By Ulrike Putz in Cairo and Mahalla, Egypt
Mahrouz, the butcher, likes to eat well. His blood-speckled white apron stretches over a majestic paunch, which may have its days numbered. Mahrouz used to take home two kilograms of meat for his family every evening -- plenty for him, his wife and two children. "Now I bring back only one kilo," the butcher says.
Meat has become too expensive, even for Mahrouz, who gets it at wholesale prices. He hardly has any customers left, he complains, standing behind his butcher block, which is in the open air near a busy main street. Above him empty meat hooks swing in the wind, a few lonely sausage chains seesaw in the exhaust-heavy breeze. Only three mutton legs wrapped in moist linen cloth are waiting for customers. "Corn and maize have become scarce, the price of animal feed has risen sharply -- what can I say, business is bad," Mahrouz sighs.
If you want to learn how global food shortages are affecting the poor, a good place to go is the street market in Cairo's impoverished Boulek al-Dakur district in the early afternoon.
Market stands might be piled high with cucumbers and tomatoes, flat bread stacked high on trays which bakers have pushed out of bakeries to cool -- but that is precisely the problem. While traders used to sell their perishable goods by midday, now they cannot get rid of them.
Bread and Life
There is still enough food in Egypt, whose nearly 80 million people make it the most populous country in the Arab world. But it's becoming scarce, and prices are rising. People simply do not have enough money to buy what they need to feel full. Forty percent of Egyptians have to survive on $ 1 a day or less -- too little to afford the daily "Eesch," which in Egyptian Arabic means both bread and life.
The "monster" of hunger, which Germany's Finance Minister Peer Steinbrück has warned will loom on the world political stage, is a longtime reality for the poor of Boulek al-Dakur.
A mother has come to shop with her three daughters at a loud and dirty market next to the railroad. "We can't live anymore," she says. The graceful young woman's hands are empty; she's not carrying any shopping bags home today -- only, it seems, a psychological burden.
Her rent, she says, has shot up from 100 Egyptian pounds (€11) to 200 Egyptian pounds (€22). But her husband, who works 12 hours a day for the security service, doesn't earn more than €33. Only 100 Egyptian pounds a month are left to feed her family of five. For that she can buy 400 flat breads or 30 kilograms of rice -- or three kilos of meat. "It's simply not enough," she says and at the end of the month she has to ask her neighbors for money. "We now eat noodles only every four weeks," she says quietly.
'We're Suffocating'
Her misfortune is that her oldest daughter has a hearing impairment. As the family lives from hand to mouth, they can't afford any extra expense, like a hearing aid. "My entire hope is that prices will fall again," she says.
But this is wishful thinking. Egypt's national statistics office has calculated that the retail price index climbed 11.5 percent during the 12 months to January 2008. But the massive explosion in prices has happened since then. The price of basic foods, especially, has shot up: the price of bread and grains has risen by around 40 percent in the last few months. The fact that the government subsidizes bread is simply not enough, in view of the price rises. There is not enough cheap bread for everyone, and every household is hit hard by increases of around 26 percent in the price of rice and oil. The price of cheese, milk and yogurt has also risen, by around 17 percent. The price hikes are strangling poor Egyptians. "We are suffocating," many people say at the market.
The price rises have struck them like an earthquake -- for no reason, and without warning.
Most people here have never heard of biofuels, developed by green-minded Westerners from edible plants. They also don't know about population explosions in China and India which have caused those nations to buy up food on the world's markets. All they know is that life has grown hard.
Two weeks ago, these hardships drove people onto the streets of an industrial town called Mahalla, 90 minutes by car from Cairo. Tens of thousands of people protested the price rises in spite of orders to stay at work. Schools and businesses were set on fire. Police cracked down hard; hundreds were arrested and at least one youth was killed. It was a sign of things to come -- what World Bank President Robert Zoellick recently called "social chaos," provoked by the hunger of the poor.
The power of the protests became apparent when two days after the unrest, no less a personage than Egypt's prime minister came to Mahalla. He tried to quiet workers by promising a monthly wage bonus. The protests and enormous hikes in food prices have made the regime in Cairo nervous. Food is a common denominator.
Even the Rich are Moaning
The latest edition of the Community Times, a glossy magazine for English-speaking Cairo residents, devotes its cover story to the "New Faces of Hunger." In keeping with its readership, a chemistry professor and rich housewives are featured; the latter complain that fish filets in restaurants have become so much more expensive. A luxury problem, perhaps -- but a symptom that resentment is growing, even among the rich.
It is no longer only the unemployed or the political opposition who are grumbling. How ironic it would be if the regime collapsed over a problem that, for once, it can't be blame for. Even Mubarak's regime cannot cope with a global food crisis.
That, at least, is how a woman called Hosmeia puts it. In a country where the economy grew by 7 percent last year, where sales of new cars have quadrupled in five years, Hosmeia is bitterly poor, like the majority of the population. Her husband works "one day yes, 10 days not." He sweeps the streets, she helps him with that -- together they have five small children. Sometimes she can't buy bread for them all. "We nearly have to cry," the 37-year-old says.
A month ago, prices shot up abruptly; she doesn't know why. But if the situation fails to improve, there will be new and bigger demonstrations -- even if they're illegal. "They leave us no option," says Hosmeia. "If I want to feed my children, I have to either steal or break the law and demonstrate."
The only people who might be in a position to enjoy the current state of affairs are the two children of a confectioner with the nice name Mabruk, meaning Congratulations. Mabruk's cakes have become more expensive, because nuts, chocolate and imported granules are also pricier. Mabruk, whose white cap and big bushy beard identify him as a devout Muslim, sees the situation realistically: "The people can't buy bread, they are even less likely to buy cakes," the 30-year-old says. So, many of the sweets he offers for sale in his vitrine, remain unsold.
And so, though he brings less money home from work, his children cheer when they see their father: The sweets he can't sell during the day become the family dessert.
© SPIEGEL ONLINE 2008
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