Requests for food aid have increased in recent weeks in the Algarve among traditionally better-off families, who now face income shortfalls due to Covid-19, prompting them to turn to support that is usually more targeted to the needy population.
With 30 years dedicated to supporting the most needy, the Aids Support Movement (MAPS) was forced to adapt its headquarters to Faro to be able to respond to the increase in requests for help it has received.
“On the first day we were asked for meals, we served 10 or 15, on the following day 30 and it grew up to the 300 we have today,” says the vice president of the institution, Elsa Morais Cardoso, to Lusa.
The official reveals that only with the support of the partners they have been able to guarantee the supply of daily meals, but also "the reinforcement of soup, yogurt, bread and fruit" to around 300 people between the headquarters, in Faro, and the delegations of Quarteira (Loulé) and Portimão.
“Those who had needs continue to have it, aggravated by the pandemic, but there is a new group that has never experienced this situation and social differences are noticeable when people come to us,” notes Elsa Morais Cardoso.
Tourism, catering and the airport of Faro they continue to be “the big employers” in the Algarve, he says, considering that “when the two members of the couple work in these sectors”, the pandemic “puts them in a situation that has not been common in recent decades in Portugal”.
A tour of the headquarters corridors demonstrates how it was necessary to reorganize the team and structure to respond to the current challenge. Among psychologists and technicians preparing hampers, there is also a social worker promoted to cook and work rooms converted into packaging units.
At the entrance door there is now an acrylic panel, forcing the social distance between those who provide help and those who need it, creating a new reality, which is also reflected in the need to deliver meals to those who “have no possibility to travel for not having money to put gas in the car”.
“We have already had requests for help from the middle of the Algarve mountains”, stresses the MAPS vice-president.
In households with children, the situation “is very complicated”, he says, with mothers “arriving desperate and often with tears in their eyes” for not being able to give their children “the yogurt or the porridge”.
“What most despairs people are the uncertainty of their work, they don't know if they will return to their jobs. Many were even fired, they don't know if they're coming back and most won't even come back”, he laments.
Not far from there, at the Motoclube de Faro, we also work to respond to the requests for help of those who were “in economic difficulties and cannot buy food”, says its president to Lusa, noting that these are not just people with precarious jobs, but “all classes social”.
“We have received several support from Algarve companies and cash deposits that we revert to food that we take daily to those in need,” says José Amaro, as he arranges packages of rice, pasta and other food items on the pallets that now occupy part of the headquarters' basement.
Assuming that social support “is at the genesis of the club”, he highlights that much of the support has been channeled to people who “lost their jobs in catering, from where they took food for meals at home”.
“Only those who are delivering things see the difficulty people have and the way we are received, so it is important to thank those who help us so that we can help those in need”, he concludes.
Comments