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Yes it's bad. It's horrible actually. Lebanon has become a basket case of a country. But I think the headline may be exaggerating the direness of the situation
by anonu 5y ago
Yes it's bad. It's horrible actually. Lebanon has become a basket case of a country.
But I think the headline may be exaggerating the direness of the situation. Yes it's bad but I don't think Lebanon is about to go into a famine situation which is what the headline portends to...
Source: people on the ground in Lebanon.
- akomtu 5y agoWhat stops them from fixing their food supply?
- neom 5y agoCorruption and lack of organization. Since the explosion the government and the ability to systematically get things done has basically gone to zero.
- raincom 5y agoLebanon imports food. Who will provide them USD or EUR? Sure, exporters can. However, whatever they export accounts for 10% of imports. Basically, other countries have to donate food to Lebanon at this moment.
- recuter 5y agoWell, the currency lost something like 90% of its value over the last year since the blast. (https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/04/05/lebanon-currency-inflation-exchange-rates/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/04/05/lebanon-currency-inflat...) This April the black market rate dropped to 12,000 and caused minor riots. Now its at 18,000 and plunging in fits and starts. The median salary is now something like $30 a month (down from $600 couple years ago). The army no longer being able to afford to feed its soldiers has resorted to giving helicopter tours to tourists (https://english.alarabiya.net/News/middle-east/2021/06/29/Lebanon-army-offers-tourists-helicopter-joyrides-for-150-in-cash-payment https://english.alarabiya.net/News/middle-east/2021/06/29/Le...). There's gas shortages and riots everyday all over the place. This is Tripoli now: https://www.reddit.com/r/lebanon/comments/oaw4h5/tripoli_right_now/ https://www.reddit.com/r/lebanon/comments/oaw4h5/tripoli_rig... The foreign currency reserves have dwindled over the last year from $30 billion to $15, the minimum required by law is currently $14, and their very extensive food subsidies program is costing them 500 million a month and is about to be nixed. They can't maintain their electric grid and people get only a few hours of power a day. Also this whole time there hasn't been a government. All the key players are corrupt beyond belief and wanted for either terrorism, drug trafficking or embezzlement. Pretty sure they will indeed have a famine soon if nothing changes.
- devoutsalsa 5y ago> The foreign currency reserves have dwindled over the last year from $30 billion to $15, the minimum required by law is currently $14 Is that $15,000,000,000 or $15.00? Just curious :P
- aparsons 5y agoComments like these are generally not constructive to discussions. You are on the internet, on Hacker News, so I assume you’re probably living in a first-world country and completed secondary school or college. Which number do you think is more likely?
- andyana 5y agoWhat a dumb assumption on your part.
- glial 5y agoI went to Turkey in 2005. The 1 lyra note was also the 1,000,000 Lyra note.
- kingofpandora 5y agoOne million lira was equivalent to one new lira.
- glial 5y agoYes. I apologize for messing up the spelling. It just struck me as amazing that they still used the old bank notes, and just cut 6 0’s off for the conversion.
- indeedmug 5y agoI thought the guy was talking about $15 too. I figured that they completely ran out of foreign currency.
- 5y ago