"Government and Geldof help transform village at the heart of Ethiopian famine"

Ethiopia was stamped in the minds of a generation as the defining symbol of starvation and all that was wrong in Africa. The scenes of emaciated children and parents dying on a brightly lit plain, and of Bob Geldof and Band Aid pricking the conscience of the west, are part of the collective narrative of the time. It was, said the BBC’s Michael Buerk 30 years ago this month, “a biblical famine” and “the closest thing to hell on earth”.