Fighting hunger and stress
Mandela Day efforts tackle growing challenges of Covid-19 crisis
TODAY’S Mandela Day could be the country’s most important as Covid-19 starves children and families.
Nearly 60% of households across South Africa face overwhelming stress because of the loss of income, and money for food running out before the end of the month, children are bearing the brunt of a rapidly escalating hunger pandemic.
Feeding families will be the key focus for many organisations this Mandela Day.
South Africa reached a low point this week, with the Covid-19 storm surging, icy gale-force winds, power blackouts and the economy teetering on the brink.
But the legacy left by Mandela for ordinary South Africans to take care of one another may bring a ray of light into the lives of many today.
Pietermaritzburg Economic Justice & Dignity Group programme co-ordinator, Mervyn Abrahams, said yesterday that a number of reports had been released in the last two weeks, detailing “the main challenge coming out of Covid-19 is a massive increase in hunger.
“There are common reports coming out across South Africa on the depths of hunger severely impacting our communities. Food has become too expensive, while wages and social grants are too low,” he said.
The programme tracks a basic food price basket, which Abrahams said had increased by R250 between March and June. Adding to this, its research indicates the Child Support Grant is 22% below the food poverty line and 34% below the average cost to secure a basic nutritious diet for child.
“A lot of people are not working and food parcels are not reaching people due to over-regulation and red tape. It’s difficult to separate the costs of a child from the household. There is rent, electricity, water and food to cover and if a household has no other income, the child grant will be split among the household,” said Abrahams.
The Old Mutual Savings & Investment Monitor annual survey was released on Thursday and, in light of the pandemic, focused on how people were being financially affected. The survey tracks the shifts in habits and attitudes towards saving and investing of working households in metropolitan areas.
A key finding was that 57% of those surveyed were earning less than they were at the end of February, while 40% of those currently employed only had enough funds to survive for one month or less should they lose their jobs. As many as 66% of respondents stated they are “constantly worried” about losing their job and/or income.
Old Mutual head of research and insight Lynette Nicholson said only one in two credit card holders were able to comfortably make their repayments every month.
“A very alarming consequence of the financial pressures households are experiencing is that just over 50% are dipping into their savings to make ends meet, 37% have fallen behind paying household bills, and 23% have cashed in on savings/investment policies,” said Nicholson.
Yesterday morning volunteers from Chefs With Compassion, SA Chefs Association and SA Harvest were busy in the kitchens at Greyville racecourse making huge pots of soup for their #67 000 litres national cook-athon which will feed many empty tummies today.
Hundreds of chefs from 10 cities and towns – Durban, Johannesburg, Cape Town, Pretoria, Bloemfontein, Mokopane, Rustenburg, Vereeniging, Port Elizabeth and Nelspruit (Mbombela)– took to kitchens yesterday to reach their goal of 67 000 litres of soup.
In the middle of the chopping and boiling, KZN Chefs With Compassion’s Jodi Gillespie said a recent visit to families living in the Salt Rock area north of Durban had provided a glaring example of the hunger and desperation caused by the lockdown.
“We spoke to families who have barely eaten in three weeks. What is so humbling and heart-wrenching is that young and old, black, white and coloured, are all helping each other.
“As chefs, most of us have not worked since March and can’t see a chance of going back to work in the near future, but at least we are able to use our skills to help and have partnered with soup kitchens across the country,” said Gillespie.
Chefs with Compassion, backed by 300 chefs, restaurant owners and volunteers, was started in April, soon after the lockdown began. Daily meals are prepared in restaurant kitchens across the country to alleviate hunger.
Also celebrating Mandela Day by addressing hunger today will be the Do More Foundation, with its goal to provide a million hot chicken meals to impoverished children and their families.
Based in KwaZulu-Natal and founded by RCL Foods, the foundation has corporate and NGO partners, and for Mandela Day will be working with 329 soup kitchens across the country (affiliated to Meals on Wheels, Afrika Tikkun, Save The Children and the Department of Social Development).
Do More Foundation executive Warren Farrer said: “For Mandela Day, we looked at how we can help. This year it’s about children and their vulnerable families. There is much more to be done as millions sink deeper into poverty in the wake of the lockdown.”
Farrer said after Mandela Day, they would continue towards raising R10 million to provide much-needed meals.
Another report released this week, The National Income Dynamics Study: Coronavirus Rapid Mobile Survey, which included research by 30 social scientists, found the loss of income for families unable to work during lockdown had become the driving factor in hunger. More than 47% of respondents said they had run out of money for food in April.
Commenting on the stress being caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, psychiatrist, Dr Marshinee Naidoo, who practises at the Akeso Alberton mental health facility in Johannesburg, said: “The fallout has resulted in additional potential for traumatic experience, including the stress if a loved one becomes ill and needs hospitalisation, having to live in isolation from family and friends, or having a relationship fail under the strain caused by uncertainty and fear.
“For others, the stress may be caused by ongoing financial hardships, events such as being retrenched and anxiety about the future.” She said the incidence of post traumatic stress disorder would be exacerbated by the pandemic.
“We will need to pay much greater attention to this condition as a nation.”