Zero hunger – DDRN

Wasted at Both Ends: How the Global Food System Discards from Farm to Shelf

Sofia Kiryttopoulou — Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:08:33 +0000

At a plantation in coastal Ecuador, a crate of bananas is set aside, not because it is spoiled, but because it is slightly curved in the wrong way, too small, or marked by minor blemishes. Thousands of kilometers away, in a Paris supermarket, sealed yogurt containers are emptied into a bin at the end of the day, discarded not for contamination, but because they have passed their “best before” date. Neither is unsafe. Yet both are destined for waste.

This contrast is not incidental. It reflects a deeper structural reality within the global food system, where food is routinely discarded both before and after it reaches the market. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, roughly one-third of all food produced globally is lost or wasted, while the European Commission reports over 58 million tonnes discarded annually in Europe alone.

What emerges is not a broken system, but a coordinated one: production and retail practices that generate surplus on one end and enforce selectivity on the other. The result is a continuous flow of food that is grown, transported, and ultimately discarded at different stages of the same supply chain. To understand how this dynamic takes shape, it is necessary to begin at the source: the conditions under which food is grown, selected, and often discarded long before it ever reaches global markets.

The Producer’s Burden: Invisible Waste in Peru

In export-oriented regions such as Latin America, food waste is not primarily the result of poor farming practices or environmental conditions. It is shaped by the requirements of international trade.

Global supply chains operate under strict grading systems in which the value of produce is determined by standardized criteria of size, color, and shape. Retailers in high-income markets impose detailed specifications that define what is considered marketable. Produce that deviates from these parameters, even slightly, is excluded from export channels regardless of its nutritional quality. This system effectively prioritizes visual uniformity over edibility.

For producers these requirements create a structural dilemma. Because even minor imperfections can lead to rejection, farmers are compelled to overproduce as a form of risk management. To fulfill a contract for a fixed quantity of “Class A” produce, growers must account for the proportion of their harvest that will not meet these standards.

Evidence from Peru illustrates the scale of this dynamic. A case study from the REFRESH Project documents how cosmetic specifications imposed by export markets generate substantial losses at the farm level. In some crops, rejection rates range from 10 to 40 percent depending on quality requirements. In one instance, more than 3,500 tons of edible onions were discarded in a single year because they did not meet size or shape criteria. Citrus producers face even higher levels of uncertainty, with exportability rates for certain fruits dropping to around 50 percent. When local markets are unable to absorb this surplus, rejected produce is often left to decompose or is buried, as the cost of transport exceeds its potential value.

Price volatility further intensifies these losses. Agricultural markets are highly sensitive to fluctuations in supply and demand. Periods of overproduction can lead to sharp declines in prices, making it economically unviable to harvest or distribute crops. In such conditions, farmers may leave produce in the fields, not because it lacks demand in absolute terms, but because it cannot be sold at a price that covers production and distribution costs. This reflects a broader imbalance in which producers bear the risks of market instability while operating within constraints set by distant buyers.

The environmental implications of this upstream waste are significant. Food that is never consumed still embodies the full cost of its production. Water, fertilizers, land, and labor are expended regardless of whether the crop reaches the market. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, agriculture accounts for a substantial share of global freshwater use, meaning that production losses translate directly into resource waste.

This is particularly evident in regions such as the Ica Valley in Peru, where large volumes of water are used to produce export crops that may ultimately be discarded due to market standards. Studies highlight that water-intensive food is wasted in areas already facing severe water stress, illustrating how food loss translates directly into inefficient use of scarce water resources.

The result is a system in which a significant share of food is filtered out at the very beginning of the supply chain. This upstream waste remains largely invisible to consumers, yet it forms a foundational part of the global food economy and sets the stage for further losses at the retail level.

The Retail Gatekeeper: Why Good Food Dies on the Shelf

While part of the global food waste crisis occurs on distant farms, it also continues in the climate-controlled aisles of supermarkets. In these regions, food waste is not caused by a lack of technology or storage capacity. Rather, it is the result of retail strategies that prioritize brand image, visually appealing displays, and risk avoidance over the actual consumption of food. Supermarkets function as the ultimate gatekeepers of the supply chain, and internal policies often mandate the disposal of large quantities of perfectly edible products.

One of the most significant drivers of this waste is the “aesthetic of abundance.” Retailers operate on the principle that overflowing shelves encourage purchases. This leads to a cycle of overstocking, particularly in produce, bakery, and deli sections. To maintain the appearance of abundance until closing time, stores stock more than they can reasonably expect to sell. In one case study of a supermarket in Poland, a single store generated 3.3 tonnes of food waste in just two weeks, with meat, fruits, and vegetables comprising more than half of the discarded volume. Often, it is cheaper for retailers to discard surplus than to risk a half-empty shelf affecting customer perception.

Date-label practices further exacerbate the problem. “Use By” dates indicate food safety, while “Best Before” dates refer only to quality. Many retail policies fail to distinguish between the two. Once a product reaches its “Best Before” date, it is frequently removed and discarded, even if it remains safe to consume. Research by WRAP shows that consumer confusion over date labels drives significant household waste, but the cycle begins with retailers, whose policies often prevent discounts or donations of items approaching these thresholds. Products such as yogurt, cheese, and bread are routinely disposed of despite being perfectly edible.

Policy interventions provide important examples of how this dynamic can be addressed. In 2016, France passed the Loi Garot, making it illegal for supermarkets over a certain size to destroy unsold food. Large grocers are now required to establish donation contracts with charities. Before the law, many stores destroyed edible products to prevent “dumpster diving.” While the legislation has increased food donations, over-ordering and waste at the retail level persist.

The retail system treats food as a high-volume, low-margin commodity where disposal functions as a routine inventory management tool. When a supermarket discards a crate of aged produce, it is not only wasting food. The energy, labor, water, and transportation that brought it to the shelf—including scarce water from Peru’s Ica Valley—is lost. The retail gatekeeper completes a cycle that began thousands of miles away, linking upstream overproduction to downstream disposal. By prioritizing a flawless shopping experience over resource efficiency, the system guarantees that millions of tonnes of food are grown, transported, and ultimately discarded.

Environmental Costs and Pathways Forward

The cumulative effect of waste at both ends of the supply chain is staggering. Globally, if food waste were a country, it would rank as the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases, largely due to methane released from decomposing organic matter in landfills. Each discarded item carries the embedded energy, water, and labor that went into its production, transport, and storage. In regions like Peru’s Ica Valley, water scarcity is severe, yet millions of cubic meters are used annually to grow crops that never reach consumers. Similarly, fuel, fertilizer, and packaging invested in overproduced or rejected food in Latin America and the energy used to ship it thousands of miles to Europe or North America are effectively wasted, amplifying both carbon and resource footprints.

Addressing this dual-hemisphere crisis requires structural change. Shortening supply chains through direct-to-consumer models or subscription services for “ugly” produce allows farmers to sell imperfect but nutritious crops that would otherwise be discarded. Reforming cosmetic standards can significantly reduce waste at the production stage and ensure more food reaches markets while protecting both revenue and resources. On the retail side, clearer guidance on date labels and mandatory donation policies, such as France’s Loi Garot, can prevent edible food from being thrown away unnecessarily. Greater transparency in contracts between retailers and producers could reduce overproduction and distribute risk more evenly across the chain.

Reducing food waste is not a matter of isolated fixes but of rethinking the value of food. Each discarded item represents lost labor, water, energy, and land, resources concentrated in producing regions but wasted globally. Combining supply chain reforms, policy interventions, and consumer education can shift the system from a cycle of disposal to one that respects the true cost of food production. Tackling this challenge benefits both the environment and the communities that grow the food, creating a more equitable and sustainable global food system.

Sofia Kiryttopoulou is studying for a Bachelor’s Degree in Balkan, Slavic and Oriental Studies. Specialization: Politics and Law, at University of Macedonia | Thessaloniki, Greece.

Funding Policies in the North Hurt Capacity Building in the South

Asger Roejle Christensen — Thu, 08 Feb 2024 06:15:02 +0000

Denmark has valuable experience in running an efficient research administration. It’s important to continue sharing this experience with the global South countries like Ghana in order to address risks of bureaucracy, according to an experienced Danish development researcher

In many cases, South partners in development research projects would nowadays be able to continue the projects themselves without the North, including gaining funding from international aid agencies or large private foundations.

”But in the case of long-term and consolidated collaborations like the one between my university and universities in Ghana, they would clearly lose momentum without us”, says Senior Scientist Finn Plauborg, an experienced agrohydrologist at the Department of Agroecology at University of Aarhus.

On top of conducting several research programs between his own department and partners in Ghana and other countries in the Global South, he has served as leading coordinator of the Danish-funded ”Building Stronger Universities” program (BSU) at the University of Ghana. The BSU-program covers a number of universities in selected countries in the Global South, and its specific purpose is to build up research capacity at national universities in the Global South.

It worries Finn Plauborg when, for instance, a country like Ghana – as it happened recently – is removed from the list of countries which receive future research grants from Denmark’s FFU-fund, the Independent Research Fund. Simply because statistics have shown that it has passed a milestone and become a middle-income country and therefore now is considered able to pay itself for that kind of projects.

”And that is not fair”, says Finn Plauborg. For many years, the BSU effort in Ghana has been tied togetherwith FFU-funded research projects primarily concerning malaria and climate change. In these two fields, the local universities have, according to Finn Plauborg’s observations, built their own strong research communities, ranging from professors to postdocs and upcoming PhD’s.

The purpose of the BSU-program was exactly to strengthen the South-North networks and gradually push universities in the South to further develop in the direction of becoming research-based universities. It was fast becoming a success story, but now Finn Plauborg fears this ”momentum” will be lost.

”The typical grants from FFU has only been maybe ten or twelve million Danish kroner, but that has been enough to cultivate a vitalization of local universities’ research capacity. They have been able to continuously employ new postdocs and PhDs and thereby establish a firm structure around them which is partly built on Danish experiences. This progress might get lost with no new funding for FFU-projects. I know this is creating serious frustrations in several scientific fields at universities in Ghana”.

”Indeed, we have had a very strong research collaboration with the two largest universities in Ghana for many years”, he observes. ”The continuity of this effort has been secured through the years exactly because we have had the opportunity to apply for new research grants from FFU when it was needed in order to continue the strong collaboration”.

South-driven projects

Finn Plauborg has developed a very personal commitment towards Ghana. ”When you are running through a village at five o’clock in the early morning to avoid the heat, you can observe that there is still a lot of work for us to do in Ghana. In my opinion, there is still a need for us from the North in that effort”. For Finn Plauborg, it is more than a relationship that he builds with his closest research colleagues. ”When you work there for three weeks in a row, the weekends become a very important part of the stay. You can visit your personal friends – I have three families outside the research community whom I always visit – you can have a local dinner with them.”

”Personally, I have decided to make my contribution in Ghana, maybe five years more. I don’t intend to shop around among countries. Successful development projects are, like most other projects, based on good personal relations. If you have built up a strong relationship that is able to withstand small conflicts which will always appear, then it’s a very valuable thing and you shouldn’t discard it.”

”Look at the successes we have had. During the BSU-program from 2010 until 2015, we had four PhD’s from University of Ghana. All of them are now employees of the university, doing excellent research. We are still working together with them, and we know each other well. They have been to Denmark for longer stays during their PhD-training, and they understand and appreciate our contribution. This is the way to go”.

“During the BSU-programs, we have tried to make the South partners capable of running the projects themselves. It works much better than it did in the beginning.

Finn Plauborg has tried to make his own analysis as to why it is generally so difficult to make this kind of transfer of expertise work. Why do they so often not respond to their emails? The answer is bureaucracy.

“We are, for instance, running into bureaucracy when we are buying research equipment. I have just bought equipment for one million Danish kroner for two projects. It’s the Ghanian university’s money but it’s much easier to circumvent bureaucracy and corruption if I do the actual buying. They avoid so much trouble and extra expenses. We know that when the goods arrive we have to rush to the airport to pick them up. The longer we wait, the larger the expense grows”.

Confidence for the future

One of the main purposes of the BSU program was to transform universities, built on education, into universities, which are also built on their own research.

”Who knows about that? We do, in Denmark. We have a very long and valuable experience in doing exactly that. It’s not something that you can read about in a book. My observation is that when we make an honest effort to share this experience, our colleagues in the South evaluate it very highly. They really get something out of the investment”.

”All the BSU-projects have had an administrative column aimed at introducing a more efficient administrative structure, which the universities in the South didn’t have to begin with. This is totally necessary if they want to become globally recognized research universities. We have observed that in relation to malaria research projects at our partner universities in Ghana”.

As a consequence of both the BSU program and FFU funding being stopped in Ghana, Finn Plauborg has now engaged himself in a large research project proposal into how to improve the water resources of the country at a time when the population has doubled within a few decades. This proposal is formulated in close cooperation with a large Danish private company, Grundfos, and local partners, and, outside the Danida frame, it is still possible to apply for public funding.

”So, even though the malaria and climate change projects will have to stop, I hope to be able to continue working in Ghana. Inspiration from Danish experiences will still .

For a veteran in the field like Finn Plauborg, the reward is mainly felt when he observes ”bright young people who want to become researchers and are developing all the necessary skills. Through the years, we have seen ten or twelve of them in Ghana. It’s such a joy when you feel that they are confident in expressing their opinions and These young people will be very important for Ghana in the future”.

Ecuador: The highest number of chronic child malnutrition in South America

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Mon, 08 May 2023 11:10:49 +0000

Back there, intertwingled with the clouds, is the snowy mountain of Carihuairazo. The altitude here in the town of Tisaleo is more than 3.200 meters above sea level. Up here the air is dry. This area is known for agriculture, potatoes, beans, peas, corn, blackberries, and strawberries. Here is at first sight no lack of food.

But then again. The province of Tungurahua – of which Tisaleo is a part – has the highest statistics of chronic child malnutrition in the country with 41.34 % of children 0-2 years old, according to the National Institute of Statistics and Census in Ecuador (INEC). Most of the food they cultivate is to be sold and consumed elsewhere.

Diana Belén Pilco Pilco, 36, is preparing her son Lucio, almost two years old, for a small Christmas parade through the part of Tisaleo called El Calvario. She is the treasurer at the local CNH group (Creciendo con Nuestros Hijos – Growing with Our Children) in the Calvario sector – a government initiative for vulnerable children regarding malnutrition. The group in El Calvario consists of 16 children and their parents – the majority have a really low income and several are single mothers. They work in agriculture or in footwear manufacturing. Most work daily, seasonally – not with a fixed monthly income. On the days they work they can earn around 12 USD (the currency in Ecuador) per day.

Being a part of the CNH group, they get visits once a week. Sometimes they would get eggs or hens from the group initiative.

The pandemic has been hard on them, Diana recons. And in general, their difficult economic conditions make it hard for them to offer healthy and good food to their families:

“We talk about that among the mums because they give us talks about nutrition for our children they give us training, but as the doctor sometimes tells us, the nutritionist tells us what we have to feed our children, but there are times when we don’t have the access to give them one egg a day. And even worse to buy meat, chicken, and fish because they are more expensive products, and we don’t have enough money to buy them. The doctor told us that we must try to give them as much food as possible, and sometimes there is not enough, we give them what we have at home, and sometimes that is also why this happens with malnutrition in our children.

Diana’s son Lucio suffers from malnutrition and anemia, she tells us. And as a mother, it is really difficult, not being able to treat and feed well your children:

“It is difficult, it is helplessness we feel because sometimes when there is enough, we feed ourselves and we feed good, but when there is not, sometimes, no matter how much we want to, we cannot. We give what we have from our pocket. But sometimes there is nothing. And unfortunately, those who pay the consequences are our children,” says Diana.

But equally, Diana and the other mothers try their best to improve their conditions and get better access to food for their children. For instance, they plant vegetables like chard or peas– which would be too expensive to buy. They also raise guinea pigs to sell – which is a traditional food in Ecuador.

Diana points out another thing that would be a great help for the families in Tisaleo. To get a local pediatrician, so that they would easily and quickly be able to bring their small children to medical checks.

And poverty plays a central role in the predisposition for malnutrition among children. So, explains Betzabe Tello, who is a Family Doctor, has a Ph.D. in medicine, and is a research professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador (PUCE), where she has published studies related to chronic child malnutrition. She has also collaborated with the United Nations Children’s Fund, UNICEF, and with the Ecuadorian Ministry of Public health on this topic.

“Chronic child Malnutrition is a serious public health problem in Ecuador, and it is only getting worse. Poverty is the most important determinant of malnutrition. 40% of children under 5 in Ecuador live in the poorest parts of the country. That is quite a lot. Also, the ethnic population, the indigenous population is the most affected – by poverty and by malnutrition. Education of women is also a determinant for the malnutrition of children,” explains the researcher.

According to data from UNICEF, 40 % of malnourished children in Ecuador are indigenous even though the indigenous population only makes it up for seven percent of the total population.

At the level of Ecuador, it is the Central Andean Provinces, like Tungurahua where Diana is living, which are most affected, here half of the children suffer from malnutrition, which is a serious issue. Here lives the poorest population, almost entirely indigenous population.

“There is no quick solution, because of the political panorama, the political decisions are not tackling the structural problems of malnutrition. It is not just about food but also access to healthcare, clean water, and education. For the prevalence of malnutrition to disappear, we must look at narrowing the inequality gap”

Ricardo Fabricio Huaraca is the local doctor in the El Calvario sector, where there are living 2.646 persons. He points out several reasons for the record-high level of chronic child malnutrition in the area:

“We have a high rate of child malnutrition. There are several precarious situations contributing to that, like the water here in the Calvario area in general, is not drinkable. This is a factor that influences malnutrition and in addition to this the parasites that are quite frequent here, that is another important factor that we have,” says the local doctor.

He agrees on the lack of access to healthy food is a key element in the problem, but not the only one:

“Access to an adequate and balanced diet is very complicated at times due to the precariousness of the parents’ access to food. Sometimes it has not been possible to carry out many check-ups, obviously here as the population is quite dispersed and there is not much staff at times to be able to carry out the necessary technical visits by our health personnel,” says Ricardo Fabricio Huaraca.

Another of the members of the CNH group is 23-year-old single mother Erika Lizeth Panimboza with her son Gael, 1. She has been living her whole life in Tisaleo. Being a single mother, is tough, especially economically, she tells:

“We lack food because even though I work hard, sometimes I can’t afford to buy all the necessary things for him, like yogurts, for example, I can’t afford to buy all that,” says the young Ecuadorian mother.

Her son is suffering from malnutrition, she has been told by the doctors:

“My son has short stature and does not have a very good weight. I don’t know what it’s due to, but I’ve been told that it’s because of his poor diet, because he doesn’t eat properly like yogurts, cereals, fruit, and all that because I don’t have a lot of money. I do worry because I don’t have enough money to buy enough things for him,” says Erika.

Another big wish of hers is a hospital in Tisaleo that will attend 24 hours a day, to get better medical attention, especially for small children like her son Gael.

Studies from before the pandemic showed that almost half of Ecuadorian families didn’t have access to an adequate and balanced diet. And during the pandemic, those things got worse. A condition with serious consequences for the children, their families, and the whole country. Something the Ecuadorian researcher is really worried about:

“Immediate consequence of malnutrition can be infectious diseases or even premature death. Then there are the long-term consequences, which are many, obesity, diabetes, and lack of productivity. A small child is not just small in size but also its head, thoughts, and aspirations are small and limited. That can lead to a lack of productivity, lack of access to adequate work, and poor living conditions. And in general, a lack of productivity in the country. Chronic child malnutrition also weighs on the country’s economy in the end. And all this is more likely to be passed on to the next generation, end the end we are doomed to poverty,” thinks Betzabe Tello.

Ecuador is the country in South America with the highest rate of chronic child malnutrition and the second in Latin America (after Guatemala) according to UNICEF. One-third of children in Ecuador are malnourished.

The Ecuadorian doctor points out, that her country could learn something from neighboring Peru:

“In Peru, they seem to have done something right, according to the Ecuadorian researcher: “They have managed to reduce malnutrition because they have had a very strong policy – they kept during different governments, with a strict budget allocation to this area. They managed to reduce malnutrition; they’ve had an anemia policy too”.

Lise Josefsen Hermann – a freelance journalist based in Latin America for more than a decade. She is a Pulitzer Grantee, works for the investigative media Danwatch and has published in media like Al Jazeera, BBC, Deutsche Welle, Danish Broadcasting Corporation, El Pais, New York Times, and Undark Magazine. Photo: Charlie Cordero, Cesar, Colombia.

Measuring ‘Poverty in Bundles’: A New Method to Target Poverty Reduction

Namrata Acharya — Mon, 08 May 2023 11:09:35 +0000

The Global Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) is a yearly publication by the UN that measures worldwide poverty levels. This year, a new way to address poverty was introduced. For the first time, it uses a concept called ‘poverty in bundles’, or a combination of deprivations a person suffers, to assess the precise nature of poverty across regions. The idea is to tackle the problem through a targeted approach.

To understand the concept of ‘poverty in bundles’, it is important to acknowledge the MPI, an index launched in 2010 by the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative at the University of Oxford and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). It was a step towards achieving the UN’s SDG 1 to end poverty everywhere in all its forms.

The MPI measures deprivation for each household by monitoring ten indicators spanning across three broad categories — health, education and standard of living. Within each of these dimensions there are indicators of deprivations. In the dimension of health are nutrition and child mortality, within education, years of schooling and attendance, and within the standard of living there are six indicators — cooking fuel, sanitation, drinking water, electricity, housing and assets. Each of these indicators is given equal weightage within each broad category while calculating the overall MPI.

For the first time, the UN report looks into the interlinkages among the ten indicators of the MPI. It investigates the overlap in deprivation indicators in pairs, triplets, or bundles. For example, the report found that 80 percent of poor people who are deprived of drinking water also experience deprivations in sanitation, this is an interlinked pair. Again, almost half of the poor people, 470.1 million, are deprived of both nutrition and sanitation worldwide, a pair that makes them more vulnerable to infectious diseases.

The findings of the 2022 report state that across 111 countries, 1.2 billion people, or 19.1 percent, live in acute multidimensional poverty. This compares to 1.3 billion people, 21.7 percent, across 109 countries in 2021. The largest number of poor people live in Sub-Saharan Africa, nearly 579 million, followed by South Asia with 385 million people.

MPI is being increasingly seen as a more rigorous measure of poverty than income. In recent research, called the Relationship Between Income Poverty and Multidimensional Poverty in China, Xiaolin Wang and others found that the coincidence of income poverty and multidimensional poverty is 31 percent. In other words, 69 percent of multidimensionally poor households are not considered poor in terms of income poverty in China. While an increase in income can significantly reduce multidimensional poverty, its impact is therefore limited.

The interlinkages in the MPI can identify patterns of poverty across different regions of the world

For example, the UN report says that a poor person in South Asia is more likely to be deprived of nutrition, cooking fuel, sanitation and housing, while a poor person in Sub-Saharan Africa is more likely to have those deprivations, along with drinking water and electricity.

In complying with the SDG, the multi sectoral policies, formulated on the basis of interlinkages, can not only lift millions out of poverty, but also minimize poor people’s burden by enabling them to overcome multiple deprivations at the same time, says the UN report. The study finds that there are 120 possible deprivation triplets, and the diversity of deprivation patterns is striking.

The UN report has a special mention of India, where 415 million people experienced poverty between 2005-2006 and 2019-2021. Rural areas, also the poorest, saw the fastest reduction in MPI value. The incidence of poverty fell from 36.6 percent in 2015-2016 to 21.2 percent in 2019-2021 and from 9.0 percent to 5.5 percent in urban areas.

Limitations of the MPI

However, measuring poverty solely on the basis of MPI has its own limitations. Most importantly, it ignores the purchasing power of people. For example, in the case of India, where the income per capita is much lower than in other parts of the world, the MPI ignores the stagnating income levels. According to data by the UN’s International Monetary Fund (IMF), India’s per capita income in 2021 was one of the lowest in the world at $2,191, which puts it in the 144th position out of 194 economies.

“I think that the figures on household amenities are plausible and that most of these facilities are actually being utilized, with the partial exception of toilets. None of the deprivations included in the multidimensional poverty index capture short-term purchasing power. It is important to bear that in mind, especially when we are looking at episodes like the last few years in India, when many people’s purchasing power has been eroded” says Jean Dreze, Visiting Professor at Ranchi University, India, in an email to DDRN.

“There is no contradiction. Poverty in India is declining, but India is still one of the poorest countries in the world. In some aspects of poverty, like nutrition, progress has been very slow, so that India’s position vis-à-vis other countries has deteriorated”, adds Dreze. The underlying data for India used in the report are based on what is known as “the censored headcount ratio” or HCR. The censored data integrate the deprivation in one dimension, e.g. nutrition, with all other dimensions e.g. fuel, sanitation, etc.

Therefore, a person might not be able to afford two square meals, but his deprivation will decline if he has other amenities like toilets and electricity. The uncensored HCR captures what can be said as undiluted deprivation in each category. Further, a look into the MPI data shows per capita consumption declined from 3.8% to 3% between 2005-15 and 2015-21, the latter being the Modi era.

“Also, when uncensored data are taken into consideration, the level of poverty decline is much lower than that in the case of censored data”, points out Drèze. For example, the decline in the deprivation rate of average ‘living standard,’ comes at 14% in the case of censored data, but only 8% in the case of uncensored ones. INTERACTIVE CHART

Earlier, every five years, the government published a survey of consumption expenditure, a repository of data on the purchasing power of the rural and urban populations. In 2017-18, the government scrapped its own consumption expenditure survey stating quality issues—a precedence not seen before. The leaked report, published in the media, had some disturbing facts— the average monthly spending of an Indian fell by 3.7% between 2011-12 and 2017-18. It declined by 8.8%t in villages.

“The notable decline in poverty in India does not match with ground reports”, said Dipa Sinha, Assistant Professor of Economics at Ambedkar University, India, in a zoom interview with DDRN. India still must go a long way in terms of eradicating hunger. It ranks 107th among 121 nations in terms of hunger—a ‘serious’ concern, according to the Global Hunger Index. INTERACTIVE CHART

“The findings are true, but when we look at the ground reports, there is a mismatch. We have seen many more toilets and gas cylinders in Indian households than before. What is missing from the data are effects, like nutritional or learning outcomes, as well as aspects like purchasing power and access to resources”, says Sinha. One of the limitations that the UN report notes is the lack of availability of harmonized data. It says that the irregularity of multitopic household surveys hinders the power and potential of the global MPI.

The report states, that “it is time to emphatically raise alarm on missing data on measuring poverty”. While the MPI comes with its own limitations, the interlinkages among different dimensions of deprivation that the UN report highlights offer new forms of solutions toward targeted poverty alleviation schemes. At the same time, a robust database can add multifold efficiency. Depending solely on MPI, while ignoring other measures of development, like the Purchasing Power Parity (PPP), which measures the purchasing power of the people at a given time, might be an instance of self-denial.

Namrata Acharya is a journalist with bylines in Al Jazeera, South China Morning Post Zenger News, Mongabay, The Wire, The Juggernaut, KR- Asia and more.

Xiaolin Wang is the deputy dean and a professor at the Institute for Six-sector Economy at Fudan University. His main research areas are innovation and international development, poverty measurement, public service, digital economy, and industry convergence. He has served as deputy director-general of the Information Center of the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development, China. He was also the chief of the research division of the International Poverty Reduction Center in China (IPRCC) between 2015 and 2019.

Jean Drèze is a Belgian-born Indian development economist who has been influential in the economic policy making of India. His co-authors include Nobel laureate in economics Amartya Sen, with whom he has written on famine, Nicholas Stern, with whom he has written on policy reform when market prices are distorted and Nobel laureate in economics Angus Deaton. He is currently an honorary Professor at the Delhi School of Economics, and Visiting Professor at the Department of Economics, Ranchi University. He was a member of the National Advisory Council of India in both first and second term.

Jean Drèze: A Scholar who Integrated Research with Action in Social Science

Namrata Acharya — Sat, 11 Feb 2023 16:23:47 +0000

Action-oriented research is a road less traveled in the world of academics. Often researchers are confronted with the dilemma of the need to remain objective while taking a clear point of view in their research. Jean Drèze, a Belgian-born Indian economist, has broken this myth by showing how action-based research can lead to tangible results while adhering to objectivity.

Drèze is one the most outstanding development economists in the world, he has been working on issues related to hunger, famine, gender inequality, child health and education in India for several decades. He has co-authored several books with the Nobel laureate Amartya Sen regarding hunger and developmental issues in India. In his book “Sense and Solidarity” published in 2017, Drèze extensively talks about action-oriented research.

However, the path to converge the two — activism and research — was not an easy task for Drèze. It was only after he met Sen, that Drèze began to find harmony between research and action. The manifestation of this amalgamation can be seen in his works, which led to some landmark welfare policies in India.

One special focus of Drèze’s action-oriented research is India’s landmark rural employment scheme, called the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 (NREGA) — a law that guarantees employment on demand to all adults in rural areas, subject to a maximum of 100 days per household per year. Drèze played a key role in the drafting of the law. In addition, he was one of the co-authors of the Public Report on Basic Education in India, also known as the ‘PROBE’ report. Launched in 1999, PROBE is an extensive investigation of the schooling situation in India, digging deep into the reasons why a large number of children were deprived of the fundamental right to education.

Drèze’s recent research interests include the impact of the Covid-19 crisis on schooling among underprivileged families. In late 2022, he conducted a quick survey on the subject with student volunteers in Jharkhand, a state in Eastern India. The results showed an alarming situation. For example, not a single school in the sample had functional toilets, electricity and water supply.

Drèze is currently an honorary Professor at the Delhi School of Economics, and a visiting Professor at the Department of Economics at Ranchi University in India. He has also taught at the London School of Economics. Drèze studied mathematical economics at the University of Essex and did his Ph.D. (economics) at the Indian Statistical Institute, New Delhi.

What motivated you to study development economics in India?

One step led to another, as tends to happen to most of us. I came to India on an exploratory visit, as a student, but the country quickly caught my imagination and became a lifelong home. For an action-oriented scholar, India used to be a great place, because of its democratic institutions. These institutions are in bad shape right now, but that’s not the last word.

You have spoken about action-oriented research in your book “Sense and Solidarity”. Can you briefly tell us how you integrated the two — research and action — into your works in India?

I have never been interested in research for its own sake. There are many possible motives for doing research. For me, it was always part of a larger endeavor to contribute to public action. For instance, my research on social policy is connected with various campaigns for economic and social rights, such as the right to food and the right to work. This research is not a standalone exercise, it feeds into collective efforts to change things on the ground.

In your research, how do you connect your findings with policy implications, particularly when the governments prefer to formulate policies on the basis of vote banks rather than facts?

First of all, we should avoid the notion that influencing government policy is the only way to achieve practical change. Public action does not necessarily take the form of government intervention. As far as government policy is concerned, in a relatively democratic society like India there are many ways of trying to influence it. We can go to the media, the courts, the parliament, or the streets for that matter. Sometimes we also get a chance to join the odd advisory body, like the National Advisory Council in 2004, and that can help too.

To conduct action-oriented research, what kind of research methodologies are most desirable? Do you think personal interactions, interviews and observations are better tools over pure data analysis?

I think that all methods are potentially useful as long as they are scientifically and ethically sound. But action-oriented research has a natural affinity with field-based and participatory methods. Practical experience is very important to understand how and why things work the way they do. Of course, this is not a substitute for data analysis. It is when data analysis and practical experience come together that we are on the strongest ground.

In your book you have mentioned dependence on funding, especially corporate funding, for research is a key challenge in action-oriented research. In that case, what are the alternatives?

I do a lot of work with like-minded friends and student volunteers who are driven by enthusiasm for action-oriented research. They are happy to work for free, use public transport and stay in the villages during field surveys. For overhead costs, we seek support from individual well-wishers. I realize that it is not possible for everyone to work in this way. The main thing is to avoid dependence on funding agencies that restrict our freedom of expression and action. Many of them have their own agenda and exert a subtle influence on the findings and uses of development research.

How do you differentiate activism from research in an action-oriented study?

Sometimes, research itself is a form of activism. For instance, when investigative research exposes corruption or propaganda, it tends to rock the boat. In general, however, I think that action and research are best seen as complementary but independent activities. Mixing the two can easily create some tensions. There is a mistaken notion that the main tension arises from the need for objectivity in research. In fact, the quest from objectivity does not prevent us from taking a position or acting on it. But other tensions can arise between research and activism. For instance, activism often involves dramatic rhetoric. That does not always fit well with the reasoned argument one expects from scholarly research.

Do you think that universities, especially the biggest names in the world of academics, are giving enough weightage to action-oriented research in the context of development studies?

I think that across the social sciences, universities could do more to prepare youngsters for action-oriented research from various positions in society, not just academic positions. When I was studying economics, I had a split personality. I was doing research for my PhD and I was an activist in my spare time, and the twain never met, because I was unable to connect research with action. It was only after I started working with Amartya Sen that the two started coming together. Things are perhaps a little better today, but even today I see a similar frustration among many students. They would like to use their research skills for a good cause, but they don’t know how to go about it. We need to create more spaces where this sort of work is possible, both within and outside universities.

If MNREGA, the 100-day guaranteed job scheme in India, is counted as a policy implication of action-oriented research, what are your reflections on two decades of its implementation? Do you think what started as action-oriented research has now transformed into a political tool?

Research rarely has “policy implications” on its own. In economics, many papers end with a section on policy implications, but most of the time these so-called implications don’t follow from the preceding research. Good policy requires not only sound research but also value judgements and inclusive deliberation. No amount of research can tell you whether MNREGA is a good idea. The campaign for this Act relied not only on some action-oriented research but also on a certain view of Indian society and a strong commitment to the interests of the working class. And yes, it is very much a political campaign. It is not an outcome of action-oriented research alone, but it has certainly built on it.

Can you throw some light on your current/ ongoing research works? What methods are you using for it?

One of my recent interests is the impact of the Covid-19 crisis on schooling, especially among underprivileged families. In late 2021, we conducted a quick survey on this with student volunteers, and the findings were really alarming. Except for a minority of privileged students who were able to continue studying online, children had been virtually abandoned by the schooling system. The survey helped to push for accelerated reopening of schools, after a gap of almost two years. Unfortunately, the schools reopened in a business-as-usual mode, and not much has been done to help disadvantaged children, as we learnt from a follow-up survey in late 2022. Very little attention is being paid to these issues, because privileged families are doing fine, so this is a case where some basic action-oriented research can really help. The same point applies to a range of economic and social rights, from nutrition and healthcare to freedom from discrimination. So, there is plenty to do.

As an economist, Jean Drèze has proved that research in social sciences can lead to tangible results. They are not merely theories discussed in academic circles, but outcomes that can change the lives of millions of people. Living a simple life in the hinterlands of India, Drèze has seen and experienced the hardships of people from close quarters. When this experience combines with his high degree of academic rigor and knowledge, we get a rare combination — a researcher who has lived, written and made tangible changes in the development landscape of India.

Namrata Acharya is a journalist with bylines in Al Jazeera, South China Morning Post Zenger News, Mongabay, The Wire, The Juggernaut, KR- Asia and more.

Bolivian Researcher Carla Colque-Little Throws Light on the Superfood-crop Quinoa

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Mon, 12 Sep 2022 12:06:50 +0000

Carla Colque-Little specializes in diseases of one of the star crops from Bolivia – quinoa. A plant that many countries – for instance, Denmark – are eager to adapt to cultivate in their farmland – is a crop for the future. But changing the habitat of the quinoa is not without problems. Understanding diseases and plagues is a key to success. And Carla Colque-Little, who did her Ph.D. in Denmark with a scholarship from the Bolivian government, holds important information on that key.

She is dressed in a stylized indigenous skirt and a vicuña wool shawl. Carla Colque-Little recalls how years back she walked around in these same streets of La Paz, the administrative capital of Bolivia, thinking and deciding about the great offer she had got about studying in Denmark. A great step for an Andean woman from Bolivia. “My life changed that day.“ Her face lights up with a big smile when recalling the moment.

But the decision was not easy at all. As a single mother with two children, leaving her country and the rest of her family was an enormous challenge and change. “It has not been without sacrifice,” the Bolivian scientist admits. Also, when she lost her mother while studying abroad that was a tough mark on that road.

Back in 2014, the government of the indigenous president Evo Morales began offering scholarships to 100 people like Carla. Together with Carla, we visit the Ministry of Education in La Paz, where we meet Mario Fuentes Teran, Director of University Education: “With these scholarships, Evo has thought of the Bolivian youth even without having gone to the university. It has been a way of democratizing education in Bolivia to improve development in the country. The initiative is a part of the national policy on science sovereignty,” states Mario Fuentes Teran.

The new government of 2020, led by Luis Arce Catacora, offers 200 scholarships tells the education director. The scholarships will be given in the areas of science, technology, nuclear energy, and health. The deal is that the Government pays for the studies, travel and stay in the host country. In return, the students must work twice as long as they studied – in strategic enterprises back home in Bolivia. It’s the strategic state enterprises – like Lithium Resources, Sugar production, Bolivian Airways, seeds (in the case of Carla), oil – who makes their suggestion to which kinds of specialization is needed for the interests of the Bolivian State.

When the 100-scholarship program was launched, Carla already had a master’s degree from London. She decided to go do her Ph.D. Copenhagen with a scholarship from the Bolivian government: “In Denmark, people didn’t believe me, that coming from a developing country, my government had paid for me to be there. We can now raise our heads. It’s about scientific diplomacy,” says Carla.

She is right now preparing to say goodbye – once again – to her family and country. She returned to Bolivia last year and she managed to negotiate to go back to Denmark; her specialized knowledge about diseases in quinoa is sought after.

While we meet Carla, she shows us around her beloved city La Paz – where she went to school and did her studies at the University. Her connection with her roots and her country is clear and strong. Quinoa is a product of worldwide interest. Carla is a phytopathologist, which means she studies diseases of plants. This research area is about genetic breeding when searching for disease resistance. But it did not have prestige , according to Carla: “The general idea is that you just identify the disease, the insect pest, for instance, you look for a cure – could be chemical – or sometimes it doesn’t impact the yield performance sufficiently to be worried about. And that’s it,” says Carla.

And the same happened in the area of quinoa: “The global interest – outside the Andean countries – was about adapting the quinoa to places with long days – in Europe – Germany, Denmark. And in China, Corea, and Japan to the conditions, they have there”. A great change from the conditions in Bolivia, where there is almost no difference between the time for sunrise and sunset.

And scientists have succeeded in adapting quinoa to these new conditions. “They have made advances – actually they have published about the genes related to the conditions for long days and its chromosomal location. This is a step ahead on making the necessary stable adaptations so that the crop can grow under these conditions”.

But it quickly turned out that it is not that simple just to move a plant from one part of the world to another, a completely different one. This is where Carla and her colleagues’ research comes into the picture: “Thanks to our research we have managed to show that the adaptation, the domestication of the plant, the crop has had a biological penalization. That penalization refers to a loss in beneficial microorganisms, and of greater resilience of the plants towards diseases”.

Basically, the research shows how the quinoa grows well and healthy when it is together with its many organisms in its native environment, explains Carla: “In the original environment of the plant, it is not alone. There is a complex of organisms that lives together with it. We know that in the soil there is a great quantity of bacterizes – other microorganisms that favor the plant. In this symbiosis, the plant is living in balance. But then, when you take this plant and you want to adapt it to other systems – to a completely different place – it’s possible, yes – but there is a biological penalization – it loses a lot of these good microorganisms, which then give more space to those bad ones – the diseases”.

So then, the diseases that earlier were not very important (to study) suddenly get important, tells Carla: “In my thesis, our research has found the scientific evidence for this, and it has important implications because the diseases infect the grain, they produce mycotoxins”. So suddenly the demand for a profile like the one by Carla increased: “The global interest towards quinoa will look for researchers who are up to date on those aspects of the quinoa. And in diseases, there are not a lot of people because that was the least important for a long time”.

When I ask her how she could use what she learned in Denmark, she answered promptly that “it’s rather what I could teach them – about the quinoa which is from my country”. This goes both ways, she insists. “This kind of exchange should always be done like this – both ways. It also increases the possibilities of scientific discoveries. Because researchers in the Andes, are in contact with our intuition, and we can communicate this to the people in Europe. This is really interesting,” Carla points out.

It’s easy to notice how Carla has a different background and cosmovision than that of a typical European scientist. She tries to link intuition – or call it observation – with known or unknown facts, for instance how she dreams of being able to speak with the plants to be able to understand them better. Before leaving for Denmark, she first paid visits to the important places for quinoa to collect information. She went to Puno, close to the Titicaca lake in Peru. She visited Quito, the capital of Ecuador, and many other places in that country. Also, the trip passed Lima, and she visited an experimental station for quinoa in Peru.

Carla expresses herself, her work, and her connection with nature in a way far from the European academic world. “I would like to listen to the plant in its place – it is a living being that I wish I was able to communicate with. That it enriches me and tells me about it. It is the same when I am in the lab, I also wish I could communicate with the organisms – they are alive! They are interacting.” Carla is clearly very excited about this part of her work. She shows a photo of when you look in a microscope at microorganisms. “These things move, they are alive. For me, it doesn’t serve for anything just the letters – without looking at the plants, without feeling them.”

Via the computer screen, Carla proudly shows me the paper of her thesis. It includes Andean symbols such as the Bolivian mountains: Tunupa, Illimani, and Illampu, and then drawings of the quinoa, llamas, and the Bolivian flag. “This work is really important for me and for my government,” says Carla.

The conclusion of her thesis includes how this scientific research and exchange between the Andean Region and Europe is necessary. It enhances the process of discovery that will prevent and reduce infections in European grains and produce food safety. And without this exchange, it’s going to take longer to discover this. On the other hand, from the Bolivian side, they need to improve their performance and good prices and to get acknowledgment of the quinoa with a denomination of the origin. “The fact that I was in Europe with the knowledge about the Andean quinoa, facilitated that we could manage this. Us Andean people know more about quinoa than Europeans”.

And just the detail that Spanish is her mother language makes it possible for her to include other sources, which have enriched the articles and research. On the other hand, it was possible for Carla to get to learn about new technologies and experts in genetic improvement which were only accessible in Europe. She could not have done that if she just stayed in Bolivia. Both in literature and songs, there is this specific term, Lamento Boliviano – meaning Bolivian Sorrow. Something many Bolivians relate to – Carla as well, referring to when Bolivia was colonized by Spain 500 years ago. “We are all illegitimate children here in Bolivia because we are a mix of indigenous and white people. It’s about not knowing where you belong. But I always had this clear, Colque (her surname) is an indigenous name, which means Silver, because my father’s family came from the silver mines”.

She recalls being bullied in her school time for going to school with that surname – such a girl did not belong there, according to the other children, she says. But then, when indigenous Evo Morales came into power in 2005, these things began to change. “This was a historical moment really”, says Carla. “Back in 1970, indigenous people were extremely discriminated here. And now someone with an indigenous surname could even accede to scholarships”.

“Sometimes I ask myself, how can all this be happening? It is not easy for a Bolivian to travel. It was expensive. As a girl, I wanted to travel, and explore – and that is what is happening! It is still a dream for me! We need to think differently about the world. Because we have potential and talent in Bolivia. I have hope that we will succeed in this in the future.”

At this moment Carla is preparing to say goodbye to her family and country again. To return six months to Copenhagen to continue her work on diseases in quinoa to represent her strategic enterprise for seeds, “Empresa Estrategica de Semillas”. She questions the model of compulsory work in national companies in Bolivia after ending her studies with the scholarships, which the director of the Education Ministry talked about:

“I want to suggest to my government a new way of working. I want to continue with international work and establish collaborative projects, together with my strategic Bolivian enterprise. I dream of working between Bolivia and in this case Denmark. I don’t want to leave my country, but also, I do not want to be in a cave without access to what I have in Copenhagen. The University of Copenhagen has been like a platform for me. It would be great to continue with these contacts from universities in Italy, Saudi Arabia, etc. to increase exchange also for other young people. We need to get away from the idea of returning to an orthodox work in an office upon returning to Bolivia,” reflects Carla.

As the cherry on top of the pie, she proudly shows a letter she got from the current president of Bolivia, Luis Arce. “This is one of the letters I feel most appreciation for. It’s a letter from my president. It says… Congratulations on your Ph.D. in Copenhagen about diseases in quinoa and on regaining Bolivian identity. This work will for sure be really useful for society.”

The fresh food in this outdoor fridge is for everyone who need it

Asger Roejle Christensen — Mon, 15 Nov 2021 13:28:56 +0000

In front of ”Folkets Hus”, The People’s House, in Copenhagen’s Noerrebro neighbourhood, you will find two tall outdoor fridges. If you open the door to any of the fridges, you will find fresh and clean food and drink, vegetables, instant noodles, yoghurt, all kinds of everyday food as you find it in Danish kitchens. You are free to come and take it home on your bicycle if you in any way need it.

The fridge, which is called ”Faelleskabet” in Danish, a pun which play on the word ”Faelleskabet” meaning ”common cabinet” and ”community” at the same time, is the centerpiece of an activist- and volunteer-driven project which was originally meant as a visible protest against food waste in modern society.

During the corona pandemic, however, it also served as a source of food for individuals and families who were hard hit financially by the lockdown restrictions.

”The pandemic has justified the presence of the fridge even more. Due to the restrictions, many suddenly became jobless. However, the access to free food made the situation a little easier,” explains Irene Valentina di Lauro, originally from Italy, masters student and activist, the main founder of the Open Fridge.

Most of the volunteers at the fridge, who are picking up the food as donations from supermarkets and bakeries, filling up the fridge and keeping it nice and clean, are immigrants like her, some of them relatively recent immigrants with a need to socialize.

The fridges were put up in November 2020 in the middle of the second lockdown in Denmark.

”During a time when many of us have been completely isolated, the fridge has been a way to safely engage with other people, because the fridge is outdoors”, she continues. ”It creates a space for social interaction around food”.

The need for food clearly existed during the lockdown. Some poor families became even poorer and needed help to be able to serve three decent meals every day for their children.

The extent of the need is hard to register and measure. ”We don’t ask people why they pick up the food in the fridge”, as Irene Valentina di Lauro says. ”But obviously there is a need”.

Almost 60.000 poor children in Denmark

Figures from The Economic Council of the Labour Movement (AE, Arbejderbevægelses Erhvervsråd) show that even before the corona crisis began, one out of twenty children below 18 years of age in Denmark grow up in families, which are defined as poor according to indicators for relative poverty from Statistics Denmark (Danmarks Statistik).

The AE analysis showed, that in the year of 2019, 59.700 Danish children were relatively poor. A quarter of a million people lived in relatively poor families. The analysis also showed very large diffeencen between different municipliaties. In the poorest regions in Southern Jutland, Western and Southern Sealand, Lolland, Falster and the Western suburbs of Copenhagen. In these areas, on average, actually between six and ten percent of all children below 18 grow up in poverty.

In these areas, local chapters of the Danish branch of Save the Children, Red Barnet, are engaged in several activities in support of those of the poorest families who don’t have a supportive network themselves.

Recently, Majbritt Borgmann, Senior Advisor at the main office of Red Barnet in Copenhagen, made an informal survey by telephone. She called the local chairpersons of the chapters in the ten poorest municipalities in Denmark, in which Red Barnet has activities going on. Shea sked whether vulnerable childrens’ families have had their situation worsened during the pandemic.

”Ten out of ten told me, that their condition had worsened”, says Majbritt Borgmann.

Food donations for the families

”The children have primarily suffered deprivation of food. It has been hard for the families to secure three healthy meals to them every day. In normal times, the children attend institutions, where they get something to eat. But when the children are at home for shorter og longer time, it puts suddenly pressure on the household budget”.

Because of this serious situation in many families, local chapters of Red barnet have simply provided these families with food, either in the form of food coupons for the local supermarket or in the same way as they do at the Open Fridge in Noerrebro. The families were given food boxes with food, donated by supermarkets or restaurants.

”We have never done this before”, says Majbritt Borgmann. ”It is not our role. Red Barnet works politically for better conditions for children, but it is not a charity organization. But during the lockdown we judged that there was a special need that we did it”.

”The corona crisis has been a magnifying glass, which has enlarged the problems which we have seen before that. It has reinforced the social challenges in these families which we already knew about”.

Several of the families which were under the strongest economic pressure were families with another ethnical background than Danish. These families, typically, had to live with the so-called ”integration benefit” (integrationsydelse), which is distinctly lower than the ”cash assistance” (kontanthjælp) which Danish and European families in the same situation would be entitled to.

In some instances, families who live in poverty have had difficulties finding the right clothes for the season for their children. During the pandemic, it became extra difficult for some of the families as the recycling shops were closed, and they couldn’t find cheap second-hand ”flyverdragter” (outdoor onepiece jumpsuits) and similar clothes for the children, which it was expected by the schools that the children wear.

The general well-being of the families, helped by Red Barnet, was also threatened during the pandemic.

”Being at home within a family in which the parents or the single mother already were fighting other social challenges like mental vulnerability or chronic illness, can be very tough”, Majbritt Borgmann explains. Some less privileged parenst might be able to find a balance in everyday life because the children are away in school and other activities for much of the day. But if everyone are at home all the day long, this balance becomes impossible to achieve”.

Eating once a day

Not only Red Barnet, but also Danish Red Cross has reported a worsened situation among the poorest members of Danish society as a consequence of the restrictions during the pandemic.

In December 2020, members of Danish Red Cross made a survey among 347 families which received ”julehjælp” (Christmas Help) from Red Cross. They were both asked about consequences of the corona lockdowns for their private economic situation and about their well-being in a broader sense.

44 percent of the parents wrote that the corona situation had impacted on their economy and job situation. 65 percent wrote that they had worries every day or several times every week about the family’s economic situation. Several of the parents explained that they have had to drop out of an education or give up a job in order to support the childrens’ school work at home.

Now, back to Noerrebro. The Mødrehjælpen (Mothers’ help) office in the neighbourhood was reporting about more poor childrens’ families already during the first months after the outbreak.

”It is primarily single mothers who apply for help, but we have also single fathers comming to us”, Mette Faber, chairperson of the local chapter of the Moedrehjaelpen in Noerrebro, says to the local weekly Nørrebro LIV. ”During corona, we were asked to donate money to buy food. We meet people who only eat once in a day themselves to secure that their children become saturated. It is simply despairing”.

”It hs been an incredible load to be trapped, in many instances in smalle apartments with very little surplus. That’s why the restrictions of the government have hurt so badly, when we continously have had to cancel trips and other social events (for the children, red)”, she continues.

So there is indeed a need for an open fridge like Faellesskabet. After having filled up the fridge with vegetables from a supermarket, Irene Valentina de Lauro sat down with me to explain about her project. Together, we were observing people coming to pick up the contents of the fridge, some housewifes, some young students, some elderly homeless men.

Irene Valentina di Lauro has decided to make the project into a research subject for her own master thesis.

”I worked with the volunteers and I am a volunteer myself. But I put myself in the shoes of an anthrolopogist while doing the volunteer work. I tried to detach myself emotionally”, she explains.

”I have done a lot of observatons. But I didn’t want to be sitting here having a camera and asking people. ’What is your income?’. I felt that would be unethical and unnecessary. Of course, I sometime talked to people while we were putting food into the fridge, but it happened naturally. I didn’t want to force it on people. Most of the people I talked to were students or people with very low income. But my thesis contains more a qualitative than a quantitative analysis”.

The focus of the thesis, ”An Action Research Project about Food Distribution” is on ”community building”, the role played by volunteer activities in creating an community in the local area which didn’t exist earlier.

”After corona, the authorities were worried about hygiene, they were worried that people touched the same items, and actually they would have preferred us to pack everything in plastic”, Irene Valentina di Lauro says. ”But the last time we had an audit with them, they were very happy”.

But their scepticism didn’t come from the corona scare. In Irene Valentina di Lauro’s understanding, they would have been sceptical anyway.

”Where you have foodstuffs, you have micro-organisms, which could in unlucky cases hurt some people. The people from the health authorities were just following the rules they had to administer. In any municipality you have to be very risk averse”, she explains.

Also read: Two years later, families in Kenya’s informal settlements are still food insecure and “Ollas Comunes” in Chile in times of the “new normal”

SUPPORT DDRN SCIENCE JOURNALISM. DONATE DKK 20 OR MORE(APPLICABLE IN DENMARK ONLY)

Live webinar: The impact of Covid-19 on food provision
Time: Thursday 18 November 2021,12:30 am (GMT+1)
Presenters: Verah Okeyo, Kenya; Marta Apablaza, Chile and Irene Valentina di Lauro, Denmark. Place: Online (Zoom), Register by e-mail: info@ddrn.dk

The volunteers are local housewifes and students, most of them immigrants from many different countries. Photo: Asger Roejle Christensen

Irene Valentina Di Lauro is active herself every day, picking up vegetables and other everyday foods from local supermarkets and delivering it to the open fridge. Photo: Asger Roejle Christensen

Report by Danish Red Cross (in Danish)

Two years later, families in Kenya’s informal settlements are still food insecure

Verah Okeyo — Mon, 15 Nov 2021 13:24:21 +0000

The scorching sun is unforgivingly baking the ground in Korogocho slums in Nairobi with the same intensity that pangs of hunger are hitting the bellies of Joyce Khamala and her three children. To this family, lack of food is a rodeo that they are used to riding, but not as brutally as it has been since the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world. The thirty-three-year-old mother of three says that she and her children have faced all the pain that COVID-19 could inflict on anyone: death, stigma and material need.

“My husband died of COVID-19, and he was the sole breadwinner,” said Joyce.

Apart from the lack that accompanied the death of the family’s sole provider, Joyce’s in-laws believe she bewitched her husband and cut all the support to her and her children.

She said: “We go for days without food and live by the grace of God and well-wishers.”

Joyce and her children are one of the families in Kenya’s informal settlements. According to the United Nations body concerned with human settlement and urban development, UN-Habitat, there are more than 500 slums in Kenya including the largest in the continent. The slums occupy only 5 per cent [PDF] of the total residential area in the capital city of Nairobi but house more than 4 million people, 65 per cent of the city’s population. Yet, despite the large population, people living in slums are historically marginalised in government economic and health policies. This omission exposed them to more severe consequences in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak.

The pandemic could not have come at a worse time. Kenya’s poor storage of its grains has led to losses due to contamination by Aflatoxin, toxic and deadly chemicals produced by a fungus called Aspergillus flavus. For instance, the country destroyed 13,992 [pdf] metric tonnes of aflatoxin-contaminated maize in 2014, a challenge that was reported in pockets of the country throughout 2019 to 2020. Additionally, the country recorded deficient agricultural produce due to protracted drought, floods and a locust invasion. Consequently, Kenya’s food inflation had risen between March and April 2020 to 12 per cent, hitting a three year high according to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS).

Joyce could not work her way out of this need. Like many women in the slums, she relies on casual labour such as washing clothes and cleaning homes for other homes. On a good day, she said, she earns about Sh200 (about US2$), barely enough money to buy a meal for her and the children. With the lockdowns and the fear of the pandemic, the homes that would provide her these opportunities shut their doors.

Before the pandemic, Joyce said that the cost of two kilogrammes of cornflour had already risen to Sh100 (approximately US1$). In May 2020, the cost of the same flour rose to Sh130 (nearly equivalent to US1.30$), a rise in prices with an instant negative effect. In July 2020, humanitarian organisation Kenya Red Cross and Concern Worldwide conducted a food security assessment[PDF] and found out that less than one per cent (0.9%) of the households were food secure. More than half (55%) were on the brink of starvation. Little has changed in August 2021 as the prices of food and nonalcoholic beverages continue to rise more than any other commodity in Kenya, according to KNBS. Expectedly, the lack of food has stopped many children, including Joyce’s, from going to school.

The pandemic exacerbated a chronic and acute shortage of food driven by, among many other factors, the government’s neglect of the people living in the informal settlements. In April 2020, the president announced tax relief to cushion the economy from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. But, in a move that shocked the public, members of parliament in Kenya voted to end the tax cuts in December 2020, hurting an already economically challenged population.

The challenge has continued, even throughout 2019 to 2020. The country recorded deficient agricultural produce due to protracted drought, floods and a locust invasion. Consequently, the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) reported that Kenya’s food inflation had risen between March and April 2020 to 12 per cent, hitting a three year high.

Like many women in the slums, Joyce relies on casual labour such as washing clothes manually and cleaning homes. On a good day, she said, she earns about Sh200 (about US2$), barely enough money to buy a meal for her and the children. Before the pandemic, Joyce said that the cost of two kilogrammes of cornflour had already risen to Sh100 (approximately US1$).

In May 2020, the cost of the same flour rose to Sh130 (nearly equivalent to US1.30$), a rise in prices with an instant negative effect. In July 2020, humanitarian organisations Kenya Red Cross and Concern Worldwide conducted a food security assessment[PDF] and found out that less than one per cent (0.9%) of the households were food secure. More than half (55%) were on the brink of starvation.

According to the national statistics, little has changed in August 2021 as the prices of food and nonalcoholic beverages continue to rise more than any other commodity in Kenya. Expectedly, the lack of food has stopped many children, including Joyce’s, from going to school.

More than a third of Kenyans –about 36.1 per cent, which is 17.1 million people – live below the international poverty line, a measure of extreme poverty defined as earning less than $1.90 a day, according to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics. The World Bank reported that as of 2015, one in every two Kenyans were living in multidimensional poverty, a measure that uses a weighted index of ten factors related to education, health, standards of living and education.

Citizens like Joyce fall in both categories of poverty and desperately need their governments. Therefore, it was a relief when Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta announced on May 23, 2020, that the government would run a national cash transfer program aimed at reaching 669,000 households that the most vulnerable citizens.

Charles Lukania, a community social worker in Korogocho, would identify the families who would receive KSh1,000 (about US9$) in 35 weekly stipends for eight months. Charles said that it was a hard choice to pick from people who have faced neglect.

Lukania said: “Slum residents, already grossly affected by chronic poverty, are highly vulnerable to different forms of shock, including those arising from political instability.”

Joyce and many families missed out on the cash transfer. Instead, politicians and government officials enrolled their friends and families, according to a damning report from Human Rights Watch (HRW).

“Some people committed suicide when they failed to provide for their families,” said social worker Lukania.

Amidst the gloom and dread, there are some organisations that provided cash transfers to cushion households from starvation during the pandemic successfully such as Action Against Hunger every month to families in arid and semi-arid counties in Kenya such as Isiolo.

Verah Okeyo is a global health journalist and communications specialists based in Kenya

Also read: The fresh food in this outdoor fridge is for everyone who need it and “Ollas Comunes” in Chile in times of the “new normal”

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Live webinar: The impact of Covid-19 on food provision

Time: Thursday 18 November 2021,12:30 am (GMT+1)
Presenters: Verah Okeyo, Kenya; Marta Apablaza, Chile and Irene Valentina di Lauro, Denmark.

Place: Online (Zoom), Register by e-mail: info@ddrn.dk

Joyce Kamala, a mother of three who lives in Korogocho slums in Nairobi, in her casual job. PHOTO / Anne Macharia

“Ollas Comunes” in Chile in times of the “new normal”

Marta Apablaza Riquelme — Sun, 14 Nov 2021 15:03:25 +0000

Due to the advance of COVID-19 – during 2020 – neighbors, friends and families from popular neighborhoods in Chile organized “common pots”, a form of popular organization where, through the delivery of homemade meals, food was assured to thousands of people impoverished and unemployed by the pandemic. In 2021, the “Ollas Comunes” or “Common pots” across the country face new challenges: to continue the project despite the low donations and the return to “normal” life of the members who contribute it. However, the “Common Pots”, after their extensive work, also reap some fruits: networks between organizations, links and regeneration of the social fabric, as well as future continuity projects.

When the month of September arrives, the hearts of Chileans feel lighter. The worst part of winter is behind us, the beginning of spring is approaching and with it “the national holidays” also appear. In other words, the days when citizens can celebrate are ahead of us.

The calendar marks Friday, September 17, and the sky in Santiago de Chile, the country’s capital, is blue. The air is fresh and the city has little traffic. Families gather to eat “empanadas de pino” and to drink “Earthquakes”, a traditional chilean drink. This is the first celebration of national holidays in which Chileans can celebrate with relative normalcy after the coronavirus crisis and the social outburst occurred in October 2019.

In the neighborhood of Santiago Centro, two types of architecture coexist, tall buildings built a few years ago where families, young people, adults, children, migrants lives next to old and small houses that are testimony of an ancient time where Santiago – was not a megalopolis – but a city where indigenous people, peasants and workers came to make a living (1960).

On the streets named “Coquimbo 321”, you will find the “El Progreso” Neighborhood Council of Santiago Centro. A community organization of a territorial nature, representative of the people who reside in the same neighborhood and whose purpose is to promote the development of the community, defend the interests and ensure the rights of the neighbors.

The clock marks 1:00 p.m. and inside this old house there are at least 40 people preparing the meal for the day. As it is a national holiday, the meal prepared for today is “Completos”, a bread with Viennese and onion and parsley that is eaten on days of celebrations. A man in his 50s passes by outside the venue and orders lunch. He receives two “completos”, a juice box and a piece of fruit. The atmosphere is chill and relaxed.

On a long tour

There is a song in Chile, called “En un Largo tour” composed by the band “Sol y Lluvia” – which was part of the cultural resistance against the Pinochet dictatorship whose lyrics sings: “At this hour, precisely at this hour, when your brain begins to turn off with the latest soap opera – I would like to take you out for a walk – On a long tour – Through Pudahuel and La Bandera – Through Pudahuel and through La Legua – And you would see life as it is ”.

The song alludes to the disconnection of some people with the social reality of Chile in times of dictatorship. The same emotion can be transferred to Chile and the social reality that arises after the mobility restrictions due to Covid have dropped. The quick drop of new coronavirus cases associated with the wide vaccination coverage of the population in the country, has resulted in optimism and a feeling of return to normality. However, there is a galloping increase in poverty and, therefore, in food insufficiency.

According to the report “The state of food security and nutrition in the world”, released in July 2020 by the United Nations, food insecurity in Chile reached 15.6 percent of the population before the pandemic and 3.8 percent (700 thousand people) suffer from severe food insecurity. This means that almost three million people in our country do not have regular access to sufficiently nutritious food.

The current health crisis has deepened this phenomenon. The COVID Social Survey of the Ministry of Social Development of July 2020 showed a worrying increase in this figure to 19.4 percent. This same study in November 2020 shows that 71 thousand households in Chile suffer from severe food insecurity. This topic seems to be invisible. This is why the “Olla Común” El Progreso Neighborhood Council delivers food every Thursday and Friday to more than 400 people.

Valeria Bustos, president of “Junta de Vecinos El Progreso”, leads a team of 40 people who organize a common pot every Friday and deliver food rations to homeless people. In April 2021, Valeria and her volunteers delivered food to nearly 200 people. “Due to the worsening of poverty there are now 400 servings. All monetary contributions are self-managed ”, she indicates.

This Friday, September 17: Adrian, Manuel, Nicolás and Roger embark on a three-hour journey to deliver two “completos”, a juice and a fruit to every homeless person they found in their route. They walk through the streets of Santiago Centro with a supermarket cart where they carry food rations. The beneficiaries of this ” Ruta Calles” live in squares, corners and parking lots. They are mostly middle-aged men but there are also women with children. “They are mostly people who do not have the means to support a place to sleep,” explains Roger, an English teacher, who has been a volunteer for the Junta de Vecinos “El Progreso” for a year.

As these young men deliver food to homeless people, the city and their citizens seem to be enjoying the national holidays. Every time a meal is shared, a kind word is delivered as well. A lot of homeless people experience deep loneliness and they don’t have a support system to rely on.

Pandemic and return to the “new normal”

“We are working very hard because the “Ollas Comunes” are not in the spotlight. With the return to the “new” normal in the chilean society after a drop in coronavirus cases, people tend to think that “Ollas Comunes” are not important anymore, but still people come and ask for food”, says Pablo Vasquez, one of the organizers and participants of the Olla Común Campamento “Che Guevara” de Lo Prado.

“The money contributions have dropped and we have had to look for new ways to get money or food donations”, indicates Pablo whose Olla Comun delivered 150 rations of food three times a week during 2020.

“Now we only deliver lunch twice a week,” he adds. The reasons for this new scenario – from his point of view – are two: People who participate in the “Common Pot” cannot go because we are returning to regular work and because money contributions have dropped”, states Pablo.

In the case of the Common Pot of the “Ex Camp Che Guevara de Lo Prado”. Manuel, Pablo’s brother and main cook at La Olla Común, cannot show up regularly because he has a new job. “I also went back to my face-to-face work,” he explains.

And he adds: “The other participants in La Olla, for example, are also in the same situation. For example, Norma went back to work in the mornings, which leaves less time for the Common Pot and the other participants show a natural fatigue due to the work they have done, ” he explains.

“We continue working in the” Common Pot “because we have a commitment not to leave the people and users of the Olla Común without lunch, but there is a lack of economic and human resources to continue,” he indicates.

A third difficulty that the “Common Pots” are facing is the rise in prices of basic inputs for food such as fruits and vegetables: “Gas was at 17 euros and now at 22 euros approximately in addition to a rise in prices like vegetables, fruit and meats. They have become more expensive. All these rises add up and cooking food becomes more and more expensive, “explains Pablo.

Ollas Comunes: A dynamic place to develop a support system

As of September 2021, there are still no official figures for the number of “Ollas Comunes” in Chile. There is only a projection of the same social organizations that keep a cadastre and map of the Common Pots in Chile. According to Paloma Ahumada, a sociologist who runs the @ComunOlla account on Twitter, there were 490 “pots” that deliver about 70,000 daily rations. This figure applies to March 2021 because as the year progressed, many common pots closed.

“Some closed because they had fewer users, but also because people’s donations decreased. There is an idea that we are back to the new normal and that the pandemic is over but it is not. People who do not see poverty in the face think that we are in a state of normality but the truth is that we are in a crisis that will take years to solve, “says Ahumada about the food insecurity that grows in the country.

The participants of the “Common Pots” are very aware of the challenges in terms of food insecurity that the country will face: “This 2021, there are less “Ollas Comunes” working for the neighbors. However, throughout this pandemic we have been able to generate a network of “Common Pots” throughout the country, which has allowed us to make visible and articulate ourselves in the work we do ”, Pablo affirms.

And he explains: “If we close the “Common Pot ”probably the person who visited us will not die of hunger but will continue to eat poorly. Therefore, we want, together with other common pots, to generate something that would serve to continue channeling this aid contribution, or to generate public policies related to that. We want to create a group that projects, ensures and works towards a better food quality and that has the greatest need “, she indicates.

And he ends on a positive note about the experience of the “Olla Comun Ex Campamento Che Guevara de Lo Prado Camp ”: “Due to the Olla Comun, we were able to built links and networks have been regenerated between neighbors who have manifested themselves in anniversary celebrations and of festivals such as “Children’s Day”, as well as national holidays “, he relates.

“From our experience, the “Common Pot” has become a channel for support activities between neighbors and children. It is a catalyst for activities between neighbors. Thanks to the activity of the Common Pot, links and a strengthening of the social fabric have been generated “, he concludes.

“If we can generate, from the point of view of public policies, early prevention interventions in mental health, we will have a tremendous impact on the health of the general population. In many countries, especially in Latin America, we need to invest in a public policy of mental health care at an early age and that it is maintained over time. Urgently”, he concludes.

Marta Apablaza Riquelme is a freelance science journalist based in Santiago, Chile

Also read: Two years later, families in Kenya’s informal settlements are still food insecure and The fresh food in this outdoor fridge is for everyone who need it

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Live webinar: The impact of Covid-19 on food provision

Time: Thursday 18 November 2021,12:30 am (GMT+1)
Presenters: Verah Okeyo, Kenya; Marta Apablaza, Chile and Irene Valentina di Lauro, Denmark.

Place: Online (Zoom), Register by e-mail: info@ddrn.dk

El resurgimiento de las “ollas comunes” en Chile: solidaridad en tiempos de pandemia

Marta Apablaza Riquelme — Wed, 07 Apr 2021 14:52:53 +0000

Durante 2020, debido al avance del COVID-19, personas de barrios populares de Chile han estado organizando “ollas comunes” como una forma de asegurar alimentación a su comunidad. Vecinos, amigos, familias del mismo barrio que sufren por el desempleo y la precariedad laboral debido a la pandemia, han fortalecido este sistema de distribución de alimentos para asegurar una comida diaria a miles de familias en todo el país.

Chile es un país de contrastes. Cuando una persona cruza la cordillera de Los Andes, puede ver las magníficas montañas nevadas, impasibles con su nieve imperecedera. También puede ver a lo lejos el hermoso y azul océano pacifico. Asimismo, el viajero puede ser testigo de la implacable soledad del desierto más árido del mundo y también sentir la frescura del aire de los prístinos bosques del sur del país. La magnífica belleza de la naturaleza de Chile contrasta con la persistente desigualdad económica y social que hizo que el país entrara en una crisis política cuyas postales recorrieran el mundo. Esto ocurrió en octubre de 2019.

Luego vino la pandemia…Por lo que a la crisis política y social que Chile estaba atravesando se sumó la crisis sanitaria provocada por el avance del COVID-19 en el mundo. En Chile, la pandemia profundizó las grietas provocadas por la desigualdad económica pues las cuarentenas, la enfermedad y la cesantía provocó que miles de personas no pudieran cubrir sus propias necesidades alimenticias ni las de su familia.

La Olla Común Che Guevara de Lo Prado

El reloj marca las 10:30 del miércoles 17 de marzo de 2021 en Santiago de Chile. En una pequeña casa de madera de la comuna de Lo Prado, se enciende el fuego para calentar las cacerolas. El menú que la Olla Común “Ex Campamento Che Guevara de Lo Prado” prepara para el día de hoy es el tradicional plato chileno llamado “Carbonada”. Este plato es un guiso que lleva zanahoria, papa, arroz, zapallo y carne.

Al ruido de los utensilios de cocina se suma las risas de los cocineros. El equipo de la Olla Común Che Guevara de Lo Prado está compuesto por cinco personas cuyos rangos de edad varían entre los 80 y 30 años. Gladys, Adela, Patricia, Manuel y Pablo dedican tiempo, esfuerzo y cariño para alimentar a sus vecinos desde mayo de 2020. El invierno de América del Sur pegó con fuerza a muchos de los habitantes de Chile quienes de un día para otro se vieron sin trabajo y sin poder alimentarse.

Para preparar “Carbonada” se necesitó aproximadamente 25 kilos de papas, 1 zapallo entero más tres kilos de cebolla aproximadamente. La preparación del plato comenzó el día anterior cuando entre Gladys, Adela, Patricia, Manuel y Pablo decidieron el menú del día siguiente basado en los alimentos que tienen a disposición. En este caso se decidió cocinar “Carbonada” y se comenzó a pelar y picar papas para cocinar y hervir al día siguiente.

Manuel, es un joven cocinero que se crió en estos barrios de Lo Prado y decidió junto a su hermano aportar con sus conocimientos de cocina y ayudar a sus vecinos. Él es quien dirige la cocina, mientras que Pablo lidera la organización y logística de la olla común. Pablo es quien recibe los aportes en dinero, alimentos, mascarillas y se organiza con otras “Ollas Comunes”. Gladys, Adela y Patricia son vecinas de Lo Prado que decidieron aportar con su tiempo y trabajo a la “Olla Común”.

El reloj marca las 13:00 y una mujer se asoma con una bolsa a la pequeña casa de madera donde están los cocineros. Pide dos raciones. Luego, viene un niño y pide cinco. Minutos después llega un hombre de mediana edad y pide 16 raciones. Las raciones las entrega Adela, la cuenta de los platos entregados las anota Gladys en un pequeño cuaderno. Patricia va emplatando la comida. Los vecinos se acercan con mascarilla. Los casos de COVID-19 en Santiago y el país están aumentando. Sin embargo, siempre está el saludo cordial y el cariño.

El reloj marca las 15:00 horas y finaliza la entrega de alimentos por el día de hoy. Gladys sumó 122 raciones. “Van aumentando a medida que las medidas de confinamiento se van endureciendo”, sostiene.

Una forma de organización social ante el abandono del Estado

No existen cifras oficiales del número de “Ollas Comunes” en Chile o de raciones entregadas diariamente. Solo existe una proyección de las mismas organizaciones sociales que llevan un catastro y mapa de las Ollas Comunes en Chile. Según Paloma Ahumada, socióloga quien lleva la cuenta @ComunOlla en Twitter actualmente existen 490 “ollas” que entregan cerca de 70.000 de raciones diarias.

“La alimentación es un derecho humano. En Chile, particularmente, este derecho se ha visto complicado por la cesantía pero también por el abandono del gobierno. Lo que la gente ha hecho es recurrir a la herramienta histórica que significa la “Olla Común” que surgió en las grandes huelgas obreras de principios de siglo XX para poder satisfacer sus necesidades alimenticias”, sostiene María Emilia Tijoux, socióloga, académica de la Universidad de Chile y mujer que colabora en la organización de las ollas comunes.

En este sentido, Tijoux define la “Olla Común” como una herramienta de organización popular política: “Antes de la pandemia, durante la rebelión de octubre de 2019 ya se estaban organizando “Ollas comunes” pero hay que decir que siempre han estado siempre presente. En terremotos, otros desastres naturales, cuando ha habido crisis económica. Una característica de la “Olla Común” es que surge rápidamente, de un momento a otro y para reunirse en torno a las necesidades alimenticias de los vecinos”.

Autogestión e Internet

Como toda herramienta de organización social y política del Siglo XXI, la “Olla Común” también tiene una presencia online. Las “Ollas Comunes” utilizan las redes sociales como Twitter, Instagram y Facebook para difundir sus noticias y coordinarse entre ellas.

Paloma Ahumada, socióloga quien lleva la cuenta @ComunOlla en Twitter, sostiene que durante 2020 y 2021, internet es fundamental para la organización de las ollas comunes principalmente para la gestión de recursos y alimentos además de la comunicación entre “ollas”.

Y explica: “Si a una “Olla Común” le sobra un alimento, por ejemplo porotos y a otra le faltan, se realiza un intercambio. Durante los últimos meses y debido a la crisis política que vive Chile, las redes sociales también son medio de protección para los vecinos ante la represión policial”, sostiene Ahumada.

Es importante mencionar, que Chile vive una crisis donde agentes del estado como la policia ha sido acusada de violar sistematicamente los derechos humanos de los ciudadanos chilenos. Durante las últimas semanas existen denuncias y videos de violencia policial hacia el “Comedor Popular Luisa Toledo”.

COVID-19, Ollas Comunes y personas en situación de calle

Valeria Bustos, presidenta de “La Junta de Vecinos y Vecinas del El Progreso y del Comité de Vivienda por un Santiago Multicolor”, lidera un equipo de 40 personas que todos los viernes, organiza una olla común y entrega raciones de comida a personas en situación de calle. “Somos 40 personas que trabajamos en base a la solidaridad y tratamos de ayudar principalmente a la comunidad migrante, madres solteras y adultos mayores”, detalla.

Actualmente, el equipo que lidera Valeria entrega raciones de comida a casi 200 personas. El recrudecimiento de la pandemia y la imposibilidad de salir a trabajar debido a las cuarentenas, hizo que aquellas personas que tenían un trabajo precario vieran agravada su situación económica. Muchos terminaron en la calle.

“Recuerdo que cuando partió la pandemia mi primera reacción como persona, mama y enferma crónica fue de miedo. La primera medida que tomamos fue cerrar nuestra sede y suspender las actividades. Sin embargo pasaban los días y nos dimos cuenta que había necesidad de nuestros vecinos y que pese al miedo teníamos que salir a la calle con distancia y medidas de autocuidado”, relata.

Y aun cuando el equipo de la “Ruta Calle” ha sufrido en carne los efectos del COVID-19, ellos siguen trabajando solidariamente.

“Tenemos una compañera que tuvo COVID-19 y está enfrentando las consecuencias de una enfermedad grave. Este mes, seis personas de nuestro equipo se contagiaron, lo cual evidencia que el virus está cerca. Nuestra comuna es una de las comunas con más contagio activo y lamentablemente eso va de la mano con la pobreza también. Por lo que nuestra actitud es: sabemos que estamos en riesgo pero tenemos que seguir ayudando”.

Según Tijoux, durante la pandemia – y debido a lo largo de la crisis- la organización de la “Olla Común” se ha fortalecido y permanecido. “Hay un interés de participar. Todos los días las personas se juntan y sacrifican. Hay personas anónimas, dentro de Chile y fuera del país que han enviado sus aportes según sus posibilidades . Existe una organización entre todas las ollas y se preocupan las unas de las otras”, explica.

Y agrega: “Es una organización colectiva de mucha porfía y que se despliega en los peores tiempos. Pero donde además no se actúa de la caridad de la religión o del clientelismo político”.

Con todo, todas las personas que participaron en esta historia sostienen que las ollas comunes no deberían existir. “Existe una romantización de lo que es una olla común y la solidaridad, pero nunca debiera tener que existir este tipo de solidaridad ni ayuda. No debería NUNCA faltarle un plato de comida a nadie. Las organizaciones sociales y principalmente las populares como la nuestra o la gran mayoría somos autogestionadas. En el fondo somos gente pobre ayudando a otros pobres. Eso refleja un sistema político y económico pésimo. No debería ser así pues somos un país con tanta riqueza” finaliza Bustos.

Marta Apablaza Riquelme is a freelance science journalist based in Santiago, Chile

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Every Friday, the “Junta de Vecinos y Vecinas El Progreso” of Santiago Centro, Chile conducts a route to deliver a ration of food to about 200 people who live on the street. The team is made up of 40 people. Many of the volunteers have been infected with COVID-19, yet they are determined to help. The Junta de Vecinos y Vecinas “El Progreso” of Santiago Centro works mainly with the migrant community, single mothers and the elders in the city of Santiago.

Photo: Valeria Bustos

Photo: Marta Apablaza Riquelme

Photo: Valeria Bustos

The Common Pot “ Ex Campamento Che Guevara de Lo Prado” has delivered food rations to their neighbors since May 2020. Every Wednesday and Friday, they serve almost 200 meals. Five people work in the organization of the “Common Pot”. Three women (Gladys, Adela and Patricia) and two men (Manuel and Pablo). The commune of Lo Prado in Chile is one of the poorest in Santiago, capital City of Chile.

Photo: Marta Apablaze Riquelme

Check webinar program 26.april 2021, 4.00-5.30pm