I just got back from a trip to the Democratic Republic of Congo, where I was on assignment for National Geographic. More on that in the coming weeks. We were in the central part of the country. Eastern Congo – along the borders of Uganda, Tanzania, and Rwanda – has been locked in fighting for years now, and the battles have ratcheted up since last August, resulting in a huge humanitarian crisis, with hundreds of thousands of people being forced into refugee camps, along with thousands of deaths.
The region is where people depend on bananas as part of their diet more than anywhere else in the world, and the fruit there is being attacked by what is probably the most virulent banana disease: a fungus bacterium called Xanthomonas wilt. Its spread can be slowed through clean-farming techniques – making sure tools and clothing are kept free of dirt as they move from village to village – and there have been extensive informational campaigns designed to carry this information to local families, who would face starvation if the disease hit their crops.
The image above is of Laurent Nkunda, the leader of the Congolese rebels. It appeared last year in the pages of a magazine called Jeune Afrique (Young Africa). He’s vowing that he will take his forces all the way to Kinshasa, the Congolese capital. His fortunes have since changed, but the disease hasn’t – and the poster behind him, which advertises how to stop it, will probably outlast his reign.
Update: Nkunda’s reign is over. He was arrested yesterday in Rwanda, his former state sponsor. The Guardian has a good piece on it.
Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman 
