Episode 535: Humanitarians, For A Price

Enlarge this image toggle caption Gregory Warner/NPR Gregory Warner/NPR

When a famine swept through Somalia in 2011, it was hard for aid workers to get food distributed. Most of the country was too dangerous for non-Somalis to do the work. Instead, the United Nations looked at satellite images of camps filling up with tents and dispatched locals to deliver the food. A local industry around distributing aid and sheltering the poor sprung up.

On today's show, we visit a country with almost no government, but a lot of entrepreneurs. And we see what happens when locals decide to make money by becoming humanitarians for profit.

Music: Dur-Dur Band's "Dooyo." Find us: Twitter/ Facebook/ Spotify. Download the Planet Money iPhone App.