Seath Kaphunga
The warning spread across the nation like sheets of rain in a typhone. The Integrated Food Security survey warned that between October 2022 and March 2023 an estimated 3.8 million, or 20% of the entire nation would face acute shortages of food. There was no place to hide, no place to go, no way to prepare. It was too big, too widespread, too all encompassing. Now it is here!
Food prices have skyrocketed, orphans and the elderly are suffering the most.
Action for Progress (AfP) made every effort to prepare. With the help of the Malawi Project and the Orphan Grain Train in the U.S. food was shipped in and stored in the AfP warehouse in Lilongwe.
A bag of maize has now shot up to three times the previous year’s price. Hunger is widespread in 21 of Malawi’s 28 districts.
Recently when AfP made a move to distribute food in the Lilongwe District people were assembling while it was still night.
Seath Kaphunga traveled a long distance to reach the distribution center near the west edge of the city. She said the last meal she had was with pumpkin leaves. Her face reflected her weakness and hunger.
Her granddaughter stood in line to receive the food on behalf of her grandmother. Standing for a long period of time was just too much. Seath would have food on this night. Others were served as well, but as the AfP team concluded their work it was impossible not to see the people begging for food even after the supply was exhausted. There was just not enough food to go around.