European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - May 25, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Sunday May 25, 1986 the stars and stripes Page 17 an aged woman of the nomadic tuareg tribe rests in a tent right. The nomads find it difficult to adjust to farming life. Near Timbuktu Mali below precious irrigation brings water to dying crops Little land however is rescued yearly by Mort Rosenblum associated press a in Mali is when nomads and Farmers anxiously scan the Dusty sky. Rain Means they might survive yet another hard year. No rain Means famine and death perhaps worse than Ever. We have to Slop thinking emergency and Start planning food Security on a Long term said Leo de Vos Unicof director for mall who is shifting emphasis from feeding centers to Well digging. Otherwise these people Are constantly on the Edge and it is the same thing every  his urging was echoed in new York where the United nations general Assembly scheduled a special session from May 27-31 to dramatize Africa s Appeal for help in breaking its Cycle of desperation. Rain in 1985 brought Africa a respite from nine years of drought. But specialist agree that crises will Worsen unless reliable food and Export systems Are put in place. African leaders estimate they need $128.1 billion Over live years to reorganize collapsing economies. Admitting to past mistakes they vowed to find two thirds of that within their own budgets. In Washington a world Bank report supported their position. It saw new evidence that african countries were exercising political will but their efforts would fall without massive new Aid. The poorer countries together need at least $2.5 Bill lion More each year until 1990, the Bank report said. Earlier an american study by the Council on foreign relations and the overseas development Council urged . Officials to triple Long term joans to Africa to $3 billion a year. Africa s foreign debt approaches $175 billion. There have been 32 rescheduling in three years. Many countries would still fall behind if they spent every Dollar of income on interest and arrears. The drought has merely accentuated Africa s More pervasive and structural problems said an organization of african Unity report to the . General Assembly. Without help Africa will remain the sick child of the International  in Africa sick child is no figure of speech. At least 18 million people in Ethiopia Sudan Mozambique Angola the Sahel and scattered pockets elsewhere have not heard the emergency is Over. We have nothing no work no food and nowhere to go said Mohammed a Hamed a 37-year-old tuareg camped near Kopti South of Timbuktu. He is left with 4-year-old fat Mede. His three other daughters died along with the cattle and goats that were his livelihood. I look at these people and i cannot figure out How they make it said Alcha Dianara a malian nutritionist. After All the time i have spent seeing this tears still come to my  like other Aid workers she fears shocking images of starving children no longer move the world conscience. Massive Relief saved lives she said but now Africa needs sustained costly development. Rve million african children under five die each year even without famine victims of malnutrition and disease. In the major malian town of Sengou for example the clinic is out of Medicine. We Are supposed to be supplied every three months but the ministry has nothing said or. Mayi Baba Baba. We Are out of aspirin malaria tablets and  As elsewhere in Africa Mali has doctors and skilled professionals out of work because the government cannot pay them. Effects of Africa s calamity reach far beyond the suffering of individuals according to specialists who warn of downward cycles that make the continent each year less Able to feed itself. Uprooted villagers and desperate nomads wreak havoc on an increasingly fragile environment. As Trees and vegetation disappear and the desert expands scientists say Rains diminish. Even when Rains Are Good crops Are lost Lor Lack of trucks gasoline storage or processing facilities. A surplus in one area Seldom relieves a solicit within the same country. This is the tragedy of Africa said a . Worker in Timbuktu lapping a new five Ion truck silting on blocks. Ii was donated Wilh much fanfare by a French television Channel but has been Idle Lor six months Lor Lack of a simple spare part. Across Africa Well meaning donors have left a Hodgepodge of vehicles motor pumps and machinery without adequate support to keep them running. On a larger scale development projects have disrupted marketing systems and altered arming techniques which once protected fragile soil. Scientists say much arable land is beyond saving and More is threatened every year. Outsiders alone cannot do it remarked an Olli Cial at the . Agency Lor International development Mission in Bamako asking for anonymity. He fears Many people Are growing weary of trying. We Are realizing that development takes a damned Long time he said. There is no other Way african leaders insist that decades of wrong moves have imposed a new reality and they Are prepared to reorganize and revitalize their economies. We know now what in Means to manage a government to organize a country remarked senegalese culture minister Makaily Gassama. At first we All had plans ideas ideology. We did t understand  but some african leaders fear it May already be too late and they say their joint Appeal May be a last Chance to save Africa. The situation could soon degenerate into total chaos unless urgent and imaginative actions Are taken to alleviate the Burden of debt and debt repayments the Oak statement said. The world Bank put in if present trends continue the human disaster of 1983-84 in sub saharan Africa will return to haunt the world Community this year gives a breathing space but Africa s attempts to help itself will fall without. New Aid and debt  specialists Point to signs that african villagers and nomads respond to even minimum help that encourages them to Plant crops build Small water catchments and protect the threatened ecology. A few More years of Good rain can reverse some serious damage in those parts of Africa where civil War does not disrupt farming and food distribution. Djibril Dlallo spokesman for the . Office of emergency operations in Africa said i am essentially optimistic about Africa. Ii is the morale above All. I have seen hopeless situations in Central America and other places. I have never seen hopelessness in  Dlallo recently took a group of european and african journalists to Remote parts of Mali and Turkina faso to demonstrate How people Are helping themselves. At Folio Bougous Mali villagers spend every free moment carting hardened dirt from termite Hills and rocks to make a Small dam for run off water. Their Only foreign Aid is baling wire from nearby French missionaries. In the ancient City of Djenane fanta Bab Cisse Diallo has organized women into a self help cooperative to improve farming sanitation nutrition marketing and household systems. Her personal Triumph is popularizing a newfangled mud stove that uses a fraction of the Wood burned in open cooking fires. There Are 4,515 stoves around Djenane she said pausing to make a Brief calculation and beaming at her colleagues Success. And there will be 10,000 More by the end of the year. Malian women Are prepared to  in nearby Kopti Anoumou Diakite regional livestock director and a French trained veterinary scientist said the drought at least had forced a healthier balance Between cattle and Range land. It is not a scientific problem but a question of political economics he said. Look around the world. The people who have have made it Are those who Are organized. Those who Are not do not  de Vos is among a growing number of experts who feel that outsiders should provide africans with the resources to train their own specialists and work out their own systems of development. I have seen this myself in Mali he said. If you promote competent africans and give them the responsibility you will be amazed at the  mama Tapo assistant world Bank representative in Bamako agreed. Sometimes projects Are turned Down because experts come and say they cannot work. I know they will work because i know my people. I was bom