In Sub-Saharan Africa, almost 27 million people are infected with either AIDS or HIV. About 10 million of those are between 15-24 and an additional 3 million sufferers are children under 15.
A new study, presented last week in Thailand and authored by a nine-member group of MSU faculty and graduate students, clarifies how the disease is affecting poor rural farmers in Africa, where between 50 to 80 percent of people live outside cities.
Contrary to popular belief, the study indicates the majority of people dying in four of the five countries surveyed were not parents but primarily their adult-age children. The five countries studied were Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Rwanda and Zambia.
Fewer children are being left orphaned than originally believed, a discovery which might shape the way both African countries and foreign bodies implement aid to help halt the disease and help farmers continue with their work.
"When this disease began in Africa, it seemed research showed it started amongst higher-income people," said Michael Weber, an MSU agricultural economics professor and study contributor.
"Now it seems it's affecting more lower-income people. If this increasingly concentrates among poor people, we're afraid you can't get ahead of the game - increase prevention - without higher income rates."
As a result, the research indicated assistance needs to either be targeted specifically toward families suffering from an AIDS-related death - especially food assistance when the head of the household dies - or address the needs of a particular community as a whole.
"(The study) cautions against the effectiveness of food aid to mitigate the suffering of households that suffer an adult death," said David Mather, a visiting MSU agricultural economics professor who worked on the study. "From our results, that doesn't seem to be a good strategy.
"If you're a farmer growing corn and someone comes in and gives your neighbor corn, then the prices will drop. It has to be targeted in such a way that you don't have widespread distribution of food."
The study also cautions against the use of aid to develop early harvest crops and other labor-saving crop technologies. Instead, it generally promotes the development of technologies that will help every family in a community, rather than just those who suffer from the disease.
"The families that are affected by HIV are a small part of the population," Mather said. "If you had the money to invest in a whole new program just to help these people with this specific issue, that would be a lot of money to spend just to save those few hours at the harvest.
"Your money would be much better spent if you invested in a local hammer mill or community well.
"That would save a lot more time than these crop varieties and it would help families without a death."
