Letter from Richard Field from Hungary
The European Union is made up of 271 regions of which the northern part of Hungary ranks 260th in terms of per capita income. Primarily an agricultural region before the Second World War, this region was the site of much of the heavy industry grafted onto Hungary under communism–iron and steel, concrete and cement, petrochemicals, etc. Between 1949 and 1989 the picturesque town of Miskolc became Hungary’s second largest city, with some 400,000 inhabitants, and the new county capital of Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén (BAZ) county.
In the decade following the fall of communism nearly every factory and plant closed its doors resulting in high levels of unemployment and wide-scale poverty. Despite hosting several universities and boasting a large skilled industrial labor force, BAZ county failed to attract much foreign investment owing to its remoteness. The Roma community, traditionally the last to be hired and first to be fired, was especially hard hit. High levels of unemployment combined with high birth rates (Roma women usually start having children at the age of 16 or 17) means that an entire generation of Roma are being raised by parents who have never held a job and are entirely dependent on welfare and child support paid by the state. In fact, for most Roma women bearing and raising children is the only income producing “job” they will have during their lifetime. No wonder then, that even though Roma make up just 7% or 8% of the total Hungarian population, they presently make up nearly one third of the population under the age of 18.
One reason, if not the main reason, the American House Foundation started distributing bread and milk in the Jász region of central Hungary last April was that I was shocked by the number of five and six year old children I met there who weighed less than my two year old son.
While a disproportionate number of Roma live in poverty, there are as many Hungarians living in poverty today as there are Roma. A majority of them may be pensioners, but the poorest of the poor are families with children.
Last year the American House Foundation distributed over 200 metric tons of food aid through the Hungarian Red Cross. Roughly two-thirds of this went to impoverished families in central Hungary with three or more children (two or more children in the case of a households head by a single parent). This year we plan to distribute 600 metric tons of food. Roughly two-thirds of this will be in the form of bread and milk delivered daily to poor families through the Hungarian Red Cross. Of this, approximately 200 metric tons worth of bread and milk will be distributed to 200 families living in the Encs region of northern Hungary.
