Now the sparkle has gone out of my Goma cheese, too.
Blood cheese? Conflict cows?
Seriously - I have never bought or asked for a diamond ring, although occasionally I've thought about it. I haven't bought a cell phone in years by just begging other people's hand-me-downs. I don't own a PlayStation or Wii or anything like that. I haven't even owned a car in five years. I'm not the best minimalist, and I still live a western lifestyle, but I try to pay attention and be conscientious.
But now - I can't even buy a wheel of Goma cheese without thinking about supporting Bosco Ntanganda or others involved in the conflict in the east. Great.
Jason Stearns says in his War of Cows entry:
Agriculturalists - mostly Hutu and Hunde - are sometimes pushed off their land to make way for cattle. The conquest of land often goes hand in hand with securing land for cattle grazing. Raids by the Mai-Mai or Congolese army against the CNDP in North Kivu and against the Banyamulenge in South Kivu have sometimes gone hand in hand with cattle raiding worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. In Goma for a while they had introduced a new phrase into the lexicon of natural resource wars: Blood cheese.
Which is too bad, because just recently at work, they set up a Goma cheese table once a week or so, meaning I could buy more-local cheese without having to frequent the likes of Peloustore or Alimentation Express' European cheese counters if I wanted a bit of dairy in my life. [Don't get me wrong, they have great cheese and a great selection - but somehow I feel better spending my dollars on cheese flown within the country rather than from another continent when possible, and in the former case I know that some of that profit is going to a local vendor.]
ETA: This issue is not only one of warlords investing resources and how they do it, but, also referenced in the linked blog entry, of scarce land resources in Rwanda. The government is attempting to reduce soil erosion through forbidding grazing on public land. In the end, what will the result be for cattle owners, but a (continued?) fight for additional territory that must inevitably spill over into DR Congo?
Seriously - I have never bought or asked for a diamond ring, although occasionally I've thought about it. I haven't bought a cell phone in years by just begging other people's hand-me-downs. I don't own a PlayStation or Wii or anything like that. I haven't even owned a car in five years. I'm not the best minimalist, and I still live a western lifestyle, but I try to pay attention and be conscientious.
But now - I can't even buy a wheel of Goma cheese without thinking about supporting Bosco Ntanganda or others involved in the conflict in the east. Great.
Jason Stearns says in his War of Cows entry:
Agriculturalists - mostly Hutu and Hunde - are sometimes pushed off their land to make way for cattle. The conquest of land often goes hand in hand with securing land for cattle grazing. Raids by the Mai-Mai or Congolese army against the CNDP in North Kivu and against the Banyamulenge in South Kivu have sometimes gone hand in hand with cattle raiding worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. In Goma for a while they had introduced a new phrase into the lexicon of natural resource wars: Blood cheese.
Which is too bad, because just recently at work, they set up a Goma cheese table once a week or so, meaning I could buy more-local cheese without having to frequent the likes of Peloustore or Alimentation Express' European cheese counters if I wanted a bit of dairy in my life. [Don't get me wrong, they have great cheese and a great selection - but somehow I feel better spending my dollars on cheese flown within the country rather than from another continent when possible, and in the former case I know that some of that profit is going to a local vendor.]
ETA: This issue is not only one of warlords investing resources and how they do it, but, also referenced in the linked blog entry, of scarce land resources in Rwanda. The government is attempting to reduce soil erosion through forbidding grazing on public land. In the end, what will the result be for cattle owners, but a (continued?) fight for additional territory that must inevitably spill over into DR Congo?