{"id":54365,"date":"2019-07-31T08:19:55","date_gmt":"2019-07-31T11:19:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=54365"},"modified":"2023-08-23T12:20:09","modified_gmt":"2023-08-23T15:20:09","slug":"hunger-is-a-feminine-noun-part-4-cuts-to-social-programs-make-women-victims-of-poverty-and-domestic-violence","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=54365","title":{"rendered":"Hunger Is a Feminine Noun, Part 4: Cuts to Social Programs Make Women Victims"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

For the original article in Portuguese by Cristina Alves and Regina Eleut\u00e9rio published by Ag\u00eancia P\u00fablica click here for the series<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0here for the article<\/a>. <\/em>This is the fourth and final article in a four-part series<\/a>\u00a0produced through Ag\u00eancia P\u00fablica\u2019s journalism grants contest focusing on hunger in Brazil in partnership with\u00a0Oxfam Brasil<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

The autonomy that women achieved through Bolsa Fam\u00edlia is under threat, according to one researcher: \u201cIt is a true genocide.\u201d<\/strong><\/h4>\n

The combined forces of the current economic crisis<\/a> and the lack of effective social welfare policies have hit women the hardest, as they tend to be the ones assuming caretaking roles in their families. When social programs are cut or suspended in the name of fiscal austerity<\/a>, the crisis becomes even crueler for poor women who rely on this government support. They must fight tooth and nail to keep hunger out of their homes.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWomen tend to assume a leading role <\/span>in our traditional family structure<\/span>. Often, in poor or extremely poor families, the woman\u2014that is, the mother\u2014is the companionless head of household. Sometimes, a grandmother may fill this role. And, in cases of extreme poverty, that family may be plagued by frequent hunger,\u201d notes Francisco Menezes, a researcher at the Brazilian Institute of Social and Economic Analysis<\/a> (IBASE) and a specialist in poverty and inequality.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Since 2017, as the country has delved into deeper economic crisis, Menezes has warned that Brazil is at risk of returning to the United Nations’\u00a0World Hunger Map<\/a>, which it left in 2014<\/a>. A country is placed on this map when 5% or more of its population experiences food insecurity. In 2014, Brazil dropped to 3.5%.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cUnemployment and the recession have worsened the living conditions of the most impoverished sectors of the population. With that in mind, social programs should have grown. But that is not what has happened\u2014quite the opposite. Austerity has prevailed<\/a> and, despite that, Brazil has blown through its public-spending roof,\u201d adds Lena Lavinas, who holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Paris and is a professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro<\/a> (UFRJ).<\/span><\/p>\n

The Synthesis of Social Indicators<\/a> (SIS), published by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) in late 2018, shows that the number of Brazilians living in poverty grew from 25.7% of the population in 2016 to 26.5% in 2017\u2014an increase of two million people. The number of people living in extreme poverty increased from 13.5 million (6.6% of the population) in 2016 to 15.2 million (7.4%) in 2017. According to the World Bank, extreme poverty is defined by an income of less than US$1.90 per day (at 2011 purchasing-power parity), approximately R$140 (US$57) per month.<\/span><\/p>\n

Food Insecurity<\/b><\/h3>\n

In the state of Rio, at least one in six households faces severe food insecurity. That is to say, they lack access to baseline provisions, according to data from the Brazilian Food Insecurity Scale<\/a> (EBIA) published in 2014. In times of scarcity, women tend to take charge of finding food for their families.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWomen have much more initiative than men. They search for alternatives. They turn to neighbors when they need to; they rely on a network of social solidarity<\/a>,\u201d Menezes explains. \u201cAnd that support may come from many sources\u2014not just from charity, but also from relatives and from the church.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe Brazilian state has failed to recognize women\u2019s role in sustaining their households more efficiently.<\/span> The gender pay gap is large and the government has tried but failed to compensate for it. Bolsa Fam\u00edlia<\/a> and other social programs do constitute a social safety net, but they are not enough to turn around the situation of inequality,\u201d affirms Marcelo Neri, director of the Center for Social Policies<\/a> at the Get\u00falio Vargas Foundation (FGV), the largest political science think tank in Latin America.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe millennium goal was to reduce extreme poverty by half between 1990 and 2015. Over those 25 years, it fell 73% in Brazil. Since 2015, however, it has grown 40%, even as food costs have decreased,\u201d Neri notes. He adds that, between 2015 and 2017, more than six million new people were deemed impoverished in Brazil\u2014that is to say, they earned no more than R$233 (US$58) per capita per month, according to the center.<\/span><\/p>\n

Arbitrary Cuts Threaten Newly Won Autonomy<\/b><\/h3>\n

Since 2016, Walqu\u00edria Le\u00e3o R\u00eago\u2014a sociologist and political science professor at the Institute of Philosophy and Human Sciences at S\u00e3o Paulo<\/a>‘s State University of Campinas (UNICAMP)\u2014has dedicated herself to researching the lives of women in the countryside of Alagoas and Cear\u00e1<\/a> states in Brazil’s Northeast<\/a>. In her interviews, she has documented the reality of women who have used Bolsa Fam\u00edlia to assume prominent roles in their households, and who are now seeing their means of survival threatened. Over the years, R\u00eago has studied how women have achieved autonomy through the program. Now, she says, these gains are at risk: \u201cThe deepening of cuts to Bolsa Fam\u00edlia will not only reduce these women\u2019s autonomy but also compromise their lives and the lives of their children. It’s a true genocide\u2014principally for women in the countryside who have nowhere else to turn.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCuts to the program are being made under the pretext of combatting fraud, even though they are often arbitrary<\/a>. In some cases, cuts have been quite cruel, coming as people experience short-lived spikes in income due to seasonal employment. In recent years, I\u2019ve found that the picture has changed significantly. There is an environment of fear and anxiety\u2014and, worse, a strong feeling of powerlessness,\u201d R\u00eago notes. She is the coauthor of the book Money, Autonomy and Citizenship: The Experience of the Brazilian Bolsa Fam\u00edlia<\/a><\/em> (program).<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI observed a strong church presence in many of my field sites. A small room and some plastic chairs are enough for a church to set up shop. In vulnerable situations, many women are easily seduced by religious fervor and begin to think that they are not poor because they have God in their hearts,\u201d R\u00eago elaborates.<\/span><\/p>\n

She points to the ways in which extreme poverty has led many of these women to experience what she calls \u201cpermanent knowledge loss.\u201d She explains that these are women whose grandmothers dedicated themselves to embroidery in the Northeast of Brazil and to sculpture in the Vale do Jequitinhonha, in the state of Minas Gerais<\/a>. \u201cThis knowledge has been appropriated by the rich, who sponsor certain select communities to stock their fancy boutiques in S\u00e3o Paulo and Rio.\u201d The result is less work, less autonomy, and more poverty.<\/span><\/p>\n

Violence and Mortality<\/b><\/h3>\n

For Nat\u00e1lia Fontoura, a researcher at the Institute of Applied Economic Research<\/a> (IPEA), violence exacerbates all of these conditions\u2014especially for impoverished women.<\/span><\/p>\n

While gender-based violence<\/a> affects women across social classes, support networks for low-income women are more limited. They often lack housing alternatives and the means to hire a lawyer. In cases of domestic violence, it is common to hear women saying that they cannot leave their homes because they have nowhere else to go. Indeed, if the government has neglected to provide sufficient education and healthcare, it has been even slower to resolve conflicts and punish aggressors.<\/span><\/p>\n

In favelas and areas dominated by drug trafficking and vigilante off-duty police militias<\/a>, violence exacerbates existing economic problems. \u201cThese areas lack more than access to services,\u201d Lavinas explains. \u201cLiving costs a lot more when militias resell cooking gas at high prices and require local businesses to pay security taxes, which ends up making their products more expensive.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Both Fontoura and Lavinas agree that public policy has insufficiently addressed the needs of the hardest-hit sectors of the population and that this has magnified issues of hunger, malnutrition, and infant mortality. As such, they believe it is necessary for the government to allocate funds for public daycares, full-time schools that offer two or more meals, and re-opening senior care centers, all of which would make it easier for women to seek out better-paying jobs.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCare is considered a female duty, and because of that, the lack of public services in this area weighs heavily on women,\u201d Fontoura elaborates. \u201cHow can they work if they don\u2019t have anywhere to leave their young kids? Or no one to look after the older people in the family?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

As Lavinas highlights, while the struggle for gender equality cannot be limited to specific issues, it must push for changes in macroeconomic policy: \u201cIf the government retreats and lets the market act freely, without supervision or regulation, then women will continue to be harmed the most.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

An Increase in Infant Mortality<\/b><\/h3>\n

According to Lavinas, a lack of adequate public policy has led to increases in childhood malnutrition, particularly in the one-to-five age range, and in infant mortality. The latter can be attributed to worsening healthcare.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Data from the Brazilian Ministry of Health shows the infant mortality rate growing for the first time since 1990<\/a>. In 2016, there were 14 deaths for every 1,000 births\u2014an increase of 4.8% from the prior year. Data from the Food and Nutritional Monitoring System<\/a> (SISVAN) gathered by the ABRINQ Foundation reveal that between 2016 and 2017, the percentage of malnourished children five years old and younger increased from 12.6% to 13.1%.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nat\u00e1lia Fontoura also points to the importance of discussing race. Among poor women, black women are the most affected by cuts to social programs, as they tend to earn less and have fewer job prospects. Furthermore, looking at the rural-urban divide, Fontoura finds additional social differences: \u201cIn cities, poverty is often crueler. If you can\u2019t pay, you won\u2019t have access to food. Even more glaring is the stigma<\/a> that comes with poverty.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

For Fontoura, the burden of care that falls on women across all social classes is amplified in the poorest sectors of the population: \u201cWhen it comes to hunger, the burden is exacerbated by a feeling of guilt for not being able to feed their kids, which only adds to the suffering.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

This is the final article in a four-part series<\/a>\u00a0produced through Ag\u00eancia P\u00fablica\u2019s journalism grants contest focusing on hunger in Brazil in partnership with\u00a0Oxfam Brasil<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas For the original article in Portuguese by Cristina Alves and Regina Eleut\u00e9rio published by Ag\u00eancia P\u00fablica click here for the series\u00a0and\u00a0here for the article. This is the fourth and final article […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":78,"featured_media":54096,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1288,1282,1330,328,336],"tags":[2318,697,184,246,291,436,634,2739,1278,203,866,2847,431,2602,876,124,123,2634,2986,520,1017,2076,868,621],"writer":[2981,2982],"translator":[2900],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-54365","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-highlight","8":"category-research-analysis","9":"category-translation","10":"category-understanding-rio","11":"category-violations","12":"tag-austerity","13":"tag-bolsa-familia","14":"tag-ceara","15":"tag-fgv","16":"tag-food","17":"tag-gender","18":"tag-ibase","19":"tag-ibge","20":"tag-income","21":"tag-inequality","22":"tag-ipea","23":"tag-minas-gerais","24":"tag-northeast-of-brazil","25":"tag-nutrition","26":"tag-poverty","27":"tag-race","28":"tag-religion","29":"tag-series","30":"tag-series-hunger-is-a-feminine-noun","31":"tag-solidarity","32":"tag-childrens-rights","33":"tag-violence-against-women","34":"tag-welfare","35":"tag-world-bank","36":"writer-cristina-alves","37":"writer-regina-eleuterio","38":"translator-dylan-blau-edelstein"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/78"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=54365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/54096"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54365"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=54365"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=54365"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=54365"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=54365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}