Everyone is hungry, and not just the villagers who don’t have jobs. Even those who do have jobs have no food. Here are the reasons this is known as the Hungry Season as best I can surmise:
1. Lack of maize (their staple): The new crop of Maize is not ready to harvest and the old crop of maize is nearly gone, so their own crops are not producing and prices are too high to buy maize at the local market.
2. Lack of piecework (for money): Because most crops are not ready for harvest and there is too much rain, most villagers cannot find any farming piecework (called ganyu). Ganyu is how most of the villagers here earn a living. It’s a job you find for a day if you are lucky. The cash you earn (usually $1 - $2 per day) is used to buy food for that day. Once that day is done, you wake up the next morning and see if you are lucky enough to find another piece of work.
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The maize is still young during the Hungry Season months, as you can
tell here with the maize we are growing at Hope Village |
And, this year, again, is one of the worst. The inflation that hit Malawi means the villagers not only go hungry, but also have no money to pay school fees, or enjoy the luxuries of bathing soap, clothes washing soap, or oil for cooking their food.
It is so sad to hear that a hunger season even exists. Thank you for sharing this information, it is heartbreaking.
ReplyDeleteYes, so heartbreaking! Thank you for reading Patrice.
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