People Who Go Hungry

In the last week I have read many comments about a show that aired in the UK called The Great British Budget Menu. As I live in Australia, I wasn't able to view this via the BBC website, but I was lucky enough to find it on You Tube. Basically what it's about is that, three chefs stay with three families in an attempt to teach them how to cook nutritious food within their budget. Sounds easy.... Right? What if your daily budget is £1.66, which is equal to $2.55 USD or $2.75 AUD.... I don't believe that many could do this in Australia. The chefs did go grocery shopping and failed when they tried to purchase good food within the budget allowed. 

The show also looked at food banks and how every year in the UK, the number of people who required assistance from these food banks has increased. I must say that due to the fact that the majority of the blogs I read are UK or USA based, I have not read anything about food banks or people who are struggling to live within a grocery budget in Australia. Admittedly I also don't watch the news very often, so I don't hear about it there either, that is of course if this kind of issue is ever raised in the Australian media.

So after I watched The Great British Budget Menu, I started to search online for statistics regarding Australians and food/hunger poverty. Sadly, I found a lot of outdated information..... However I did find a website called Foodbank, which was loaded with current information. Foodbank stated that:-

"While there is a great deal of data available on poverty in Australia there is very little information specifically on hunger. As a result, the two million figure we quote is an estimation based on several pieces of data. According to an ANU survey, 4% of Australians are accessing emergency food supplies and, in total, 8% say they are unable to afford food. Up to 16% of respondents say they often or sometimes worry that their food will run out before they have enough money to buy more, and 13% say they cannot afford to eat nutritionally-balanced meals."

Some other statistics that I found on the website are:-

- 105 000 Australians are currently homeless

- 2.2 million Australians live in poverty

- 10.9% of Australian children live in poverty

- 1 in 4 Australian pensioners live in or are close to poverty

Image from Foodbank Australia

Some other numbers for you to have a look at:-

- According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics the Australian population is 23 million people. Foodbank states that 2.2 million of these people are living in poverty. 

- Google states that the UK population is 62 million and The Trussell Trust, states that 13 million people live in poverty.

- Google states that the USA population is 313 million and Wikipedia states, that 43 million people live in poverty.

When I was younger there was a period in my life where I lived in poverty. At the time, I didn't view it that way... "I just didn't have enough money", plus I was young, so I was earning a very low wage. Luckily for me I found my way out of that 'broke cycle'. But for some people, finding your way out is incredibly difficult, especially if you are already working full-time and have children to support, or if you are on a pension, or if for whatever reason you have found yourself unemployed.

I found a blog the other day titled A Girl Called Jack, in a nutshell she was a single mum who was employed and doing well, until she found herself unemployed. You can read her story here. Her story could be any of us, at any given time.