Kenya's Poor Hungry in the Midst of Plenty
Nick Wadhams in Nairobi, Kenya
for National Geographic News

On a muddy track that creeps between wooden stalls in Nairobi's Kibera slum, Difna Bosibori sells bundles of kale for about ten Kenyan shillings (seven U.S. cents) each. But business has been horrible. There is simply no way she can hide that for the same price she is selling bundles half the size they were a few months ago.

"I haven't even sold a quarter of my stock," Bosibori said. "So when I go home, I cook less for the children, and I go hungry sometimes because I only eat if there's enough left over." Places like the Kibera slum are on the front line in the global crunch over rising food prices. Half of Kenyans live on the equivalent of less than a dollar a day, and people who were already struggling to survive now find that spikes in food prices mean they must eat less—and sometimes not at all.

The slum is a telling example of what some experts call the new face of hunger—a situation in which shops and markets have plenty of food, but not enough customers who can pay for it.

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