Liberia’s forests fall within one of the world’s threatened biodiversity “hotspots.”

But as Worldfocus contributing blogger Myles Estey describes, for many Liberians looking to earn a living by logging, environmental preservation is not always a top priority.

Liberia turned down an interesting offer last week. Basically, a consortium of Western ‘partners’ offered to pay Liberia millions of dollars to not ratify several forestry contracts, themselves worth millions. The Liberian speaker of the house was reported to have called the offer a joke, saying, ultimately, that Liberians need jobs, not money.

This may be a fair assessment, but it did not seem like the full purpose of the offer was really considered.

[...] Despite being a country known for its ‘blood timber’ during the war, Liberia holds a massive share of the largely untouched Upper Guinean Rainforest, a precious, and increasingly rare commodity around the world.

This is valuable in a way that is difficult to sometimes rationalize in a country with an unemployment rate of 85%, and a desperate need for jobs: telling rural workers that they cannot have a job because of a global crisis involving the a substance in the air does not translate.

Of course, as UK-based environmental watchdog Global Witness raised in a report last week, these jobs offer a lot [more] shorter term benefits than virgin forests, and almost always, provide significantly less (in jobs, pay, and local benefits such as schools, clinics and infrastructure) than promised in their contracts.

Looking at other international companies involved in natural resources within Liberia, its not hard to see the dangers. Firestone, the largest employee, had to be dragged kicking and screaming last August in order to raise wages to $3.78 / day, plus a modest bonus for production, and to reduce their hours and quotas that were encouraging child labour until 2008. [...]

International forestry companies will offer similarly meager salaries for the dangerous, grueling work of equatorial forestry, and, many fear, will avoid responsibilities to the impoverished local communities.

Along with concerns raised by Global Witness and others about the track records of the companies involved in the proposed operations, and the legitimacy of some of the contracts, ample questions remain.

Does providing $5 / day jobs to hundreds of Liberians actually outweigh the benefits of preserving a virgin rainforest? Will the Liberian government be able to hold the international companies to task on their promises? How much of the proposed millions of dollars per year will actually remain in Liberia?

USAID has been working hard with the FDA (Forest Developmental Authority) to create truly revolutionary regulations for forestry here, including barcoded trees and logging strategies that look towards long term forest health. Making sure this happens will be another story of navigating bribes, failed promises and assessments (that may or may not have taken place).

Weighing environmental benefits against the need for economic growth is never easy. And this problem gets magnified in a country routinely exploited by the international companies they depends on for the capital and overhead needed to even start these operations in the first place.

With virgin forests becoming an increasingly rare resource around the world, greater debate should occur regarding the importance of both the forest and the trees, and how they can offer the maximal, long-term benefits to Liberia.

To read more, see the original post.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user The Advocacy Project under a Creative Commons license.

A Liberian boy tackles a coconut.

As the second half of 2009 begins, global stock markets have rebounded. But this may mask much of the pain still being felt around the world, as unemployment remains a huge problem.

Japan’s 5.2 percent unemployment rate is one of its highest since the end of World War II, while in Spain, unemployment has surged past 18 percent. But these figures pale in comparison to those in Liberia, where the vast majority of people — up to 85 percent — are unemployed.

Worldfocus contributing blogger Myles Estey is in Monrovia, Liberia, and describes how people get by without formal employment.

Gettin’ By

As the United States and Canada start to freak out that their unemployment rates approach the double digits, officially, Liberia’s unemployment rate remains, on paper, as 85 percent. Almost, but not quite, making it an inverse relationship.

The CIA Factbook uses this 85 percent stat, and I think everyone else cites it and throws it around like its an iron-clad stat. Its not.

While Liberia certainly lacks locations for official, regulated employment, that only 15 percent of the population works is an absurd assumption, and one that would be practically unattainable. While severe poverty is rampant, Liberians are not starving to death. Reason being, that as in any society where basic infrastructure has been destroyed, people find a way to get by.

They fill in the gaps of people’s needs, finding small ways to deliver goods and services to the population at large. ‘Git my hustle on,’ as many say.

In this hustle, profit margins are wafer thin. Full days of work often produce just a few dollars, which in turn often gets spread out to family and friends in need.

During my eight months of living here, and poking around at all levels of society, I still remain fascinated by the micro-economy. So, I have been collecting info about how many people manage to ‘get their daily bread’ - another ism. [I will] feature some of the professions that interest me the most. [...]

Profession: Coconut Seller

Location: Roaming

How it works: Coconuts come to Monrovia packed into trucks and cars from villages all around the country. The outer husks have been hacked off with machetes, to reduce size and weight. Sellers are generally old women, who carry up to 25 or 30 on their head (which is psycho heavy), or young men who can carry up to 80 in wheelbarrows.

Every seller carries a machete, allowing them to split the coconuts for anyone who stops them as they walk through the streets. They wait patiently as buyers drink, split the coconut to access the meat, take the empty shell, and move on.

Cash: Street sellers buy them wholesale for around $10 LD ($0.14 US), or ‘2 for 15′ [$LD] at spots around the city. Coconuts generally retail for $20 LD. Meaning that to make a dollar, 7 coconuts must be sold - roughly 15 pounds of weight.

Variables and Dangers: Insanely sore neck, machete wounds.

Net Profit: For female sellers, they rarely earn $ 5 US /load. Some will take more than one load per day, but it is rare, as they often have families to tend to, and business can be slow.

Wheelbarrow men can earn over $10 US/day, but this kind of profit demands a 10 hour day.

Point of Reference: used T-shirt sold on the street costs $ 1 - 3 US

To read more job profiles, follow Myles Estey’s blog.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user usnico under a Creative Commons license.

Rumor and superstition surrounds water in Liberia.

Liberia’s water supply was crippled during the country’s civil war when the main water treatment plant was destroyed. A 2006 report found that the majority of Liberian rely on untreated wells, rivers, ponds, creeks and swamps for drinking water.

But the water supply, already crippled by war, has been further harmed by widespread superstition and rumors.

Myles Estey is a journalist based in Monrovia, Liberia. He writes at “Esteyonage” about a recent scare there, when people became worried that the water would turn into blood.

Blood water

Last night, two things startled me. The first was Nigerian-manned tanks rolling past my house as I stayed up late typing - tanks are rarely a sign of a good thing. The second came waking at 3:45, only to see the bridge outside my house full of with people, and people filing under my balcony.

The bridge, most people say, should not be crossed by foot anytime after 11, and certainly not past midnight. A little surprising then that a line of people streamed across the bridge, under some of the only streetlamps in the country, and that many seemed to be women and children, not typical Also strange that most of them carried the 5-gallon water jugs that people collect their water from local wells in (running water remains rare). I struggled to come up with a reason for any of this, before drifting back to sleep, listening to the wind and a light rain that started.

This hazy memory remained lay buried until speaking with some reporters. It became clear that a ‘crisis’ gripped the city yesterday. A ‘report’ circulated, claiming that all the city’s water supplies would turn to blood by morning, though other variations claimed the water would become bitter, or perhaps dry up. People acted quickly, with reports of long lines all night at wells becoming especially feisty as dawn approached.

Origins of the report seem mixed. Truth FM definitely aired the first story about it during the day, but they were responding to already widespread knowledge, and callers comments. It spread ‘virally’, in 2.0 terminology, though without any more technology than word of mouth/cell phone. Brothers called sisters called cousins called friends called coworkers all through the night, with virtually everyone aware of the problem by dawn. Many residents stocked up with water.

“People here just believe anything,” a local journalist said of the situation. “They believe in powers and forces that don’t actually exist, just because someone told them so.”

To read more, see the original post.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user MikeBlyth under a Creative Commons license.