Desperate Haitians Survive On Mud Cookies

Slum Residents Suffering As Oil Prices, Biofuel Demand, Weather Drive Food Costs Up

(AP)  It was lunchtime in one of Haiti's worst slums, and Charlene Dumas was eating mud.

With food prices rising, Haiti's poorest can't afford even a daily plate of rice, and some take desperate measures to fill their bellies.

Charlene, 16 with a 1-month-old son, has come to rely on a traditional Haitian remedy for hunger pangs: cookies made of dried yellow dirt from the country's central plateau.

The mud has long been prized by pregnant women and children here as an antacid and source of calcium. But in places like Cite Soleil, the oceanside slum where Charlene shares a two-room house with her baby, five siblings and two unemployed parents, cookies made of dirt, salt and vegetable shortening have become a regular meal.

"When my mother does not cook anything, I have to eat them three times a day," Charlene said. Her baby, named Woodson, lay still across her lap, looking even thinner than the slim 6 pounds 3 ounces he weighed at birth.

Though she likes their buttery, salty taste, Charlene said the cookies also give her stomach pains. "When I nurse, the baby sometimes seems colicky too," she said.

Food prices around the world have spiked because of higher oil prices, needed for fertilizer, irrigation and transportation. Prices for basic ingredients such as corn and wheat are also up sharply, and the increasing global demand for biofuels is pressuring food markets as well.

The problem is particularly dire in the Caribbean, where island nations depend on imports and food prices are up 40 percent in places.

The global price hikes, together with floods and crop damage from the 2007 hurricane season, prompted the U.N. Food and Agriculture Agency to declare states of emergency in Haiti and several other Caribbean countries. Caribbean leaders held an emergency summit in December to discuss cutting food taxes and creating large regional farms to reduce dependence on imports.

At the market in the La Salines slum, two cups of rice now sell for 60 U.S. cents, up 10 U.S. cents from December and 50 percent from a year ago. Beans, condensed milk and fruit have gone up at a similar rate, and even the price of the edible clay has risen over the past year by almost $1.50. Dirt to make 100 cookies now costs $5, the cookie makers say.

Still, at about 5 cents apiece, the cookies are a bargain compared to food staples. About 80 percent of people in Haiti live on less than $2 a day and a tiny elite controls the economy.

Merchants truck the dirt from the central town of Hinche to the La Saline market, a maze of tables of vegetables and meat swarming with flies. Women buy the dirt, then process it into mud cookies in places such as Fort Dimanche, a nearby shanty town.

Carrying buckets of dirt and water up ladders to the roof of the former prison for which the slum is named, they strain out rocks and clumps on a sheet, and stir in shortening and salt. Then they pat the mixture into mud cookies and leave them to dry under the scorching sun.

The finished cookies are carried in buckets to markets or sold on the streets.

A reporter sampling a cookie found that it had a smooth consistency and sucked all the moisture out of the mouth as soon as it touched the tongue. For hours, an unpleasant taste of dirt lingered. At left, a boy shows his tongue after eating one of the cookies.

Assessments of the health effects are mixed. Dirt can contain deadly parasites or toxins, but can also strengthen the immunity of fetuses in the womb to certain diseases, said Gerald N. Callahan, an immunology professor at Colorado State University who has studied geophagy, the scientific name for dirt-eating.

Haitian doctors say depending on the cookies for sustenance risks malnutrition.

"Trust me, if I see someone eating those cookies, I will discourage it," said Dr. Gabriel Thimothee, executive director of Haiti's health ministry.

Marie Noel, 40, sells the cookies in a market to provide for her seven children. Her family also eats them.

"I'm hoping one day I'll have enough food to eat, so I can stop eating these," she said. "I know it's not good for me."

[paris146]

Well, I don''t know any Haitians, they don''t live in close proximity to me, and it''s not a story frequently on the evening news. Besides, they''re black. Most aid they''re given is usually hijacked and never makes it to the people who need it most. They''re just another sad statistic in a world full of suffering people. Any excuse I conjure up, though, just doesn''t erase the picture I have in my head of those mud cookies, and the men, women, and children desperate enough to eat them. I''m not at all a religious person, but a verse keeps repeating itself, something like, ". . . do it unto the least of these. . ."

[robertkjjj]

Does anyone else find it strange that the poorest countries in the world are in black Africa, the poorest countries in Africa are the black ones(vs the Arab ones), and the poorest island in the Caribbean is the only one that was settled by black Africans? I mean, what the heck is wrong here? Are we supposed to believe this is a coincidence? What causes this? Are we just supposed to believe forever that God has it in for black Africans and their descendants? At what point, if ever, do we expect them to figure out how to pull themselves up, and stay up? I''ve been reading and watching 40+ years of starving and sick and dying black Africans. When does this end?

[bleem3]

This is just insane! Terrible!

[b-easy63]

History of Haiti?
When you talk about the Hatians being beautiful people are you talking about the transplanted Africans brought to Haiti or about the original people of Haiti?

Posted by rushlimpdrug at 10:28 AM : Jan 30, 2008

The Africans in Haiti were brought there more than 400 years ago--they can claim after all this time, to be more indigenous to Haiti, than most Americans can to North America--and since most have ancestry n Haiti that trumps most Americans--what is your point? That is still the history of the country and the fact of oppression by their government and the former Imperialist powers that ruled or aided and abetted dictator rule over them still hold true.

Be careful how you judge others--God is not through with America yet and we seemed to be trending toward a polarized, Brazil type, 3rd world --playground for rich foreigner existence, ourselves.

[runningralph]

45,000 people per month are dying in the Congo. The Janjaweed is committing genocide in Darfur. Somalia has civil war split many ways. Kenya has ethnic cleansing going on. Haitians need help. The list goes on. If we sent out every dime we have next year all these populations would be worse off than today.

[korinsha]

The dirt that they are eating is probably much more nutritious than the processed food you are paying mega-bucks for down at the Walmart...and giving to your high fructose corn syrup lapping offspring...

Posted by Prinzowhales
-----------------------------------------------------
You really think so? So, if I proposed that you eat nothing but mud cookies for one year, while I have access to all of the groceries in Wal-Mart for one year... you honestly believe that after that time, you''d be in better shape than me?

If you consider negative clothes sizes and severe malnutrition a "better shape" then maybe. Wonder how many of those people starving to death in Haiti would turn their noses up at corn syrup and processed food in preference of mud if cost weren''t an issue...? Probably NOBODY!

[korinsha]

"Trust me, if I see someone eating those cookies, I will discourage it," said Dr. Gabriel Thimothee, executive director of Haiti''s health ministry.

He''s going to discourage it? How...? "I''d rather you eat NOTHING than those cookies!" What a jerk. If he can''t offer a solution, or a healthier alternative, he needs to shut up.

[olebd]

The gal that does the voice of Bart Simpson just gave $10 MILLION to Scientology. Not only is that crazy, it''s just plain vulgar. She makes $200k per episode to do a cartoon voice!!! I''m about ready to throw away the TV.

[olebd]

Where''s the UN? How about they gather up a coalition of countries to help out for a change instead of waiting for the U.S. to do something? Our collective pockets are filled with lint these days. Where''s Tickin'' Tommy Timebomb and all his rich Scientology buddies? Here''s your car wreck Tom...time to stop and help because you just know, you''re the only one that can.

[vmcneal2]

Thanks, grosby11...

[vmcneal2]

High birth rates are one thing but A government that does nothing but line the pockets of the wealthy Haitians with our tax dollars is something else. First, let''s stop giving money to thieves..People are eating dirt. Haiti has lots of problems and greed is at the top of the list. Anyone who has spent any time in Haiti knows what I''m talking about.

[gcrosby11]

oops - forgot to add that with the whatiffoundation.org, that 97% of what is given goes straight to a parish in Port au Prince that feeds 750 children a day, 5 days a week. The other 3% is retained for admin costs.

[gcrosby11]

If anyone is interested there is a great charity to give to, to help feed children in Haiti - the address to the website is :www.whatiffoundation.org/index.asp .

[runningralph]

Modern day Haitians could work their way out of poverty the same way China did. Birth control. High birth rates plus few resources = POVERTY. The best government could not overcome the demands of a high birth rate. Governments don''t produce food and goods. A government can only try not to let a population descend into mob rule. Until individual Haitians decide to be responsible for the own reproductive systems, the only thing the government could do to reduce poverty, is to enforce population control like China did. China is now, fifty years later, rich and powerful.

[vmcneal2]

Haiti is the poorest country I have visited and I''ve travelled to many countries. There are so many beggers in Port-Au Prince that I had to pay a begger to keep the other beggers away from me. It''s so sad. Nobody on this earth should have to eat mud. This is not the result of over population....It''s the result a government in Haiti being supported by our tax dollars. We just seem to give money with no oversight and the greedy upper class Hatians just get richer while the people eat dirt.

[prinzowhales]

The dirt that they are eating is probably much more nutritious than the processed food you are paying mega-bucks for down at the Walmart...and giving to your high fructose corn syrup lapping offspring...

[missingamerica]

Maybe we should have our genetic engineers work on a virus carrier to implant chlorophyll in our dermal cells.

Then we all could eat dirt and breed like so many weeds.

[missingamerica]

Sigh...I was going to say something about - "Hey, wait a minute - what do you mean overpopulation is not now and will not be a problem, and the Earth has now and will forever have enough resources to go around!" - but I got depressed.

[rushlimpdrug]

Guess what?
If I knew my children would be eating mud cookies I wouldn''t have any kids.
Now go forth and multiply. . .

[mcv57]

... surely the rich will be comdemned as Lazurus.