Maurice King, Honorary Research Fellow, University of Leeds,
5 Ashwood Villas, Leeds LS6 2EJ, 0044 (0) 113 2304441
M.H.King@leeds.ac.uk http://www.leeds.ac.uk/demographic.disentrapment
Saturday, 5 June 2004
Sir Bob Geldof, The Commission for Africa
This letter is written in “The Geldofian mode” as being the only one adequate to the occasion.
Dear Sir Bob,
Cutting through the academic crap!
As far as I can see, you are the only hope for Africa!
Of Africa’s many problems, much the most neglected one is its “population” - so neglected that the UN’s current initiative NEPAD (New Partnership for African Development) says nothing about population whatsoever - despite Figure ‘X’!
Figure ‘X’ is an example of “demographic entrapment”. A community is demographically trapped, if under current economic and technological constraints, (1) it exceeds the carrying capacity of its local ecosystem (too many people for the land to support), and (2) it has no new land to migrate to, and (3) it has too few exports to exchange for food and other essentials. This results in the direst poverty, starvation and violence.
Figure ‘X’. A MALTHUSIAN OUTLOOK FOR AFRICA. Although man evolved in Africa, its population grew only slowly until ‘modernisation’ and the influence of the West began seriously in about 1900. Mortality went down, whereas fertility remained high, or in some areas even increased. So Africa’s population started rising rapidly. In 1970 when its population was 364 million, its imports of basic foods (maize, wheat, rice) started to exceed its exports, so that its food balance became negative. Africa’s carrying capacity - the population it can support comfortably - is therefore about 364 million, provided soil fertility does not fall further. However, Africa’s population is expected to be 2 billion in 2050, despite the effect of AIDS, and exceed its carrying capacity five and a half times. In 2150 its population is expected to be 2.3 billion, and to exceed it its carrying capacity more than six times. About 2 billion people will therefore need to emigrate, or to be fed on imported food indefinitely. If this does not happen, there will be increasing starvation and violence, and indeed there already is. It seems likely therefore that most disentrapment will have to take place in Africa by reduced fertility.
A community is also trapped, if because its population is increasing rapidly, it is expected to be in this unhappy situation before long.
Conversely, disentrapment is the reversal of these factors, particularly the radical reduction of fertility.
I once asked the most eminent demographer of Africa, the Australian, Jack Caldwell: "How much of Africa do you think is trapped?" "Most of it!" he replied - privately! Figure 'X' supports him strongly
Inside Africa there are some particularly grave cases - Rwanda, Malawi, Ethiopia, and North Kivu in the Congo. Ethiopia, for example, had 5 million people in 1900, 12 million in 1950, and 32 million in 1984. It now has 71 million. By 2025 it will have 117 million, and by 2050 173 million - starvation permitting !! - and be still growing!
‘LOCKSTEP’ is a way of marching very close together, with one’s leg under the leg of theperson in front. If anyone changes his step, the whole squad falls over. Nobody here ever discusses entrapment! Demography is therefore intellectually corrupt, as are the disciplines and agencies dependent upon it. If ever any one of them were to discuss entrapment, everyone else would have to discuss it too, so that the lockstep would break up.
The current “solution” to demographic entrapment is to taboo it entirely - demographers, development economists, and the UN agencies never discuss it and march in a tight population policy “lockstep” that will have nothing to do with it whatsoever. The result is that the Institute for Development Studies in Sussex (the IDS), for example, Britain’s foremost institution for development economics, is completely impotent - about as much use to Africa as a ...!
Why then is demographic entrapment so taboo? For at least 25 reasons - the so-called “25 Population Demons”. A Demon is anything which holds the taboo in place, and requires change in thought and practice if it is to lift. For example, the problems of 1-child families are Demon 6. Are they better than starvation and violence?
These Demons are described in Chapter 29 of a book which is coming under separate cover - Primary Mother Care and Population (sales@ spiegl.co.uk £7.50) and which is also on the web http://www.leeds.ac.uk/demographic.disentrapment. Alternatively, ask Google to look for “disentrapment”.
Which then is the most important Demon? This is difficult. However, I have recently come to suspect, that the really critical one is probably Demon 2a - the fear that to discuss the entrapment of parts of the South will promote racial unrest in the North! (See the website) There is also the fear of uncontrolled immigration into the EU. This would explain the refusal of the director of the IDS, Keith Bezanson, and it’s Professor Emeritus, Sir Richard Jolly, even to discuss entrapment - they dare not say what is really bugging them!
All this against a background of great general reluctance to discuss any population issue of any kind, such is the “political correctness” over matters of population at the present time.
“Does one merely sit on one’s hands, look the other way, and allow a continent to proceed to starvation and violence?” “Or doesn’t one ?” Having worked in Africa 20 years, having written ten books for the health workers of Africa, and having many friends there, I argue that one doesn’t! One simply does not opt for a quiet life, while knowingly letting one’s friends in Africa tear themselves apart and starve?
A Ugandan editor, David Ouma Balikowa, removed my title, which was: “Will Uganda follow Rwanda?” and replaced it with this one.
So what in the ... does one do? I argue, very strongly, that one has to do one’s utmost to lift the taboo, and face the whole problem without any hang-ups whatsoever - and most especially to face it publicly over the media!
I have been trying to do just this. Last August I lectured in Kinshasa on Pièges demographique au Congo? There was no taboo, no aggro, and great interest. After my lecture, a doctor from North Kivu, Dr Kasonia Kizito, implored me to visit his district, which I have just done - and got a wonderful reception see. It is indeed direly trapped. I lectured in all the institutes superieurs thereabouts. Again, no taboo, and no aggro. One of my messages - delivered in French - was this one:
“Should one, or should one not, say to one’s friends in Africa that, if they don’t reduce their fertility, if necessary to one child only, they must expect the direst poverty, starvation, and violence? I argue that one has to, and that not to do so is the gravest dereliction of duty in public health. If my friends want to lynch me, they are more than welcome. I trust that I will proceed to my martyrdom with a good courage! Much better, than, say, carcinoma of the rectum!
Mercifully, I have not yet been lynched! I came away from North Kivu with a “disentrapment plan” which is presently with Oxfam - mostly family planning, and assisted migration to the rain forest (controversial). A distinguished missionary colleague, assures me that, in the South, there is no taboo on entrapment, and it seems he his right.
This message needs broadcasting very widely in Africa, accompanied by a continent-wide discussion of the need for “disentrapment”, in those communities which are trapped, and the provision of massive and universal high quality family planning services.
It is commonly argued that it is ridiculous, even to mention 1-child families in Africa. I reply that the dialogue on 1-child families can at least open in Africa, since I have done it myself in Malawi, Kenya, Uganda, and the Congo. Where it gets to is quite another matter. But who knows where it might get to a few years down a line? Whatever the message to the public has to be, the intellectuals in a severely trapped community should know what the score really is.
1-child families do of course have problems. The Chinese decided that they were better than starvation and violence. Fortunately, China has been able to ‘disentrap’ itself by its intense economic development, which Africa, so recently out of the Iron Age, cannot emulate.
Incidentally, I am trying to make contact with the Chinese government, so that I can encourage them to help provide family planning services for Africa - including 1-child families. Several African countries, notably Rwanda, need them, but nobody dare say so.
There is another Demon (in fact a considerable blessing ). If the South has to reduce its fertility to avoid starvation and violence, the North will be expected to modify its lifestyle and reduce its resource consumption, particularly of fossil fuel - and, incidentally, its contribution to global warming (the argument of Demon 3). Disentrapment in the South can therefore only be attempted in the context of a drive for sustainable lifestyles in the North - these are merely the opposite sides of the same life-saving coin.
Now for the ‘archdemon’. The United States (Demon 21) dominates demography globally and the UN agencies. Since it doesn’t want its resource consumption further criticised, it would make good political sense for it to try to keep entrapment taboo for as long as it can. There is good evidence that it is doing exactly this - it is keeping the population debate as a whole at the lowest possible ebb, while holding the taboo on entrapment tight with great tenacity - see the web.
So where does this leave Demon 2a, and race riots? I argue that if the whole deal were to be completely, and honestly explained to the public, there would be no race riots.
Such then is the gist of Africa’s population problems.
I greatly look forward to discussing them in person, soonest. If I can possibly help in any way, I should be delighted..
Yours sincerely,
Maurice King.