How to dress your child in the lean months

If you don’t earn the same amount every month, and particularly if you’ve never been to a maths lesson in your life, it’s difficult to gauge how your household income has changed over time.

We’ve been asking people in the Central African Republic if life has improved since the conflict here ‘ended’ in 2014, and one of the responses we received this month hit me especially hard.

A mother told us: “We are much richer now. My three children each have two pieces of clothing.”

Two pieces of clothing. Not two outfits: two pieces of clothing. It’s something I’ve been noticing, but it wasn’t until now that it clicked. Poor children have either a top OR a bottom to wear.

I had a look through the photos I’ve taken here, and pulled out some examples of kids, most of whom were just in the background, messing about. See what I mean about their clothes?

Compare these children with Youssou’s family, below. Youssou is one of the people we’ve helped to start growing food, and now he and his household grow enough to eat, and a bit extra to sell.

So they’re doing pretty well: all but one of the children has top and bottom covered, and six out of eight have shoes.

“Why do they have so many children if they can’t afford to clothe them?” 

I’m glad you asked. For one thing, before the crisis, this family was fairly rich, and because Boda is so fertile, no-one was starving. Even during the ‘lean months’, people had enough to eat: 93% of children under five were well nourished and thriving.

Also, these aren’t all Youssou’s children. Some of them are his nieces and nephews, whose parents were killed during the war, so Youssou and his wife took them in.

Poverty here is brutal and relentless. People aren’t ‘poor but happy’ – they’re poor but resilient, and (amazingly) hopeful, determined and proud. We’re beginning to see change, but it’s agonisingly slow.