Last week kidnappers snatched two Spanish aid workers from the Dadaab refugee camp on the Somali-Kenya border, which put Somalia back in the news.

We had almost forgotten about the 10 million people in the horn of Africa who are still on the verge of starvation.

After all, we did our part.

Canadians gave $70 million to famine relief in East Africa, matched by another $70 million from our government. Earlier this month, International Co-operation Minister Bev Oda called Canadians compassionate and generous.

We may be compassionate and generous, but are we informed and self-aware when we give?

Recently I spoke to Muuxi Adam, a University of Winnipeg student who arrived here as a Somalian refugee in 2004.

Since then he has created a National Film Board documentary about his experience, nearly completed a degree in international development studies and is now working to set up a school in the sprawling Dadaab refugee camp.

Adam doesn’t consider the famine in his homeland a natural disaster akin to an earthquake or a tsunami. He calls the crisis a political one.

In a country with no central government, those with power are busy diverting food aid to themselves or selling it for profit, Adam said. Aid organizations are struggling to deliver food in a violent country where theft and corruption are rampant.

“How many leaders can you talk to? How many warlords can you bribe?” Adam said. “It’s a mess.”

“I was a kid in Somalia in 1993,” Adam recalled. “I remember going to the market and seeing food for sale that was supposed to be delivered to those who were dying of famine.

“There’s been a lot of warning that sooner or later another famine was going to strike East Africa. The western world has generally ignored those warnings. Now that the crisis is here, they are trying to write a prescription just for that situation.”

So what can compassionate, generous Canadians do, short of meddling in Somalia’s political minefield?

That depends, Adam said, on whether you want to do something that feels good or something that contributes to long-term change. Because long-term solutions to famine and conflict have to come from the Somali people themselves.

“We don’t need to introduce democracy. We don’t need to introduce another way of solving problems. There are traditional ways and traditional knowledge that can empower local people to create massive change,” he said.

Adam will be speaking more about these ideas at the Global Issues Conference here in Winnipeg on Oct. 28 and 29. The one-day conference is aimed at engaging students on issues of global inequality.

Adam doesn’t think people should quit giving money to alleviate suffering in East Africa. But as we dig deep into our pockets, we also need to dig deeply into our own motives for giving and our own connections to the problem.

There are a billion people on the planet who are chronically hungry. There are another billion who are overfed. That’s not a coincidence. The links between our plenty in Canada and hunger in other countries are complicated, yet very real.

Some of these links are more visible than others.

Look at the daily lineups at Tim Hortons drive-thrus, said James Kornelsen, public engagement co-ordinator for Canadian Foodgrains Bank.

“Depressed and volatile prices for coffee often impoverish small-scale coffee farmers in Ethiopia,” he pointed out.

Meanwhile, we try to spend as little as we can on our daily (or thrice-daily) cup.

Our privilege is often built on other people’s disempowerment. Reversing that equation is much more complicated than giving some cash to famine relief, and it produces less salve for our colonial conscience.

But generous, compassionate Canadians need to consider it.

Josiah Neufeld is helping organize the 2011 Global Issues Conference on Saturday, Oct. 29 at St. John’s College at the University of Manitoba. Muuxi Adam will speak at the opening lecture at Aqua Books on Friday, Oct. 28 at 7 p.m. Register for either event at www.accountabledev.com.

Published in Volume 66, Number 8 of The Uniter (October 19, 2011)