Food Crisis Rocks Egypt

By now, many have heard of the food crisis that is rocking Egypt.

Protests broke out in Egypt this past month. The government reacted by raising the wages of its employees, but in turn raised the price of fuel as well. While government employees find some relief in higher wages, expenses still soar.
A report by the BBC reports that 33% of Egyptians are seriously vulnerable to the current food crisis: "20% of the country's population live below the poverty line [of $1 a day]. Another 13% are just above it and for them, any wobble in consumer prices means they go under."

In a nation where an estimated 45% of children suffer from iron-deficient anemia, access to nutritious food is critical. Yet soaring prices are driving even the price of bread to unheard-of heights.

The Economist magazine, in a recent article on the global food crisis, outlines the impact on each economic strata of society:

“ the middle classes in poor countries are giving up health care and cutting out meat so they can eat three meals a day. The middling poor, those on $2 a day, are pulling children from school and cutting back on vegetables so they can still afford rice. Those on $1 a day are cutting back on meat, vegetables, and one or two meals, so they can affort one bowl. The desperate- those on 50 cents a day- face disaster.” (The Silent Tsunami, p. 13; April 19th, 2008 issue)

This is exactly what is happening in Egypt.

Rising food prices puts pressure on the 33% of Egyptians who do live on two dollars a day or less to pull children out of school. If they work, the children might provide that little bit of extra income that might help the whole family eat today in exchange for a brighter future tomorrow. This pressure is especially heavy upon families that lost their only source of income with the death or abandonment of their father, the sort of families that Coptic Orphans seeks to reach through the Not Alone program.

And the eish balady, the government-subsidized bread that sustains the poor, is not enough for such families.
Samy, a boy from Upper Egypt, says that he doesn’t always receive balady when he goes to get some. “I stand for four hours to get a loaf and because I am a young child, people push me and take my turn in the line.”

Mervet, a mother of three other boys, says that she can only get a single Egyptian pound worth of balady for her whole family.

After waiting in line for hours, she asks a distributer behind a kiosk if she may purchase a little more than the one-pound-worth ration, even 1.5 pounds worth. The distributor tells her: “just take what you got and get out of here.” Yet Mervet is persistent: “can we at least purchase a little flour so that we can make bread ourselves at home?” He replies: “where would we get flour? a sack costs 50 pounds and even we can’t find one.”

In our flagship program, Not Alone, We provide access to basic rights such as adequate food and nutrition as a regular and foundational part of our holistic approach to giving children who have lost a father the tools that they need to break the cycle of poverty. Families in our program receive the financial assurance that even if they cannot get the government-subsidised balady, they still can afford to eat.

With a basic sense of security from knowing that the basic right to adequate food is available, children can develop their potential to change their communities.

Donate Now so that together we can provide more disadvantaged children in Egypt have access to their basic right to nutritious food.