In India there are more poor people in three states... than there are in the whole of sub-Saharan Africa.

It's not just a lack of preparedness. I think the easy answer is to say that these are poor people and black people and so the government doesn't give a damn. That's OK, and there might be some truth to that. But I think we've got to see this as a serious problem of the long-term neglect of an environmental system on which our nation depends. All the grain that's grown in Iowa and Illinois, and the huge industrial output of the Midwest has to come down the Mississippi River, and there has to be a port to handle it, to keep a functioning economy in the United States of America.

Sub-Saharan Africa is also home to 400 million of the world's poorest people.

There's a vast class - the poor, the underprivileged, the people least likely to vote - who are not represented any more.

In sub-Saharan Africa, fewer than 1 in 5 girls make it to secondary school.

They are some of the best entry level jobs that are available to poor people. And they also make products available to the working poor.