by Nina Munk
“Mr. Sachs’s chances of getting the job are slim”: [Jonathan Ledger], “The End of Live Aid,” Baobab Africa Blog, Economist, 8 March 2012.
Author’s Note
on the island of Mustique: Nina Munk, “Dennis the Menace,” Vanity Fair, May 2001.
on a chairlift in Sun Valley: Nina Munk, “Steve Wynn’s Biggest Gamble,” Vanity Fair, June 2005.
bigger than the Taj Mahal: Nina Munk, “Greenwich’s Outrageous Fortunes,” Vanity Fair, July 2006.
the failed $163 billion merger: Nina Munk, Fools Rush In: Steve Case, Jerry Levin, and the Unmaking of AOL Time Warner (New York: HarperCollins, 2004).
$140 million for a Jackson Pollock: Carol Vogel, “A Pollock Is Sold, Possibly for a Record Price,” New York Times, 2 November 2006.
on assignment from Vanity Fair: Nina Munk, “Jeffrey Sachs’s $200 Billion Dream,” Vanity Fair, July 2007.
A Note About the Author
Nina Munk, a contributing editor at Vanity Fair, is a journalist and the author of Fools Rush In: Steve Case, Jerry Levin, and the Unmaking of AOL Time Warner. She was previously a senior writer at Fortune, and before that a senior editor at Forbes. Her work has appeared in Vanity Fair, The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Fortune, and The New York Times. She lives in New York.
Visit: www.ninamunk.com
Follow: @ninamunk
Illustrations
Jeffrey Sachs, his wife, Sonia (in black), and Ahmed Mohamed (front center) celebrate the opening of the short-lived Millennium Villages Livestock Market in Dertu. © Nina Munk
Abdi Hussein, Dertu’s first shopkeeper, waiting for customers. In good times, his store brought in as much as $55 a month. © Guillaume Bonn
Amina Abdi, a resident of Dertu, inside her traditional Somali aqal, a dome-shaped hut made of soft twigs, grass mats, and cowhides. © Guillaume Bonn
Ahmed Mohamed in Dertu’s Millennium Villages Project compound. “I can promise you,” he told the people, “it won’t be long before your lives improve.” © Nina Munk
Attracted by Dertu’s relative wealth as a Millennium village, nomadic pastoralists, immigrants, squatters, and refugees began settling in town. Soon the once-pastoral landscape resembled a shantytown. © Nina Munk
In the arid bush near Dertu, a nomadic Somali herder sought grazing land for his most prized possession. The more camels a Somali has, the greater his wealth and status in the community. © Nina Munk
As Dertu began to prosper, Abdullahi Bari Barow, the itinerant schoolteacher, built for himself and his wife this “semi-permanent” house with the ultimate rural African status symbol: a tin roof. © Nina Munk
In the summer of 2011, with another drought gripping the Horn of Africa, everywhere in Dertu animal carcasses littered the parched land. © Nina Munk
At Sahlan Bath Hussein’s tea shop, the author (center), Sahlan (right), and Sahlan’s daughter (left) take a break. © Nina Munk
Once a month, to immunize children and treat the sick, the Millennium project set up temporary open-air health clinics in the bush around Dertu. © Nina Munk
In Ruhiira’s commercial center there were growing signs of economic activity: bicycles, diesel generators, and new shops. Yet David Siriri couldn’t help but wonder how much of that activity would continue once the Millennium project had run its course and he had moved on. © Nina Munk
On one of Ruhiira’s many hilltops, a farmer stands above his matoke banana plantation. © Nina Munk
David Siriri inspecting the soil in Ruhiira’s moist valley, where he hoped to plant such high-value crops as cardamom and ginger. “Agriculture,” Jeffrey Sachs told his staff, “is the economic pillar of this whole project.” © Nina Munk
Sebuuma Sadati, one of Ruhiira’s “banana boys,” on the road to Mbarara, where he would sell his matoke at a markup of 1,000 shillings (or $1) a stalk. © Nina Munk
In Ruhiira, children traveled as many as six kilometers a day to fetch water from the valley below. “Our problem here is water,” the local parliamentarian told Sachs. “Water, water, water.” © Nina Munk
Overcoming years of obstacles, one hundred kilometers (sixty-two miles) of donated PVC pipes finally arrived in Ruhiira. In July 2011, piped water began flowing from forty public taps. © Guillaume Bonn
Outside Ruhiira’s Omwicwamba Primary School, Jeffrey Sachs is surrounded by local dignitaries, journalists, and villagers. © Guillaume Bonn
Angelina Jolie and Jeffrey Sachs in New York, at a screening of MTV’s The Diary of Angelina Jolie and Dr. Jeffrey Sachs in Africa. © Andrew Kent/Getty Images