HAPPY NEW YEAR OF 2025!

On 12 January 2010, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck Haiti killing 300,000 people. Fifteen years on, the key threat the country faces is not from nature but from extreme instability caused by lawless gangs. Daily shootings and killings dominate life, with entire areas under gang rule, leaving residents powerless to ensure their safety. Schools suffer closures, businesses are paralysed, and many essential services are inaccessible.

The territorial dominance of gangs has disrupted food imports and distribution. Ports are closed, roads are blocked, and alternative transport methods like boats or helicopters are both costly and risky.

Precious locally grown produce rots because farmers can't access markets, leaving both producers and consumers struggling to afford food. Meanwhile, the price of basic items such as rice has soared, exacerbating hunger among a population already devastated by unemployment and the frequent destruction of homes, which often contain families' life savings.

Despite efforts to provide aid, the lives and livelihoods of ordinary Haitians are still endangered by extreme food insecurity, escalating violence and a failed economy. “Food is the biggest incentive,” says Emmline Toussaint, one of the coordinators of Mary’s Meals’ school feeding programme in Haiti.  “To prevent children joining a gang, we need to focus on the poverty.  It is the poverty that is killing them. They are living a nightmare. Mary’s Meals is needed now more than ever. We are doing our best to make sure that the children are eating every day because if we don’t have the school feeding programme, the children won't have anything.”

Global charity Mary’s Meals is on the front lines of this atrocity, providing meals to more than 2.4 million children every day.  They work in partnership with some of the world’s poorest communities, and first started working in Haiti in 2006.

Since then, the promise of a nutritious meal at school has drawn hundreds of thousands of Haitian children into the classroom, where they can focus on their education and find stability and hope of a brighter future.

Mary’s Meals is currently on the ground in 500 Haitian places of education feeding 175,000 children every school day with support from local volunteers. There’s still hope for Haiti 15 years after this major earthquake.  Listen to some of these first hand testimonies and see that there’s a way to help today!

Chantrelle Paul and Verena II School

In September 2023, Verena II School was attacked by rival gangs. This was at its old site in Delmas 2 area of Port-au-Prince, an area controlled by gangs.  Fighting spread into the school grounds, with one of the gangs trying to hide in the grounds. All the children and staff hid in the building and while no one was injured, some of the buildings were set on fire and destroyed. The school was closed for about two months, but it was forced to move to a new location. The school is now operating across two sites: the old site in Delmas 2 and the new in Maïs Gâté.

Chantrelle Paul has two children, age 16 and 11. Walker, age 11, attends Verena II Primary School in Port-au-Prince, Haiti where he receives Mary’s Meals. Chantrelle is a volunteer cook for Mary’s Meals, helping to prepare and serve meals to the children who attend Verena II Primary School every school day.  Her testimony regarding the effects that Mary’s Meals has had is beautiful.

“The fact that my child is eating every day at school is one of the biggest blessings.

If Walker goes to school and I don’t have any money, I don’t have to think about what’s going to happen because I know he is going to eat a good meal at school, and even sometimes he comes home and says:

‘Mum, I'm not hungry because I ate, so I'm fine.’ The meals are one of the best things that Mary’s Meals could have ever done for me and my family. Thank you to everyone who makes it happen.

I pray every day for the school feeding programme because I know if he doesn’t have that, then it costs me a lot of money to try and find some food for him.

My belief in God is the main thing I have. I truly believe that God will not let us go. I believe that one day things will be restored, and we’ll have a better Haiti. I might not see it, my children might not see it, but my grandchildren will see it.”

Myrlande

Myrlande is also cook at Verena II Primary School, in Port-au-Prince, where she prepares and cooks the Mary’s Meals school feeding programme meals for the students every school day. She has three children age 21, 15 and 10. Her children used to attend Verena II, but she moved them to a school closer to where they live because of the gang violence.

The following is her testimony regarding Mary’s Meals and the hopes that she has for them as well as for Haiti.

"When there are no meals at school, the children don’t come and when they have meals, they always come. This means they don’t have time to be outside, on the streets and to be tempted by

what’s happening there. So, coming to school and having the food is the best way to keep them in education and out of the gang.

When the children know there will be meals, they tell one another, and they all come. It really encourages them to be in class and stay there.

We have a saying that Haiti is a boat, and it will not sink. We all believe that Haiti will not sink. I might not see it; it’s not going to be tomorrow. But there will be a change, and my children will benefit from it.”

Mary’s Meals’ low-cost approach means that it costs just $25.20 (USD) / £19.15 / €22 to feed a child with Mary’s Meals every day for a school year. This is only possible because of many thousands of dedicated volunteers across the globe – in more than 40 countries – playing their part in a variety of ways.  Through your purchases this month, you will be helping support Mary’s Meals in this time of great need in Haiti!