Children, the most vulnerable group today

In a community survey conducted by a TV station over the weekend, a girl of about five years old, was heard saying that she has been served with an egg by her mother only on the day her father brings home his salary. This heart-wrenching statement by one of the children of our country is no doubt genuine and it reflects the pathetic situation being experienced by millions of people in the country, against the backdrop of the severe economic crisis that has engulfed the country.

United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) said on Friday that staple foods have become so unaffordable in crisis-hit Sri Lanka that severe malnutrition is among the highest in the region and it is the poorest, most vulnerable children who are paying the steepest price.

It must be recalled that the UN stated in June that Sri Lanka has the second-highest rate of acute malnutrition among children under five years of age in South Asia. Now, after two months, it says malnutrition in the country is the highest in the region. 

The reason is obvious. UNICEF Regional Director for South Asia, George Laryea-Adjei said in a statement on Friday, “Families are skipping regular meals as staple foods become unaffordable. Children are going to bed hungry, not sure of where their next meal would come from.” President Ranil Wickremesinghe told Parliament in June, as the then Prime Minister, that a recent study by the World Food Programme (WFP) had found that 73% of participating households had reduced their diet and food intake. That was in June. In the same month, the UN said that at least 17% of children in Sri Lanka are suffering from ‘chronic wasting’, a highly contagious disease that carries the highest risk of death. One has to imagine the situation now, after two months.

This is not the result of a natural disaster, but that of a man-made crisis. The International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva had told NDTV in May that the economic crisis in Sri Lanka is a result of mismanagement. In a recent interview, former President Mahinda Rajapaksa also had acknowledged that all past governments and leaders including him should have been held responsible for the current economic downturn. That apart, some of the actions taken by the Gotabaya Rajapaksa government, including the prohibition of importing chemical fertilizer and not seeking help from the IMF in time accelerated the crisis, creating a spiraling effect in it. 

According to a recent story published in the Daily Mirror, Professor Buddhi Marambe of the Agriculture Faculty of the Peradeniya University, the country has suffered a crop reduction by nearly 50% in the last Maha Season compared with the previous year, due to lack of fertilizer and other agro-chemicals for cultivation. He had predicted that harvest of the present Yala Season is also bound to fail by a similar percentage. When the Opposition parties and the experts pointed out the impending food insecurity due to the shortage of fertilizer, the then Agriculture Minister Mahindananada Aluthgamage denied it.

 
Now, the UNICEF states that mass food insecurity will only promote further malnutrition, poverty, disease and death in the region. As Laryea-Adjei said in his statement “We cannot let children pay the price for the crises which have not been made by them. We must act today to secure their future tomorrow.” He further says “children need to be placed squarely at the heart of the solution as the country works to resolve the crisis.”

The country doesn’t have options other than the programme involving the IMF which has taken into consideration the vulnerable segment of the society when implementing its bailout programme for Sri Lanka. In almost every recent IMF statement the need to protect the poor and vulnerable sections of the society has been stressed. However, the whole process seems to be in the hands of the Sri Lanka’s creditors, especially China. How soon the country is going to be benefitted from the IMF programme depends on the “adequate assurances by Sri Lanka’s creditors that debt sustainability will be restored.” 

Meanwhile, during a virtual conference organized by the Department of Business Economics of University of Sri Jayewardenepura last week, experts opined that after the staff-level agreement with the IMF, the full approval for the envisaged IMF Extended Fund Facility (EFF) arrangement could take about six months, considering the challenges in the negotiations process with the country’s creditors, particularly China. 

So, it would be a very long wait for our children who have already faced with a horrible situation. How many of them have the ability to skip their regular meals and go to bed hungry that long?