By Nic JJ Olivier and Sheryl L Hendriks For millions of poor households across Africa affected by lockdowns, the threat of contracting Covid-19 may be more distant than the very real fear of hunger. Many are indefinitely trapped in cramped homes with multiple household members, wondering...
Stephen Greenberg The Covid-19 crisis has exposed the stark inequalities that persist in our society. Vast disparities in access to healthcare, food, shelter, personal safety, water, transport and communications have been laid bare. Aside from imposing a lockdown, the government has been in disarray in responding to...
Riaan Grobler Unemployment and the subsequent loss of income remain key concerns for South Africans and have a direct impact on food security, research by Ask Afrika has shown. It found that food security at a household level is low, and that one in three adults went to bed...
Event details Date: 27 May 2020Time: 15:00 to 16:30Venue: Online via Zoom, registration requiredAttend event via webcast The distribution of food parcels quickly led to conflict in several communities across South Africa. How sustainable is the provision of food directly to those who need it, and can it be done fairly? Do food parcels...
In South Africa a range of social solidarity networks have emerged to respond to the COVID-19 hunger crisis. They are a vital part of the societal response because of their speed, innovation, and local responsiveness. They complement the central role of government. Yet the government is...
PMBEJD |Pietermaritzburg | 8 April 2020 Observations from the supermarket floor, the waiting lines, the street, the spaza shop, the taxi, the home, the kitchen, the plate and the stomach. The attached paper is based on observations and conversations with women in Pietermaritzburg from 19th March to 7th April...
PMBEJD Research Report 28 April 2020 On Thursday 23rd April 2020 we collected food prices in Pietermaritzburg supermarkets which target the low-income market. We present these price increases from before the lockdown to this date (2 March 2020 to 23 April 2020). Last week we started...
Questions are circling about the mobilisation of 73,000 additional South African National Defence Force personnel, and whether this suggests an intensified militarisation of the lockdown. This would bode badly for community-based efforts to resolve the food crisis and signal that the state has abandoned its...
Stuart Gillespie Senior Research Fellow, The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) Malnutrition is by far the biggest driver of ill-health and premature mortality in every region of the world. A slow-burn attritional problem, it does enormous damage. The COVID-19 epidemic that’s sweeping the world, meanwhile, brings a series of...
Children go without school lunch and families eke out the last of their supplies As the government grapples with finalising a plan to feed a growing number of desperately hungry people amid the Covid-19 national lockdown, shelters say they are seeing starving people who have not...