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Charlene, 16, a mother with a 1-month-old son, has come to rely on a
traditional Haitian remedy for hunger pangs: cookies made of dried
yellow dirt from the country's central plateau.
The mud has long been prized by pregnant women and children here as
an antacid and source of calcium. But in places like Cite Soleil,
the oceanside slum where Charlene shares a two-room house with her
baby, five siblings and two unemployed parents, cookies made of
dirt, salt and vegetable shortening have become a regular meal.
"When my mother does not cook anything, I have to eat them three
times a day," Charlene said. Her baby lay still across her lap,
looking even thinner than the slim 6 pounds 3 ounces he weighed at
birth.
Though she likes their buttery, salty taste, Charlene said the
cookies also give her stomach pains. "When I nurse, the baby
sometimes seems colicky too."
Food prices around the world have spiked because of higher oil
prices, needed for fertilizer, irrigation and transportation. Prices
for basic ingredients such as corn and wheat are also up sharply,
and the increasing global demand for biofuels is pressuring food
markets as well.
The problem is dire in the Caribbean, where island nations depend on
imports and food prices are up 40 percent in places.
The global price hikes, together with floods and crop damage from
the 2007 hurricane season, prompted the UN Food and Agriculture
Agency to declare states of emergency in Haiti and several other
Caribbean countries. Caribbean leaders held an emergency summit in
December to discuss cutting food taxes and creating large regional
farms to reduce dependence on imports.
At the market in the La Saline slum, two cups of rice sell for 60
cents, up 10 cents from December and 50 percent from a year ago.
Beans, condensed milk and fruit have gone up at a similar rate, and
even the price of the edible clay has risen over the past year by
almost $1.50. Dirt to make 100 cookies now costs $5, the cookie
makers say.
Still, at about 5 cents apiece, the cookies are a bargain compared
to food staples. About 80 percent of people in Haiti live on less
than $2 a day and a tiny elite controls the economy.
Merchants truck the dirt from the central town of Hinche to the La
Saline market, a maze of tables of vegetables and meat swarming with
flies. Women buy the dirt, then process it into mud cookies in
places such as Fort Dimanche, a nearby shanty town.
Carrying buckets of dirt and water up ladders to the roof of the
former prison for which the slum is named, they strain out rocks and
clumps on a sheet, and stir in shortening and salt. Then they pat
the mixture into mud cookies and leave them to dry under the
scorching sun.
The finished cookies are carried in buckets to markets or sold on
the streets.
A reporter sampling a cookie found that it had a smooth consistency
and sucked all the moisture out of the mouth as soon as it touched
the tongue. For hours, an unpleasant taste of dirt lingered.
Assessments of the health effects are mixed. Dirt can contain deadly
parasites or toxins, but can also strengthen the immunity of fetuses
in the womb to certain diseases, said Gerald N. Callahan, an
immunology professor at Colorado State University who has studied
geophagy, the scientific name for dirt-eating.
Haitian doctors say depending on the cookies for sustenance risks
malnutrition.
"Trust me, if I see someone eating those cookies, I will discourage
it," said Dr. Gabriel Thimothee, executive director of Haiti's
health ministry.
Marie Noel, 40, sells the cookies in a market to provide for her
seven children. Her family also eats them. "I'm hoping one day I'll
have enough food to eat, so I can stop eating these," she said. "I
know it's not good for me." |
