Inhabited since before recorded history, Mozambique came under the control of Portugal beginning in the 16th century. While gold and ivory formed the basis of the economy, settlement by Portugese was sparse up into the 1880s. But by 1885 enough immigration had taken place to warrant the region's organization into a formal colony, called Portugese East Africa. Portugal kept Mozambique closely tied to it economically, but the 1950s saw the beginning of protests by the native peoples against continued Portugese rule. Beginning in 1961 and continuing for more than a decade, the Frelimo (Front for the Liberation of Mozambique) rebellion fought a guerrilla war. By 1964, the northern part of the country was almost completely in Frelimo hands. Portugal had its own revolution in 1974 and thereafter agreed to support independence for Mozambique. At that time, the Portuguese exodus from Mozambique left much of the country's administrative infrastructure wrecked. In June 1975, independence was granted and a Marxist Frelimo government was installed. During the 1980s, a movement to overthrow the Frelimo regime was organized and civil war erupted. Supported by South Africa, the anti-Frelimo group grew stronger. In response, the Frelimo government adopted a new constitution that spelled out an improvement in individual rights, including freedom of the press and speech, and provided for a multiparty democracy to be established. The civil war came to an end in 1992 and in 1994 the country's first-ever multiparty elections were held .



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I think it is impossible to describe Africa in words; you have to see it, hear it, touch it, taste it and smell it. You have to hear the cacophony of kids screaming and brakes screeching, the distinct sound of drums and the faint wail of Muslim prayers at dawn- usually with an accompanying chorus of dogs- in order to imagine Mozambique. You have to taste coconuts, curry, bad Malawian beer, peanut sauce and the thick, pasty, cornmeal gruel they call chima, the mainstay of everyone in the countryside. It is a meal that fills the stomach and, unfortunately, not much else.

You have to smell the ocean or the clear, unpolluted air of the sparsely-populated savannahs. In the capital city, Maputo, the smell is usually garbage. In 99 degree heat, the stench is so powerful that it almost knocks you over when you walk down the street. I've come to appreciate the coolness of night, when the city sleeps, the dumpsters burn, and the smell of fire momentarily masks the putrid odors of midday heat. I think it's beautiful and atrocious all at the same time; I think most Mozambicans would agree.

Maputo is the commercial and cultural nucleus of the whole sprawling nation. This capital city, alone, accounts of 37% of the national economy, and in this embryonic national economy, over 70% of the annual budget comes from international aid money. Without this aid, I sense that Mozambique would fall apart. Maputo is a strange mix. The decaying Portuguese colonial architecture, with low, slanting terra-cotta roofs, grandiose arched doorways, mimosa lined streets, and guava-filled gardens, coexists beside ominous, communist-era, cement towers. In the 70's when the towers were built, function was valued over any attempt at aesthetic beauty. At that time, Africa was destined for greatness. Today, if not for the innumerable colorfully-printed capulana skirts flapping off 10,000 city balconies to dry, Maputo might look like an unending sea of gray from the 8th story window of my apartment.

I have to wonder how much my first impressions of Maputo must have been slanted by the fact that I came here from Buenos Aires, said by many to be among the most beautiful cities in the world. In comparison, Maputo is ugly, but is not without its charms once you figure out the places worth visiting and construct an intricate strategy to get there. Here, public transportation is hard. If you have a car, you are either an international ex-pat (this usually means white and European, but there are some exceptions) or a member of the elite, and very small, Mozambican upper class (invariably aligned with the ruling political party, Frelimo). Either you have a car or you are part of the poor masses, and must rely on whatever transportation you can get, however uncomfortable and precarious it is. If you're like me - a glorified intern with an income that exempts me from either category- you end up living in a strange intermediate area, often bumming rides from folks with cars, but just as often boarding the rickety, sweat-stenched, and overcrowded chapas, the privately-owned mini-busses that operate in the absence of government-owned public transportation.

If you're like me - a glorified intern with an income that exempts me from either category - you end up living in a strange intermediate area.

The driver/owners of the chapas buy them used from South Africa, usually not bothering to paint over the Japanese characters that betray their true origin. They get them with 100,000 or 150,000 miles- whatever is the upper limit to be considered "safe" public vehicles in Japan. The vans are then driven at 50 mph over the pothole-ridden streets of Maputo until they stop running all together or one of the wheels fall off, whichever comes first. When I get off, too often I feel like I've had a brush with death. For 99% of Mozambicans the chapas are only option for getting anywhere.

But to hear people talk about the chapas is to enter into a tiny microcosm of public dialogue about the future of Mozambique. "Ok, so the chapas are crowded, uncomfortable and dangerous, but at least now we can leave the city. Before, during the war, that would have been impossible." And, indeed, it was. As we traveled around the Maputo province getting ready for our fieldwork, my colleagues described how it was 15 years ago, at the peak of the civil war, when the roads were covered with land mines and there were frequent ambushes by the foreign-financed, counter-revolutionary Renamo guerrilla group, known regionally for their spectacular human rights abuses and forced dislocation of over 2 million Mozambicans. Even just across the bay from Maputo on the small island of Catembe, which is now a common weekend destination for people seeking sandy beaches and a little break from the city, walls are riddled with bullet holes in testament of how ever-present the war must have been in people's everyday lives.

War was waged on and off for almost 20 years, after independence from Portugal in 1975 until 1992, when the Peace Accords were signed. During the war, Mozambique's infrastructure was completely destroyed and the country is still recovering. There is one paved highway that connects Maputo the other urban centers in Mozambique, and even this vein, appropriately called "Highway Number 1," remains dirt for extended distances. In the distant Mozambican provinces bordering Zimbabwe, Zambia and Tanzania, most of the roads are dirt, and when the rains come, the rivers rise, leaving travelers stranded for days. This may seem like tough going for those of us accustomed to the gleaming, four-lane highways of the U.S., but to many Mozambicans, again, it a vast improvement from the times when roads were not passable because of fighting.



The end of the war and the signing of the peace accords are critical markers for the country. Time, life, and nationhood, are understood in terms of "before" and "after" by many Mozambicans I have known. "Before" was the time of the war, before that was colonialism. Relatively speaking, the "after," while dismal by western standards, is enough to give many people hope. During the war, there was little advance in terms of education or health, as all government resources were channeled into fighting. At that time, Mozambique accrued a massive foreign debt that is still being paid off, while the hulking bodies of the Soviet tanks and machine guns that were purchased lie scattered across the countryside, rusted beyond recognition, stopped in their tracks with no money left to move them. Today, at least, international funds are being used to stabilize the country socially and economically.

For a country recovering from such a tragic recent history, I believe Mozambique is actually doing pretty well. It has survived 30 extraordinarily difficult years of constant ideological transition, from Colonialism to Communism, then Communism to Capitalism. It is surrounded by the not-so-inspiring influences of South Africa and Zimbabwe (not to mention the Great Lakes Region a little farther North). From 2000 to 2002 a series of devastating floods destroyed whole cities and left thousands homeless and hungry. An additional factor in post-war political and geographic consolidation is Mozambique's cultural diversity. It is a country composed of 10 separate ethnic groups and has a population adhering to three very different religions (Christianity, Islam and traditional Animist).

Not knowing what to expect when I arrived here a few months ago, I have been pleasantly surprised at how infrequently any of these historical ruptures seem to matter to the Mozambican people. Certainly the Argentines insult the Chileans with greater frequency and vehemence than Mozambique's previous warring factions do one another. The groups are totally disarmed and their opposing viewpoints have been channeled into a functional democracy. Political violence is rare. The large Muslim population is integrated politically, culturally, socially, and professionally, and marriages between Christians and Muslims are common and accepted. I suppose that all this is a longer way of saying that, despite all its "development indicators", I have experienced Mozambique as an extraordinarily sane and hopeful country.

Living here, it is impossible to forget that Mozambique remains one of the poorest countries in the world. Within a month I saw how these statistics are reflected in the everyday lives of real people.

Living here, it is impossible to forget that Mozambique remains one of the poorest countries in the world. It's easy to spout off statistical examples: the average annual income is around 200$ USD; only 50% of the population is functionally literate; the life expectancy is 39 years; the AIDS rate exceeds 25% in some parts of the country; 1 in 5 children dies before the age of two; preventable diseases such as cholera, TB, and malaria kill thousands of people each year, and those who survive polio or leprosy are left begging on street corners. On average, the agricultural sector, which accounts for 78% of the population, produces around 85% of the food needed nationally to meet minimum caloric requirements. This means that the remainder must be made up by international food aid, collection of wild roots and seeds, or, altogether too often, reduction of meals from 2 to 1 per day. After almost a month of fieldwork in different parts of the country, I saw how these statistics are reflected in the everyday lives of real people.



My time in Mozambique has left me in awe at the dignity with which both the powerful and the powerless are able to confront the Mozambican reality. Administrators are positive and forward-looking, in every respect, believing that step-by-step they will achieve the small milestones necessary to build prosperous and sustainable communities. That illusive and complicated thing called culture is their strength and the vantage point from which they imagine a different future. As a foreigner I must bite my lip at the maddening bureaucracy, the promotions based on family-ties instead of merit, and the rigid formality observed with superiors, whose employees see no ethical problem in cheating them behind their backs. I know this is not my battle. If these things are to change, they can only be changed by Mozambicans. There is a long way to go in this country, but the Mozambican people believe success is possible. I admire their fortitude and I hope they are right.

My internship consisted of designing and carrying out a national study, a three-month project with joint supervision by FAO and National Secretariat for Food Security and Nutrition, or SETSAN. The work carried out by my Mozambican partner and I in the field was to interview dozens of people- mostly administrators, public officials, aid workers and an assorted medley of teachers, missionaries and entrepreneurs- at both provincial and local levels. For me it was by far the most exciting part of what was has otherwise been a pretty standard office job. In the time that my partner and I spent traveling, we compiled data about how food security and nutrition information published by SETSAN is used in decision-making.



Essentially, we were trying to identify specific information gaps and systemic communication failures between SETSAN and decision-makers at National, Provincial and Local levels, as well as assess such "hazy" aspects as political legitimacy, inter-sectoral rivalry, and corruption. All of these factors have measurable effects on whether or not people in a position of power get the information they need in time to make a good decision. When the information in question has to do with nutrition and food security, the effects of communication failures are suffered quite acutely by those farther down the chain. This happens when, for example, the (preventable) brown-streak disease kills half of the cassava crop in a matter of months, leaving thousands of families without food or when nutrition surveys showing chronic stunting fail to reach the agricultural extension agents whose choices of seed for distribution contribute to the problem.

The data we collected after a total of 8 weeks of interviews was immense. By now we have combined everything from the field with previous work done in the capital and we are in the final stages of writing our report. The report is a systematic reflection on what we heard from these decision-makers, highlighting patterns that emerged based on hierarchy, location and specific areas of operation. Most importantly, however, will be the recommendations we make to the Secretariat, also reflecting a synthesis of our informants' criticisms and suggestions. Our goal is to accurately convey their observations of what works and what doesn't, and the steps necessary to fix problems. The report is a pleasure to write, but the only way of knowing if its results will ever have any measurable, positive effect would be to stay. Indeed this must be an important factor in the decision that many foreign nationals make when they commit to a country like Mozambique.

Today marks the close of my final weekend in Mozambique. On Friday I went to a St. Patrick's' Day party at a shi-shi club filled with beer-drinking ex-pats from every acronym you can think of: "FAO meet UNICEF," "Kelly, this is Gabriela from WHO. Gabriela works at AECI and her husband is with MSF" "Oh, you're American? I am with USAID. You work at SETSAN? Maybe you know Paulina from UNDP." It is truly inspirational to meet so many brilliant and hard-working people who are successfully making a life for themselves in international development work. To observe a group of 10 people communicating in 4 different languages simultaneously is mind-blowing. The late-night conversations with other 20-somethings from Italy, France, and Germany, carried out in Portuguese, our only common language, are utterly hilarious. Yet, I must admit that I am a bit saddened by all of this.

I wish there were enough educated Mozambicans to run their own country. Even among the tiny portion of kids lucky and dedicated enough to finish high school, there is about a 1/10 chance of getting into the one public university.

I wish there were enough educated Mozambicans to run their own country, and there are not. In Mozambique there are a few private universities but only one public university, called UEM, which provides about two-thirds of the higher education available in the country. The UEM has so little funding that even that among the tiny portion of kids lucky and dedicated enough to finish high school, there is about a 1/10 chance of getting in. This year, 20,000 applicants vied for only 2,000 spots. The government's education priority is currently primary school. They want to reach as many children aged 6-10 as possible, and teach them the bare minimum, to read and do basic math, so that someday, as mothers, they can understand the directions on anti-malaria medicines, or maybe run a profitable corner kiosk. But I wonder, "Is this the right approach?"

I remember the time I spent in Ecuador researching education in a poor, rural community, where school was considered a waste of time compared to what kids could learn in the fields or what income they could earn packing mandarins for pennies. I know that the forced creation of a literate society is a slow endeavor. I do not marvel at the many villagers who feel their marriageable 13-year-old daughters have little to gain in an educational system designed to teach them tools for a system they will never have the financial means to enter. And again, thinking of the university, I wonder if some more of the national education budget should be spent to provide a college education to the other 18,000 kids who applied.

Let us assume that 2,000 students matriculate and 1,500 graduate each year from UEM, and that at least 10% of graduates flee Mozambique to work in a country that can pay them more for their skills, in what is often referred to as "brain-drain,". Let us also assume that another significant percentage will pursue further studies abroad. Adding a total of 1,000 UEM graduates to a generous estimate of 1,000 graduates from elsewhere (private universities and studies abroad) Mozambique is left with barely 2,000 new college graduates annually. These 2,000 new graduates must then choose between the expanding private sector, the well-paid NGO sector, or the impoverished national government of a nation twice the size of California and containing 20,000,000 people. Despite the goodwill and determination of Mozambique and the international community, the numbers just can't work. Mozambique and other countries like it must find better incentives for college graduates to stay and pursue careers in the public sector, to fill this desperate need.

This past weekend I went to the beach for the last time. The sun was fantastic and the beautiful Indian Ocean waters were soul-cleansing. On the way home my friend and I spoke little. He, too, is leaving soon, and we were both contemplating our impending departures. I looked out the window at the grass-huts lining the road, small cooking fires illuminating the compounds. I wondered if this was a polygamous tribal group. Many in the South are. My eyes wandered to the horizon where, off in the distance I know there is an elephant reserve, where all the elephants brought in from South Africa in an ill-founded, conservation initiative, have since been poached for their ivory. I saw some men stumbling down the road, drunk off cheap, home-distilled alcohol. And I felt, for the first time, a deep wave of nostalgia.

It is heart-breaking and inspiring to live in a place like this. The difficulties may seem insurmountable, but it certainly makes getting up in the morning seem like a worthwhile endeavor.




Contributed by Leslie MacColman, who worked in Mozambique for three months with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

To read a Global Envision article that provides a persuasive look into the persistent problems of modern Africa and offers some possible solutions, see The Shackled Continent.



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