R3k can feed 121 children nutritious food for a day

There is not much you can do with R3 000 if you usually spend R30 000 on a handbag overseas.

However, it only costs R24.79 per day to provide nutritious food for a child for a day. Yes, Ms Gigabyte, you can feed 121 children nutritious food for a day with that R3 000. And 1 210 children per day with that R30 000 you would pay for another handbag.

According to the Pietermaritzburg Economic Justice and Dignity group, the average cost to feed a child a basic nutritious diet cost R743.90 in May 2021, while the Child Support Grant is only R460, 21% below the food poverty line of R585 per capita.

The R460 grant will only last for 18 days. Although this will not mean that children will eat nothing for the rest of the month, it shows that child nutrition is compromised from day one.

Research has proven over and over again that children who do not eat nutritious food to help their development battle to cope at school. Most of them don’t even complete school and drop out toperform low-paid jobs that pay little, starting a new loop of hunger and underdevelopment of children.

It serves little purpose to put plasters on the problem when institutions want to empower underfed children later in life. They will not reach their full potential because their growthwas stunted due to lack of nutritious food. In short: they will forever stay behind.

Evidence shows that children are suffering from hunger andunder-nutrition. The historical stunting levels indicate that the growth of approximately 30% of boy children and 25% of girl children under the age of five years is stunted.

This is not a problem that can be hidden. Government under-spending on children has long-term consequences for our education, health, social and economic outcomes, the group says.

Under-spending on children’s care and nutrition means that any investment in education will not be effective because hungry children struggle to learn. Malnourished children also get sick more often, more severely and for longer, putting more pressure on public healthcare.

Hungry children develop more slowly and never develop to the full potential they would have had if they had proper food to eat. Our country needs critical thinkers who are productive and skilled. Our children cannot eat the handbags.

But they all know the taste of the weeds that grow where they live.