The undernourishment in the Dominican Republic it went from 8.3% in 2020 to 4.6% in 2023, freeing almost 500,000 families from hunger, according to the latest data offered by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
Based on these encouraging data, President Luis Abinader declared that Dominican Republic would reach the goal of “Zero Hunger” in 2028.
It is known as undernourishment the condition in which the habitual consumption of food of an individual is insufficient to lead a normal, active and healthy life. From 2004 to 2006, a total of 1.8 million Dominicans fell into this group of people.
This is equivalent to 124 stadiums Quisqueya full of undernourished people. However, the data has improved. In the period from 2021 to 2023, the figure dropped to 500,000 undernourished people, according to data from the FAO.
“You have to wait for God to send something”
Carlitas de la Rosa lives in La Ciénaga, near the Ozama River. The streets in his neighborhood are not paved. When it rains, everything floods. In that place, just 20 minutes from the tall buildings of the capitalthere are hundreds of people with empty refrigerators. They fill their stomachs when the opportunity arises.
“Things are tough here, there is almost no food. We have to wait for God send something to be able to eat, because food is very expensive,” de la Rosa tells Free Diary.
De la Rosa shows us his house, which consists of two small rooms, there is barely any light. His refrigerator is sadly empty. There are some eggs, some containers and little else. For them, eating is a privilege.
To get a bag of food, he gets up early to fill a bag with plastic bottles, fills it, pay 50 pesos to cross the Ozama and receives his reward.
Access to healthy food
For Dominicans, being well fed means having access to a healthy diet. In many cases, this is not always possible. Over the years, the price of a healthy diet per day has been increasing.
In a timeline that spans from 2017 to 2022, the FAO collected the prices in dollars of a healthy diet per day.
In 2017, eating healthy meant spending $3.3 per day on Dominican Republic. This is equivalent to $99 per month. In Dominican currency: 5953.53 pesos (taking into account the current value).
This price increased progressively over the years to the point that in 2022, the price of a healthy diet It stood at 4.3 dollars a day. That is, 129 dollars per month, which is equivalent to 7,757.63 Dominican pesos. Practically half of the minimum wage.
“They are destroying the poor”
Juanita is dedicated to taking care of children in La Ciénaga. She also has an empty refrigerator just a few weeks before Christmas. “I eat whatever there is. If I can eat in the morning… Life is very hard. That’s how all of us Dominicans are, we eat what we can,” he says.
A neighbor passing by shouts: “But if the beef is like 300 pesos!” She listens to him and answers: “Well, I buy 200 pesos and each one eats a little bang, because there is nothing more.”
As for the cost of food, which increases year after year while the poor remain poorexpresses: “Prices are up there, through the roof, they are destroying the poor.”
The prices of the food for one healthy diet They have risen year after year. Due to this, almost 25% of the dominican population couldn’t afford one healthy diet in 2022.
This problem leads crawling for years. Although the number of undernourished people decreases, many Dominicans are still unable to access a healthy diet that gives them quality of life.
In 2017 they were 2.9 million people, Therefore, the figure has stagnated at figures that are around 25% of the population.
“You don’t have to eat three times a day!”
Belky Cecilia lives in another of the humble houses in La Ciénaga. The walls of his house are concrete, but they are cracked and the paint is peeling off. “We eat only once“I cook enough,” he explains.
Next to her is her husband, who has an eye condition. “You don’t have to eat three times a day!” Belky says with a laugh, as if eating three times were stupid or something out of the ordinary. “Sometimes I make breakfast, a coffee and we sustain ourselves with that,” he concludes.
