Egyptians Struggle To Prepare Ramadan Meals
Increasingly more Egyptians are struggling to pay for the festive Ramadan meals – which are eaten at nights after the fast is broken. Rising inflation is the main problem: food prices have doubled in just about one year time, shoppers say. Official statistics show that the damage is less, but still severe: 35% inflation of food prices.
This causes a problem for every Egyptian, of course, but especially for the poor who spent more than 2/3 of their income on food alone.
“There’s a rough, back-of-an-envelope estimate that all the improvements in salaries and subsidies have added 18% to the income of the poor but at the same time the increase in prices resulting from removing energy subsidies and liberalising some commodity prices have resulted in a loss of 19%,” Dr Samir Radwan, economist, said.
As a result, the free meals organized by shopkeepers and the rich have become increasingly important. “Anybody passing who can’t get iftar at home can get it here,” says an organiser, Khaled al-Howary.
“We have meat, rice and salad. A kitchen here makes it and everyone has his own meal.”
Shops serve free meals to 200 people each day on Ramadan in Egypt.
Tomorrow, Muslims worldwide will celebrate the Sugar Fest – it marks the end of Ramadan and consists out of Muslims visiting each other, eating sweet things all day long, drinking, having fun, being thankful. In most Muslim countries, those who have enough money to take care of themselves give to the poor. The Diyanet, the religious ministry in Turkey, for instance, said that the minimum give this year is 6 YTL per person (that’s about $5). You can, of course, give more, but this is the minimum people who have money should give to the poor.
Many if not most Muslims do this – the poor in Egypt too will be helped. One wonders, however, what their lives will look like after the Sugar Fest, once everybody has gotten back to business.
