend
like Egypt?
Political analysts of all shades are groping
for answers to this question, with the range of answers as varied as the
people who give them. Unfortunately and typically of 'the international
media,' not many think to simply ask the Egyptians and other Arabs
themselves!
Thomas Kostigen has an interesting take on the issue. In his article 'Behind Arab riots lie U.S. agricultural policies, he argues part of the antipathy is due to "U.S. policies that disrupt people’s lives and darken rays of hope."
Writes Kostigen, "The backlash by the Muslim segment of the Arab world goes deeper than
one recent, hateful film; it goes back to 1992 when small farmers in
Egypt lost their land rights under a reform scheme implemented by former
President Hosni Mubarak."
Kostigen cites an article he
wrote at the start of Egypt's 2011 anti-Mubarak upheavals, and long
before the present protests initially attributed by some to anger over a
crude anti-Islamic film.
In the earlier article, Why U.S. farm policy caused Egypt crisis,
Kostigen said under U.S. and International Monetary Fund pressure, "the
country’s small farmers who were ‘registered tenants’ became subject
to rent increases, in many cases triple what they had been paying. As
expected, these small farmers couldn’t afford the steep rent increases
and were forced off their land. More than half of all Egyptians live in
the countryside, and millions were forced into poverty. Moreover, Egypt
itself became more reliant on imports."
Kostigen points
out a great deal of those imports that have made many farmers destitute
come from the United States. The fact that U.S. wheat and other grain
farmers enjoy subsidies that make it that much harder for Egyptian and
other world farmers to survive, let alone compete, may have just fueled
resentments, suggests Kostigen.
Quips Kostigen, "It’s a great thing to provide food at cheap prices to people. But once a
population is hooked on cheap food and then prices rise, as they have
to their all-time highs, a shift in mood should be expected."
Some
will find it easy to reject Kostigen's contentions as a rant against
his country, but he provides the kind perspectives on real-world issues
affecting people in country's like Egypt that more prominent political
talking heads are completely oblivious of.
U.S.
president Barack Obama recently announced a grand initiative to help
kick-start agriculture in several African countries. It will be
significantly private sector driven.
The Egyptian example
given by Kostigen is just one of many reasons some
agriculturally-engaged people in Africa are suspicious and worried about
the 'help' the U.S. proposes to give for African agriculture. Will it
be 'help' to African farmers become more productive and competitive, or
will it be actually help to American agricultural corporations to create
and find new markets at the expense of African farmers, as Kostigen
claims has been the case in Egypt?
In agrarian
societies, issues like those pointed out by Kostigen are matters of life
and death for millions of people. The damage to livelihoods and
resentment over them cannot be compensated by then donating military or
other aid to the ruling classes.
Kostigen provides deep, well written and very readable perspectives on
some little known but important contributors to Egyptian's love-hate
relationship with the U.S. Too bad it is almost entirely predictable
that politicians and government bureaucrats in Washington D.C. will pay
little or no heed of the warnings of people like Kostigen that the
issues and feelings go far deeper than anger over an anti-Islam film.
African Agriculture
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