The immediate impacts of the COVID-19 public health crisis and the lockdown imposed from 27 March 2020 revealed the deep fragility of the South African food system. This disruption has clearly led to a period of deep uncertainty and change, but has also created an...
What will it take to transform the food system? Lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic. Join us on Friday 16 October 11:00-12:00 as we explore what thoughts, actions and capacities are required in order to build a more equitable food system....
In a Jacana ‘Don’t Shut Up’ conversation with Maverick Citizen editor Mark Heywood, author Tracy Ledger explains the direct link between malnutrition and a propensity for violence. From abused farmworkers to a lack of coordination at all levels of government, the food system not only...
In South Africa, more than nine million children live in food-insecure households, and according to findings of a local survey, South Africans count the fear of food shortages and loss of income a close second to the fear of contracting the coronavirus. "The novel coronavirus...
By Lelona Mxesibe - 27 August 2020 The Covid-19 pandemic has thrown the spotlight on the importance of the informal economy as a means of survival for South Africa’s 2.9 million citizens without access to formal employment – as well as their resulting vulnerability. This is another...
Through the past 5 months, Food Flow have spent over R1.6 Million in purchases from small scale farmers, fishers and producers supporting more than 400 livelihoods all while getting food into more than 30 communities in 3 provinces. The organisation's Impact Report tells the story of...
Obesity increases the risk of dying of Covid-19 by nearly 50% and may make vaccines against the disease less effective, according to a comprehensive study using global data. The findings, which the lead researcher described as “scary”, show that the risks for people with obesity are greater...
Yesterday (19 August 2020) the Food Lab together with Community Chest co-hosted a webinar considering the link between human and planetary health. Marcelle Mentor (from Columbia University) highlighted the critical importance of education when it comes to nutrition and noted that food insecurity is not...
Almost 150 days into a national lockdown, what we feared would happen has happened. The recently released National Income Dynamics Study (NIDS) Coronavirus Rapid Mobile (Cram) survey has found that South Africans, and worse, children, are hungry, hungrier than they have been in years. This persistent hunger is likely to...
Register now for our upcoming webinar hosted in partnership with Community Chest. ...
Ihsaan Bassier, Refiloe Joala and Thando Vilakazi COVID-19 has wrought havoc on poor households in countries across the world. In South Africa, more and more people are facing hunger resulting from mass job losses and small, poorly implemented supplementary cash grants. On top of this the pandemic has put...
Nutrition is fundamental to health and wellbeing and as such dietitians remain committed to serve and protect the nutrition agenda of South Africa. Be honest. If you think about dietitians, you think about salads and weight-loss, right? It’s okay, we don’t blame you. Dietitians do want...
COVID-19 has shown how damaging ill-health can be for the economy. But it has also shown how measures that benefit health (lockdowns) can be seen as bad economic prosperity. A similar paradox is at the heart of promoting better diets. Poor diet is the world’s leading cause...
COVID-19 has revealed the deep fragility of the African food system and brought to the fore prevailing systemic injustices. Some indications suggest that as many as 34% of people in South Africa have gone to bed hungry during the lockdown. In Ghana disrupted food supply chains...
Dr Chantell Witten is currently based at the University of the Free State, Faculty of Health Sciences in the division for Health Professions Education. She is a dietitian by profession and training focusing specifically on infant and young child nutrition. She completed her PHD at the...
It’s impossible to know how many people are now receiving food aid of some form in South Africa. Between countless soup kitchens, the innumerable NGOs, churches and community action networks providing food parcels along with government’s late-to-the-game food parcels, millions upon millions of hungry people...
“Many revolutions have been started not because of philosophies, but because of hunger. In Zulu we say that hunger makes people angry. It is easy to whip people into action when they are hungry.” This stark warning about the potential impact that the Covid-19 pandemic could...
A female farmer from Khayelitsha made headlines recently after advertising her fresh spinach on social media. by Erene Oberholzer A 27-year-old female farmer from Khayelitsha in Cape Town recently went viral in South Africa after wanting to ‘feed the nation one spinach at a time’. Yes, Ncumisa Mkabile went...
The Covid-19 lockdown is taking a potentially deadly toll on children, with reported child hunger on the rise and unemployment at a high. Spotlight takes an in-depth look at what this means for young children and asks the experts about potential solutions. In February, Spotlight visited...
A top level report to the Western Cape government paints a stark picture of the lockdown food crisis in some communities.One community reports: "Families are starving, struggling and urgently waiting for food hampers. The situation is very bad." Another says "hunger is going to dramatically increase...