That’s the ratio of people living below the national poverty line of R992 per month in South Africa. That’s 30-million people.
I knew that it was bad. But that number hit me between the eyes again.
These are the homeless and the unemployed. It excludes our domestic Mercy who worked 6 days a week at the local coffeeshop and fed 5 family members on R1 500 per month, which was what she had left over after paying the rent. It excludes people with proper jobs in the formal economy where the minimum monthly wage is now R3 500.
We can blame the government. We can emigrate. But it doesn’t take away from the fact that 30-million people go to bed hungry every day in South Africa, and most people go hungry for some part of the month.
We can never get away from that fact.
Unless we do something about it.