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The figure may fall further. Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the IMF's managing director, O Charm a conference in Tanzania that millions could be thrown back into poverty by the crisis. Piling on gloom, he saw a "threat of civil unrest, perhaps even of war" as a result. The poor are being hit not by the financial tsunami itself but by second-order waves of trouble. So the impact has been delayedbut it may also be prolonged. The global meltdown affects poor countries in three ways. First, capital: P Charm investors in the West rebuild balance sheets, private capital flows dry up, hurting marginal borrowers like the poor. According to the Institute of International Finance, a think-tank in Washington, DC, net private capital flows to poor countries will slump from almost $1 trillion in 2007 to $165 billion in 2009. The main victims are big emerging markets in East Asia Q Charm eastern Europe. But African countries have been turning to private capital too. In 2007 they raised $6.5 billion in international bonds, trivial in global terms but not to Africa. In 2008, they raised nothing. For the poor, the other kind of external capital is aid. Britain's Overseas Development Institute reckons that official aid may fall by about a fifth, or $20 billion, this year, after being more R Charm less flat in 2005-07. The fall is partly a product of the recession in donor countries some give a certain share of their gdp as aid and partly a result of currency changes which make aid in pounds and euros worth less in local terms. Italy and Ireland are cutting their aid effort. Others are "front-loading" it borrowing from future years to keep steady now, so aid could fall further after 2009. As capital flows dry up, investment is being slashed.