The Longreads Blog

The key to solving hunger in Africa starts with improving the soil. An overview of agricultural subsidies and the debate over whether the best approach is through inorganic fertilizers or greener, cheaper (but more difficult) solutions like no-till farming:

Fertilizer use in Africa is at the mercy of precarious politics. Although Rwanda’s fertilizer programme is growing, Malawi’s has started to fall apart as the country’s economy has collapsed and its international relations have deteriorated. Many of Malawi’s biggest donors, including the UK government’s Department for International Development, suspended budgetary support to the nation last year because of concerns about governance and the Malawian government’s refusal to devalue its currency as recommended by the International Monetary Fund.

Although the United Kingdom reinstated some funding to help transport fertilizer, many Malawians couldn’t purchase it this year. Changuya walked for an hour and a half to the depot in town, only to find that all the subsidized fertilizer was gone and she would not have been able to afford it anyway.

“African Agriculture: Dirt Poor.” — Natasha Gilbert, Nature

See also: “The Last Famine.” Paul Salopek, Foreign Policy

The killing of three sisters shocks a country where the past decade has seen a rise in violence toward women: 

Since the turn of the millennium, over 5,000 women have been murdered in Guatemala. To give a better idea of what this figure means, consider that if Guatemala, with its population of 14 million, were the size of the United States, this would add up to 110,000 women murdered in a decade. And conditions are only worsening with the passage of time. In 2000, 213 women met violent deaths in Guatemala, compared to 720 in 2009 and 675 in 2010. Worse still, only an estimated 2 percent of these cases have received legal action. The victims are mostly the ‘nobodies’ of society, poor women, in many cases indigenous, from families lacking resources and education. Their bodies are often found mutilated, with indications of rape. Investigations are routinely botched, if they’re even pursued. ‘She was a prostitute,’ a police investigator might say if the victim has a belly-button ring or is wearing a miniskirt. The investigation is closed before being opened.

“Letter from Guatemala.” — Aaron Shulman, Los Angeles Review of Books

See also: “A Murder Foretold: Unravelling the Ultimate Political Conspiracy.” — David Grann, The New Yorker March 28, 2011

Featured: Noah Chestnut’s #longreads page. See his story picks from The New Republic, Vanity Fair, Granta, plus more.

[National Magazine Awards finalist, 2012] A family’s difficult journey after discovering their youngest daughter has a brain tumor: 

He would remove the tumor, and we would find out what kind it was only after the pathology report. ‘But it looks like a teratoid,’ he said. I didn’t comprehend the word ‘teratoid,’ either—it was beyond my experience, belonging to the domain of the unimaginable and incomprehensible, the domain into which Dr. Tomita was now guiding us.

Isabel was asleep in the recovery room, motionless, innocent. Teri and I kissed her hands and her forehead and wept through the moment that divided our life into before and after. Before was now and forever foreclosed, while after was spreading out, like an exploding twinkle star, into a dark universe of pain.

“The Aquarium.” — Aleksandar Hemon, The New Yorker, June 13, 2011

See also: “A Family Learns the True Meaning of ‘in Sickness and in Health’.” Susan Baer, Washington Post, Jan. 5, 2012

What does it take to get a tech startup funded? Inside the competitive selection process for one incubator in New York City:

The date is January 24, one day after applications were due for TechStars, a three-month mentorship program that is part boot camp, part investment fund. Some 1,480 young companies have filled out a questionnaire and recorded two short videos for the chance to compete for just 14 spots. That works out to an acceptance rate of less than 1 percent. ‘Look to your right; look to your left,’ Tisch said at a recruiting event in early January, modifying the Harvard Law School warning to first-year students. ‘Probably none of you will get in here.’

“Future TechStars, Step Forward.” — Max Chafkin, Inc. magazine

See more #tech #longreads

Congratulations to this year’s National Magazine Awards finalists! Here’s a collection of the stories nominated.

What happens when a grizzly bear kills a human being in Yellowstone National Park? An examination of a special criminal justice system designed to protect endangered bears, while giving leeway to euthanize bears that kill humans in ways that are deemed “unnatural”:

It’s a squirrely notion, that a team of government biologists might be able to figure out why a bear does the things it does, or whether any bear behavior could truly be described as “unnatural.” But whatever its shortcomings, the grizzly justice system has been mostly successful over the years since it was introduced, and is reasonably popular. People seem to like the fact that a female bear can kill someone while protecting her cubs and be acquitted of the crime. According to a poll conducted by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department in 2001, more than 70 percent of Wyoming residents believe that grizzly bears are a benefit to the state and are an important component of the Yellowstone ecosystem. They want grizzlies to have the benefit of the doubt.

“A Death in Yellowstone.” — Jessica Grose, Slate

See also: “Taming the Wild.” — Evan Ratliff, National Geographic, Feb. 18, 2011

[Not single-page] Brigitte Harris was sexually abused by her father for years, before she decided to stop him from ever doing it to anyone again. She’s now in prison for second degree manslaughter, with a parole hearing this week:

The first thing she learned was that it could be done. ‘Everyone always focuses on Lorena Bobbitt because it’s the most popular. But each and every case I researched, no one died.’ She read about cases in China and in Europe. ‘And I start seeing how to do it without actually killing him.’ On June 26, she bought a package of 50 scalpels on eBay for $6.83, including shipping.

On July 25, Harris had her final argument with Carleen. On her home video, titled ‘My Reasons,’ she mentions Carleen’s children explicitly. ‘We both know what he wants to do with them.’ She talks about what she’s about to do. ‘Somebody’s got to do something,’ she says on the video.

“A Daughter’s Revenge.” — Robert Kolker, New York magazine

See also: “The Living Nightmare.” Barry Bearak, New York Times, Feb. 13, 2012

Featured: Andrew Hart’s #longreads page. See his story picks from The Seattle Times, Vanity Fair, The Guardian, plus more.

Forty years after Title IX, the number of female college athletes has soared, but the number of female college coaches has dropped. What happened? 

Some blame the dropoff on a shallow pool of female candidates, who often aren’t as eager to apply for jobs, let alone pack up and move, as men. But there are more pernicious reasons as well. First is an old-fashioned sexism that gives men a chance to coach women’s programs but squelches any thought of hiring a woman to coach men. There is also an ingrained homophobia that quietly pressures women to hire male assistants so as to combat any appearance of a ‘gay’ program.

One other theme came up again and again during espnW’s dozens of interviews: a lack of second chances for female coaches. Male coaches, particularly in men’s sports, often pass through a revolving door whenever they lose a job—from Bob Knight to Rick Neuheisel to Rich Rodriguez. But women fear they are much more likely to be one and done.

“The Glass Wall.” — Luke Cyphers, Kate Fagan, ESPN

More from Cyphers and Fagan: “On Homophobia and Recruiting in Women’s College Basketball.” — ESPN, Jan. 26, 2011