Economic Hardship a 'Silent Tsunami' Slamming Relief Organizations

In America, the economic downturn and spiked gas prices have forced some people to give up a vacation. Rising food costs have slimmed down family wallets, and the line at Starbucks is shorter. The consequences so far are distasteful, but not disastrous on a wide scale.

In Haiti, the economic downturn has more dire consequences. As food costs skyrocket, the increased appearance of “clay cookies” – clay mixed with oil, butter and salt to make it more pleasant to eat – highlights the hunger among the very poor.

“It’s not another dollar on top of every gallon they use in their cars,” said Mark Bush, chief operating officer of CURE International, a nonprofit dedicated to helping physically deformed children in developing countries. “It comes down to the fact of, ‘Can I actually feed everybody in my family today?’”

Relief organizations have seen the price of staples such as rice and maize jump to two or even three times their cost last year, slamming developing countries in an unending wave – like a tsunami. 

Measuring the Wave

“This is not a disaster such as an earthquake or a typhoon or a hurricane, where it comes, it’s devastating… then it’s gone and people can start moving in on the relief perspective pretty quickly,” said Mark Hanlon of Compassion International, which focuses on child development in impoverished countries. “This is a different kind of disaster. It’s ongoing. It’s daily… That’s why they call it the ‘silent tsunami.’”

Americans spend about 10 percent to 15 percent of their income on food, according to Hanlon, making food spikes comparatively easy to absorb. In many countries where Compassion operates, the cost of food already consumes 50 percent to 70 percent of a family’s income. “Sometimes now, with those costs going up, it’s even greater than 70 percent,” Hanlon said.

According to the World Food Program, an estimated 820 million people experience hunger on a daily basis. About one-sixth of the world’s population lives on less than a dollar a day. And decreased purchase power could push an additional 100 million people into deeper poverty, according to World Bank.

And the numbers continue to grow. The World Food Programme indicated July 22 that multiple African countries – including Somalia, Ethiopia, Djibouti, Kenya and Uganda – face imminent food shortages that will affect 15 million people. North Korea faces its greatest food crisis in a decade.

All those figures and alerts mean huge challenges ahead for relief organizations such as Compassion and CURE – challenges to not only do more, but to do more with less.

Robert Zachritz of World Vision, a Christian relief and child development organization, notes that while child sponsorship and donations are still increasing for World Vision, the cost of food outstrips growth in giving in many countries.

“[O]n the books, it might say revenue is going up, but because the expenses to buy 'x' amount of things have gone up, there's a lost potential,” Zachritz said.

Overall, even Christians are reducing their charitable giving. A study of 1,000 Christian adults nationwide by Dunham and Company showed that 46 percent of the Christian adults indicated that they have reduced their giving to charity.

Taking the Brunt of the Crisis

“I think it’s fair to say that it is a crisis in the Third World, where so little of the day to day income is available to do other things, so that when suddenly being fed suddenly costs three times as much,” Bush said.

In the Western Hemisphere, the silent tsunami wreaks the most devastation in Haiti and Nicaragua. In Haiti, more than half the country lives on less than a dollar a day and spend more than half their income on food. This makes the price of rice – which has doubled since December – especially hard for families to swallow.

In other countries such as Malawi in Africa, a jump in the cost of maize affected CURE’s employees along with the rest of the country. And while CURE focuses on helping children through medical procedures, mealtimes while children are at the hospital provide an avenue to sharing the Gospel. The increased cost of meals as well as fuel has forced many CURE hospitals to cut back on the number of yearly field clinics they make into areas beyond the reach of the hospitals.

Although the extent of the crisis varies from country to country, one group of people always takes the hardest hit.

“The people hurt the most is young children,” Zachritz said. “If a child gets stunted, that stunting is with them for the rest of their lives.”

The ripple effect continues from the child outward into the community, as families feel the pain of not being able to provide for their youngest members. On the flip side, sponsored children try to provide for themselves and their families by sharing food kits and sneaking food into their pockets to take home from sponsored group meals, Hanlon said.

“We are expanding program to family from food standpoint until some of this normalizes,” Hanlon said. “The question is, what is normal.”

Building the Life Raft

Hanlon compared the global food crisis to the 2004 Christmas tsunami, which killed more than 225,000 people and left many more homeless and injured. Compassion raised less than $4 million specifically for the disaster and then asked donors to stop giving because the organization had sufficient resources.

Now, Compassion is looking to raise $10 to $15 million in the next six to nine months specifically to help relieve the global food crisis. “It’s biggest single campaign or movement towards a disaster or crisis that we’ve ever done,” Hanlon said.

In Malawi, one CURE donor offered to cover any rise in the cost of maize and rice for the next six months for employees, so employees don’t feel sharp increases. Ninety-eight percent of CURE’s employees are native to the country in which they work.

“We want to make sure our employees continue to have the ability to feed their families, so when they come into work they can focus on the work-issues… That’s one less thing that our employees have to worry about,” Bush said.

Governments, too, are stepping in with funds. World Vision is partnering with MercyCorp to distribute 100,000 metric tons of food to more than half a million people in North Korea over the next year, all funded by the United States.

In addition to the Korea aid, Congress passed a supplemental aid bill bumping up emergency food program funding from $1.1 billion to $1.9 billion, according to Zachritz. World Vision will help distribute that aid and also look for ways to institute long-term programs like sustainable agriculture.

But Zachritz emphasizes that it isn’t just government or big donors that will help turn the tide.

Believing in Widows’ Mites

“I think it’s an opportunity, for God to be glorified by seeing his people, the church, respond” as long term solutions are sought after, World Vision’s Zachritz said. “It’s part of our faith. It’s who we are, as followers of Jesus, to care for those in need.”

Donations from other countries continue to be strong, which helps equalize donations lost in the U.S., but the wave of the silent tsunami is large enough to suck up whatever is offered.

Hanlon encouraged people to look at the example of the widow’s mite in Luke 21.

“Compassion is more built on the widow’s mite than it is on the major donor donation. Most of our sponsors really only have one child, and that’s about all they can handle,” he said. “It just makes you stop and say, ‘What’s the absolute most important we can do with this money in our program?’”

The organization is looking to boost their sponsorship goals by 15 percent this fiscal year, hoping to bring in 140,000 new sponsors for children.

“We’re just going to have to deeply rely on the Lord for that,” Hanlon continued.

CURE International has a unique take to raising funds – they created a tell-a-friend widget that donates $5 to CURE every time someone gives their email address.

“There are some donors out there who realize the situation exists not only in countries where we’re providing care, but here in the U.S. where the economic downturn is occurring,” Bush said. “It’s something unique that allows us to get the message out.”

As relief organizations, the media, major donors, and even government get involved, however, Hanlon encourages people not to forget the power of prayer and God’s people at work.

“We don’t really feel like any of those other efforts are going to be successful without the church getting involved,” he said. “Compassion really believes that once the church gets involves and kind of understands and gets their teeth into a particular issues, there’s not really any global issue that can’t be solved.”