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EIR Publishes “The Schiller Institute Plan To Develop Haiti”

Sept. 30, 2021—Today, EIR News Service posted, “The Schiller Institute Plan to Develop Haiti,” a 16-page report, which presents a comprehensive program addressing “eight fundamental areas of infrastructure, industry, and agriculture, which are at the core of the Haitian economy … present[ing] what capabilities and what problems exist, along with recommended development plan solutions.” Those areas are 1. Power and Electricity, 2. A Universal Health Care System, 3. Hunger and Agriculture, 4. Railroads and Roads, 5. Airports and Seaports, 6. Sanitation and Water Purification, 7. Industry and Labor Force, and 8. Education. The full report is available here.

The Schiller Institute Plan is clear in the mandate, and the urgent necessity of acting now, saying:

“The task of rebuilding Haiti is a daunting one because of the level of destruction deliberately imposed on it by two centuries of Malthusian policies. Every sector of its physical economy must be rebuilt from the bottom up, to uplift its impoverished population. But it’s not an impossible task if China and the U.S. collaborate along with other nations of the Caribbean Basin and Central America, as part of an expanded Belt and Road Initiative and Maritime Silk Road throughout the region.

“Haiti will have to establish diplomatic relations with China: it is still one of the few countries in the world that maintains diplomatic relations instead with Taiwan. China rightly insists that it will only work with nations that recognize the principle of One China, and Haiti would be wise to follow the path taken by its neighbor, the Dominican Republic—which recently broke with Taiwan and established ties with China—if it is to have any hope of attaining Chinese participation in its reconstruction.

“Haiti has been repeatedly subjected to an intentional depopulation policy every time a ‘natural disaster’ strikes the country. For 125 years, the looting of Haiti by the City of London, Wall Street, and other Trans-Atlantic banks (France is key among them), joined in the 20th Century by the International Monetary Fund and other multilateral lending agencies, has denied it the right to develop into a modern nation, leaving it defenseless in the face of repeated disasters, the August 14, 2021, earthquake being only the most recent one.

“The Schiller Institute program for the rebuilding and reconstruction of Haiti, the initial outlines of which are presented below, includes a unified infrastructure plan, financed by a Hamiltonian system of ample directed credit, created as a central feature of a bankruptcy reorganization of the disintegrating international financial system. The Schiller Institute has estimated preliminarily that a viable Haiti reconstruction program will cost between $175 and $200 billion, or $17.5 to $20 billion per year over ten years.”

The report also reviews the scuttled 2017 Haitian-Chinese $4.7 billion project to rebuild Haiti’s capital, in which “two Chinese companies—the Southwest Municipal Engineering and Design Research Institute of China (SMEDRIC), and the Metallurgical Corporation of China (MCC)—outlined a series of detailed projects valued at $4.7 billion to carry out the rebuilding of the capital and its environs. SMEDRIC indicated that the projects for Haiti’s capital were part of a broader, $30 billion proposal for the whole country, discussed at the May 14-15, 2017, Belt and Road Initiative summit in Beijing. A short time after that, a Chinese delegation carried out an 8-day investigative visit to Haiti and met with local officials.”

   Video Preview—‘Need Creative Genius of the World To Bear on Haiti and Afghanistan’

The report was previewed on Sept. 25, on an international webinar by the Schiller Institute, with the intent of bringing together the forces to make it happen. The 2.5-hour event was titled, “Reconstructing Haiti—America’s Way Out of the ‘Global Britain’ Trap,” featuring the Schiller Institute Plan and the immediate emergency action required. The plan was summarized, and discussed by experts with ties to Haiti, in engineering, medicine, and development policy. This deliberation stands in stark contrast to the events of the past weeks, which included the U.S. forced deportation of thousands of displaced Haitians from the Texas-Mexico border, back to Haiti, to disaster conditions from the August earthquake and before. The full video of the webinar is available here.

The six panelists were Richard Freeman, co-author of “The Schiller Institute Plan To Develop Haiti”; Eric Walcott, Director of Strategic Partnerships, Institute of Caribbean Studies; Firmin Backer, head of the Haiti Renewal Alliance; Joel DeJean, engineer and Texas based LaRouche political organizer; and Walter Faggett, MD, based in Washington, D.C., where he is former Chief Medical Officer of the District of Columbia, and is currently Co-Chairman of the Health Council of D.C.’s Ward 8, and an international leader with the Committee for the Coincidence of Opposites; and moderator, Dennis Speed.

Firmin Backer pointed out that the USAID has spent $5.1 billion in Haiti over the 11 years since the 2010 earthquake, but asked, what is there to show for it? Now, with the latest earthquake on Aug. 14, we can’t even get aid into the stricken zones, because there is no airport nor port in southern Haiti to serve the stricken people. We should reassess how wrongly the U.S. funding was spent. Firmin reported how Haiti was given some debt cancellation by the IMF years back, but then disallowed from seeking foreign credit!

Eric Walcott was adamant. “We need the creative genius of the world to bear on Haiti and Afghanistan.” He said, “leverage the diaspora” to develop Haiti. There are more Haitian medics in New York and Miami than all of Haiti. He stressed that Haiti is not poor; the conditions are what is poor. But the population has pride, talent, and resourcefulness. Walcott made a special point about elections in Haiti. He said, “Elections are a process,” not an event. He has experience. From 1998 to 2000, Walcott served as the lead observer for the OAS, for elections in Haiti.

Joel DeJean, an American of Haitian lineage, was forceful about the need to aim for the highest level in that nation, for example, to leapfrog from charcoal to nuclear power. He advised, “give China the opportunity” to deploy the very latest nuclear technology in Haiti—the pebble-bed gas-cooled modular reactor. We “don’t need more nuclear submarines, we need nuclear technology!” He called for the establishment of a development bank in Haiti, and other specifics.

Dr. Faggett summed up at many points, with the widest viewpoint and encouragement of action. He served in the U.S. military’s “Caribbean Peace-Keeping Force,” and was emphatic about taking action not only in Haiti, but worldwide. He referenced President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, saying that “you can tell a lot about people, by how they take care of the health of their people.” He reported that, at present, aid workers in Haiti are having to shelter in place, because of the terrible conditions.

But, he said, we should mobilize. Have “vaccine diplomacy,” and work to build a health platform in Haiti, and a health care delivery system the world over. He is “excited about realizing Helga’s mission,” referring to Helga Zepp-LaRouche, Chairwoman of the Schiller Institute, who issued a call in June 2020, for a world health security platform. At that time, she, and Dr. Joycelyn Elders, former U.S. Surgeon General, formed the Committee for the Coincidence of Opposites.

For more information contact the Schiller Institute at contact@schillerinstitute.org


Ten Nations Most at Risk for Starvation

Ten Nations Most at Risk for Starvation

Apr. 4 (EIRNS)–It was a year ago April 21, when World Food Program Director David Beasley briefed the U.N. Security Council that widespread famines “of Biblical proportions” would take place, unless action was taken. This has come to pass. The 10 countries at the top of the list in Spring 2020, according to the April, 2020 “Global Report on Food Crises,” issued by the WFP were: Yemen, DRC, Afghanistan, Venezuela, Ethiopia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, Nigeria (Northern) and Haiti.
            Now today, these very same countries remain at the top of the list of 23 nations, listed in the March 23 “Hunger Hotspots” report released by the WFP and Food and Agriculture Organization, as an appeal for emergency action. Here are the particulars for these nations given under the heading, “Number of People in High Acute Food Insecurity in Hotspot Countries:” The number of people is given in millions for each nation: DRC (19.6,)  Afghanistan (16.9,)  Yemen (16.1,) Nigeria 13.0, in 15 states and the Federal capital,) Ethiopia (12.9,) Syria (12.4,)  Venezuela (9.3,) South Sudan (7.2,) Sudan (7.1,) Haiti (4.4.
            The total number in these top 10 nations of those in acute food security is 118.9 million.
The other 13 nations on the same list have a total of 27.8 million people in dire need, bringing the combined number to 147 million. The 13 nations are:  Guatemala, Honduras, Mozambique, Burkina Faso, Somalia, Central African Republic, Niger, Sierra Leone, Madagascar, Mali, El Salvador, and Liberia.

            The WFP release on the “Hunger Hotspots” report.


Big Farmer Protests in Paris–‘France, Do You Still Want Your Farmers?’

Big Farmer Protests in Paris — ‘France, Do You Still Want Your Farmers?’

Apr. 4 (EIRNS)–Paris (Nouvelle Solidarité) –”France, do you still want your farmers?”  These were the words used to describe the protest organised on Friday in the Greater Paris region by the French agricultural union FNSEA. Over the last weeks, despite the COVID-19 lockdown and restrictions, thousands of farmers and French farm organizations pulled out their tractors, notably in Clermont Ferrand and Lyon, to protest EU policies that put them “in danger of disappearing.”
            In Germany also, farmers were in the streets in mid-March to protest their impossible conditions.
            At the center of the French protest are the latest EU outlines to reform the Common Agricultural Policies (CAP,) a regulated production mechanism established by De Gaulle in 1962 to boost production and food security, which has always been attacked by London, and has been gradually destroyed and diluted.

            With the EU’s “Green New Deal”, the proposed reform of the CAP implies new legislation aimed at taxing the use of nitrogen fertilizer. The new Climate and Resilience Bill, which farmers describe as a “punitive and unfair” nitrogen fee, would “stigmatize” the use of chemical fertilizer without providing any alternatives, said the FNSEA, France’s largest farm union. The union says the new legislation ignored the changes already taking place in farmers’ practices and would reduce farm incomes without giving a “real response” to current climate issues.

            The potential fertilizer fee coupled with the Egalim Law (requiring French producers to themselves collectively negotiate prices with large distributors), which has put agriculture output  prices well below production costs, could be disastrous to farmers and their families. At the same time the CAP reform in its current form requires farmers to make vast efforts to initiate an agro-ecological transition that most of them consider unworkable, and farmers are venting their frustration. A Senate report published on March 17 noted the “immense distress” among French farmers, due in particular to the “low level of agricultural income and the feeling of denigration” of the profession by “constant agri-bashing.”
            For the farmers, the protest is also about sending a message “to our fellow citizens alerting them to the urgency of saving French agriculture” without which “our food autonomy and the preservation of our national quality production” cannot be guaranteed. The farmers called for a CAP “for farms, not firms,” that “has the ambition to have many farmers, in all territories and in all lines of production.”


One in Three ‘Food Insecure’ In Afghanistan

One in Three ‘Food Insecure’ In Afghanistan

Aug. 21 (EIRNS)–One in three people in Afghanistan is “food insecure,” that is either with insufficient, or unreliable daily food, or both, according to the World Food Program Representative in Kabul this week, Mary-Ellen McGroarty. She spoke with AFP, and attributed the situation to strife, displacement of people from their homes, and bad weather, which she called “climate change.” There are 39 million people in the country, with masses more displacement currently taking place.

The Afghan wheat crop was down 40% this last crop year, under very dry conditions. The price of wheat in the country today is up 24% over the price averaged over the prior five years. Livestock have also been badly affected.

The WFP curtailed its operations since the Kabul changing situation since Aug. 14, but intends to ramp up again. The WFP is putting out the word that resources are needed. The WFP gave out food and aid in Afghanistan in the past week to 400,000 people overall, it was reported Aug. 20 by WFP official Frances Kennedy, to TASS. But there is a need for full-scale operations. She said, of the Afghanistan situation, “In the first six months of this year, WFP delivered food and nutrition assistance to 5.5 million people. WFP needs US$200 million urgently to continue its operations until the end of the year.”

China has pledged to send food, reported the Afghani Ambassador Javid Ahmad Qaem, on Aug. 18, in a CGTN interview. He said that he is working on finding transportation for it to reach his country. Given the air carrier problems in Kabul, he is seeking train transport via Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, which for food, in any case, is far less costly than air cargo.

Also, Amb. Qaem said that the WHO has promised to get a million doses of COVID-19 vaccine to Afghanistan.


US-China Ag Dialogue: ‘Be Happy Together With Others, Rather Than Trying To Be Happy Alone’

Apr. 2 (EIRNS)–On April 1, the third of four high level US-China Agriculture Dialogues took place, lasting almost 3 hours, titled, “Agriculture Education Dialogue: Together, how can the U.S and China transform agriculture?” The dialogue brought together the Deans and Presidents of Peking Univ., Nanjing Agricultural Univ., China Agricultural Univ., Zhejiang Univ., with UC Davis, Ohio State, the Tuskegee Institute, Oklahoma State and Iowa State Univ. The overall sponsor was the Missouri-based US Heartland China Association (USHCA). The topic was the state and future of agricultural education — extension services for the farmers themselves in China and the US, and educating students for careers in agriculture.
            Among the standout presentations, Prof. Sun Qixin of China Agricultural Univ., discussed the recent 40 year history of Chinese and American colleges exchanging students and training students together — he called this of “strategic importance.” Quoting President Xi, he explained the identity of food security and poverty alleviation for both China and for the whole world. He said that China’s development policy was to make sure that “we have a good environment for the Chinese people — China will never be a threat to other countries.” Quoting Mencius, he said, “It is better to be happy together with others, rather than trying to be happy alone.” He said that Yuan Longping is a friend of his, and that he had met with Dr. Borlaug in 1992 and in 2002. 

Prof. Huang Jikun of Peking Univ. stressed the many hundreds of ag science scholarly papers written jointly by Chinese and American researchers — written in both English and in Chinese — the authors pursuing food science with a single universal purpose. 

Prof. Kevin Chen, of the China Academy of Rural Development at Zhejiang Univ. described how the Chinese government has 1 million farm extension workers, serving 200 million farm families with small farms, many with aging farmers. He reported that only 40% of the farms have access to the internet — a problem to be solved. They have formed NAECP — the “National Cloud Platform for Grassroots Ag Tech Extension in China.”
            Among the Americans, Dr. Walter A. Hill, the Dean of the College of Ag, Environment, and Nutrition Sciences of Tuskegee University, made the greatest contribution. He framed his talk on the notion from WEB DuBois of “double consciousness” — seeing oneself and the world from “two sets of eyes,” one’s own and those of the oppressor. He said, “We need the brilliant young minds discussing China trade.” He reported that 90% of American farms are small farms, and most are losing money…” Speaking of the high quality of American Land Grant colleges (compared to the Ivy League), he said, “Big is not better. It’s the smaller that can produce the geniuses.” He called on Chinese universities to collaborate with Black colleges: “Let’s get Chinese to come here (to Tuskegee), and to work with us in a new way — I challenge you!”
            Stressing the rich common history of US-China collaboration in education, Prof. Zhu Jing, Dean at the Nanjing Agricultural University (NAU), reminded the audience that NAU was founded in 1921 by American ag economist and agricultural missionary for the American Presbyterian Mission, John Lossing Buck.
            The American speakers uniformly stressed sustainable agriculture and CO2 emission reduction (“climate-smart agriculture’). The world food crisis in the former colonial sector and the famine was not discussed, and only Prof. Sun discussed the China miracle of eliminating all extreme poverty in China. What was documented was a very deep 100 year history — continuing into the present — of the China-US joint passion for and science of food production improvement and expansion. The Dialogue was introduced by Chris Chinn, the Missouri Director of Agriculture, and by Tom Peterson, the Commissioner of the Minnesota Dept. of Agriculture.


Death by Starvation: 400,000 to Die in Ethiopia by Thanksgiving

Aug. 1 (EIRNS)–The UN warned on Saturday of “catastrophic” food shortages set to sweep world’s hunger hotspots over the next three months. Among the 23 hotspots are Ethiopia’s embattled Tigray region, southern Madagascar, Yemen, South Sudan and northern Nigeria. These worst-case locations have now progressed to starvation and death situations. “Hunger Hotspots,” issued jointly by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization and their World Food Programme identified that in the August-November period “acute food insecurity is likely to further deteriorate.” Ethiopia is facing 401,000 people dying of starvation without an immediate intervention of humanitarian aid.


WFP’s Beasley to Rome World Food Systems Pre-summit: A Mere $40B a Year Ends All Hunger by 2030

July 31 (EIRNS)–World Food Program Executive Director David Beasley made a strong intervention this past week in the July 26-28 Rome World Food Systems Pre-summit, by focusing on ending hunger, instead of greening food production, and serving “nature” apart from human beings. The UN WFP July 26 press release reported:

“Speaking at the opening of the UN Food Systems Pre-Summit in Rome on 26 July, the World Food Programme (WFP)’s Executive Director, David Beasley, called for action to reach zero hunger.

“While the world has the expertise and the resources to end hunger, efforts and attention are being directed somewhere else. ‘While we are rushing to space, 41 million people are knocking on famine’s door,’ he said.

“Calling out billionaires, Beasley said that ending hunger by 2030 would cost US$40 billion per year. ‘That seems like a lot of money. But in the United States alone, in the last one year, the U.S. billionaires’ net worth increase was over 1 trillion,’ he added.

“’There’s over U.S.$400 trillion on planet earth today. It is a shame that we have one single child going to bed hungry – let alone dying of hunger at a rate of one every five, six seconds.’”


WFP Beasley To Bezos: ‘The Sky Is No Longer the Limit’–Let’s End Hunger!

July 24 (EIRNS)–David Beasley, Executive Director of the World Food Program, tweeted on July 20, on the day billionaire Jeff Bezos took a ride into space and back:

“To @JeffBezos, @blueorigin, tremendous congratulations today! I can only imagine how incredible it was to see OUR planet from above. We’re all ONE human race. The sky is no longer the limit!! Now, let’s go end hunger together! Earth needs you!!
…you have proven over and over that anything is possible when you set your heart and mind to it. As you saw from space, Earth is a special place. 41 million people are on the brink of famine. I need your help. We need your help. Together, I know we can! #SpaceForBoth”


Insane U.S. “Wind Corridor” Is Also Top “Food Corridor”—Starve in the Dark

July 20, 2021 (EIRNS)—The “Wind Corridor” in the Central States (Dakotas south through Texas), created by the green rip-off interruptible cartels, is also the “Food Corridor” for the entire U.S., as well as a large part of the world. The two states in the center of the Wind Corridor, Iowa and Kansas, head the nation with the highest percent share of their electricity coming from wind and solar: Iowa, 49 percent and Kansas, 43 percent. Plus, there are still more “renewables” projects underway here, and more shutdowns of coal and nuclear.

Central States spokesmen against the killer green energy subversion will participate in the July 24 Schiller Institute conference, “There Is No Climate ‘Emergency’—Apply Science and Development to End Blackouts and Death.”

Blackouts in farming are a disaster. Water pumps stop. Irrigation stops. Grain drying stops. Auguring stops for moving grain. Livestock heating, cooling, and watering stops. Manure removal stops. Electrified repair machinery stops. Food processing stops. Frozen storage stops. Milk goes bad. Milking machinery stops. Transportation of inputs (fertilizers, chemicals, seeds) stops. Transportation to market and processing jams up for animals, grains, produce.

Look at the rank of Kansas and Iowa, combined population six million, in U.S. states’ food production: Wheat: Kansas is number one, accounting for nearly 20 percent. Corn: Iowa is number one. Soybeans: Iowa ranks either 2nd or 1st with Illinois, year to year. Hogs: Iowa is number one, accounting for nearly one third. Cattle: Kansas ranks third; but together with Iowa, the two states rank second after Texas. Eggs: Iowa is number one.


Yemen: A “man-made Hell” says WFP’s Beasley

WFP Chief on Yemen: “This Is Hell”

March 11, 2021 (EIRNS)–David Beasley, the executive director of the World Food Program, called the humanitarian disaster in Yemen “man-made,” and described the conditions in the war-ravaged country as “hell… the worst place on earth,” in a March 9 interview with the Associated Press. Beasley was speaking by video teleconference from Addis Ababa, following a tour of Yemen which included the capital of Sana’a. The WFP needs at least $815 million in Yemen aid over the next six months, but has only $300 million, he said, adding that the agency needs $1.9 billion overall for the year.

Beasley said that at a child malnutrition ward in a Sana’a hospital, he saw children wasting away from lack of food. Many, he said, were on the brink of death from entirely preventable and treatable causes, and they were the lucky ones who were receiving medical care.

“In a children’s wing or ward of a hospital, you know you normally hear crying, and laughter. There’s no crying, there’s no laughter, there’s dead silence,” he said. “I went from room to room, and literally, children that in any other place in the world would be fine, they might get a little sick but they’d get recovered, but not here.”

“This is hell,” he said. “It’s the worst place on earth. And it’s entirely man-made.” Yemen has been the victim of a Saudi war of aggression and a merciless blockade, under the direction of British policy-makers and with American support as well.

Beasley stressed that despite all the accusations, the Houthis have actually eased up on their restrictions on the work of humanitarian aid agencies. “We’ve turned a corner with the Houthis… in terms of cooperation, collaboration,” he said, adding that the only obstacle now is the lack of funding.


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