The package I sent yesterday will make it to Illinois, but the trip to Haiti has been postponed. The message we got from our orphanage director today is that the kids are OK, and unaware of the turmoil.
The problems of hunger and poverty in Haiti are well documented. What has pushed the people over the edge this time is desperation...food and money have always been difficult to come by there for the majority. Now food is becoming nearly impossible for the masses to obtain because the prices have risen nearly 50% since last summer. This outbreak of protests seems sudden, but the problem has been simmering for months.
I fear there are no easy answers. The price of food has gone up world wide. Even if I had not read this in the paper, or experienced it at the grocery, I could tell you it's true, because my profession involves food. For a year my staff and I have struggled with keeping our food costs in line. We have come up with 30 ways to try, but I will tell you the most effective way is to raise prices. Because prices have been raised on us. The cost of doing business has become much higher. And this is what is happening, on a far more tragic scale, in Haiti.
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