THE AMERICAN INFLUENCE IS SHOWING:

While aid trickles in, Liberians get creative to make ends meet: Skeptical of foreign aid's promise, many are creating their own jobs through clever, small-scale entrepreneurial activities (Tristan McConnell, 3/07/07, The Christian Science Monitor)

Last month, Liberia's president Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf met with donors in Washington to secure $691 million in debt relief from the US, Britain, and Germany, and $355 million in aid pledges to boost the country's moribund postwar economy. This will also help alleviate a $3.7 billion debt burden run up by Ms. Johnson Sirleaf's corrupt warlord predecessors during 14 years of devastating civil war. [...]

Most Liberians - two-thirds of whom live on less than $1 a day - can't wait for aid and foreign investment to generate employment. So, like Mr. Shain, they are working with what little they've got to create their own jobs through clever, small-scale entrepreneurial activities.