More Children are going Hungry in South Africa – Research

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South Africa’s largest household study conducted by the National Income Dynamics Coronavirus Rapid Mobile survey have concluded that too many Children and Adult are going hungry in South Africa especially during the Covid-19 lock down.

The National Income Dynamics Coronavirus Rapid Mobile survey which was launched on Wednesday to understudy the impact of Covid-19 in South Africa’s household discovered that 47% of South African ran out of Money for food during the Covid-19 lock down, thus forcing many children and adult into a tight economic crisis.

The Survey recorded the impact of Covid-19 in South African families which according to them have caused serious issue of food poverty in many South Africans household.

Available data from the National Income Dynamics Coronavirus Rapid Mobile survey indicates that:

  • Of the household surveyed, 21% disclosed that someone went hungry in their household during last seven days in April
  • 15% disclosed that they had a child who went hungry in the last seven days
  • 13% reported frequent hunger
  • 7% disclosed that their household went hungry almost every day or every day in the last seven days.
  • 4% reported a child going hungry almost every day or every day.

The team found out that of all the household which experienced hunger, 42% of adults managed to shield the children from hunger.

“This ‘shielding’ ability declines with the extent of household hunger. Where adults experienced hunger for four days or less in the last seven days, about half of respondents indicated that a child did not go hungry in the household” The Study noted.

“It would seem that in times of acute crisis like the Covid-19 pandemic, many households have managed to protect or ‘shield’ the children in the household from that hunger.

“This protective capacity of households has its limits however; where hunger becomes too pervasive, households seem unable to keep protecting children.” The study added.

The Study noted that Pandemic-induced job losses was a major threat to livelihoods of a large proportion of grant-receiving South African households

“Pandemic-induced job losses present a major threat to the livelihoods of a large proportion of grant-receiving households precisely because earnings have been an important source of income for most grant-receiving households”


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