War Is Expensive

This latest tidbit of disturbing information comes from a report recently posted on All Africa a good source for news from and about the continent.

"A new study shows that conflicts in Africa cost the continent over 300 billion U.S. dollars between 1990 and 2005 – an amount equivalent to all the international aid received by sub-Saharan Africa in the same period.

The results of the study were released Thursday in a report by Oxfam International, the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA) and Saferworld. The report is the first to show, on a large scale, the effect of conflict on Africa's gross domestic product (GDP).

The report, entitled "Africa's Missing Billions: International Arms Flows and the Cost of Conflict", compares the economies of countries at war with those of countries experiencing peace. According to the report, an average "war, civil war, or insurgency shrinks an African economy by 15 percent," and the continent loses about 18 billion U.S. dollars a year to conflict."

This is yet another example of why it is so important that people have access to employment and capital to create productive and thriving businesses rather than having to turn to war and arms dealing as a livelihood. Fair Trade businesses, though often small in scale, give rural and often uneducated people access to the income needed to both educate their children and participate in a growing economy, thereby letting medium and large sized businesses grow and prosper.