Living with food shortages

This post is probably going to be a bit long, and perhaps triggering to some people. Just saying. 

Lately, food shortages, food insecurity and subjects connected to that are on my mind a lot. I don't know if it's just me, but it's almost like I keep reading about yet another food crisis: then it's rice, or wheat, or coffee, then it's sugar and then suddenly bananas are threatened with extinction. I honestly don't know what to think of it, as I know that there are so many people somehow benefiting from crises like these. But I'm not necessarily a conspiracy theorists so I'll just leave it with this. All I do know is that how the world is right now is giving me much anxiety. 

For all (or most, anyhow) of my adult life, I was very frugal, and as a result of that, very waste conscious. My husband and I married young and started off very humbly with not a lot of money. We really tried to work up ourselves. There were good times (in terms of finances) and bad times. And there were also very bad times (for reasons beyond our control, but I won't elaborate too much on that now). I'd say it was definitely relative poverty, as we were living way below the poverty line. But I must admit, I don't like to use that word a lot, because there are millions of people who are way worse off than we were. And when I say "very bad", I think mainly of how food was a major stress point. I didn't really care about our furniture being from garbage bins or thrift shops, or cheap outings, thrifted clothes etc. But food insecurity was much more of an issue. There were weeks that we had 20 € or less to feed the four of us - still we were very "lucky" that our youngest daughter, as a newborn back then had allergies so her formula was covered by insurance. But still, it was very tight. There was always this anxiety of not having enough for the whole week, or having unexpected guests and not being able to serve them something slightly decent. Even though our friends probably wouldn't have minded, but the anxiety was still there. With lots of hard work we tried to get out of poverty which we did and were proud of that accomplishments. Probably we would still have classified as "(very) low income", but to me, it wasn't really poverty because I didn't really stress about food anymore. Still, you can get out of poverty but it's more difficult for poverty to get out of you - the anxiety stays. Not with everyone, probably, but this is what I've heard a lot from "formerly poor people". I don't necessarily think it's a bad thing in and of itself- it's human nature to be aware for dangers and to be prepared for that. It does become a problem when it's causing anxiety though. 

Fast forward to now and I'm kind of in the same boat. Kind of, because it's not due to a lack of money. But the anxiety is the same. Ever since we emigrated we were used to having some food shortages, from time to time. A few years ago, it wasn't such a big deal because it was usually very temporary, and limited to one product at a time. It wasn't really an issue. And then came covid, which made it a bit more difficult - there were more shortages, with a few items at a time. And for longer periods of time. Then came the Russian/Ukraine war and with that, energy and multiple food crises, causing more inflation (and I mean, it's not that the economy was going good here before that). And dare I say, a crisis of greedy multinationals who can't stand governments subsidizing certain food items. 

So anyway, that's a brief summary of how things got how they are currently. We have been dealing with shortages of many staples: rice, flour, semolina, milk, sugar, tea, certain pastas, couscous, coffee, eggs, oil, chicken. As of lately, it's actually better than it has been for a long time; there's milk, semolina, and white flour at the same time! Yeast is yet again a new item that seems to be not available... sigh. But fortunately, we found a box of small sachets and bought that despite the higher price. Some products had been unavailable for a year or longer until they came back to the store shelfs- white flour, for example, has recently come back but hadn't been available for a year and a half. Rice is another staple that has been gone for around a year and a half. Subsidized oil even around two years. It's quite frustrating and as one item comes back, people can't help but wonder for how long the said products will stay- it has happened many times that they came back and then went unavailable again. Some products are completely unavailable, whereas other products are slightly available, or at a very high price. Oil, for example, is available but at least 5 times more expensive than the exactly same but subsidized oil (the only difference being the packaging). This is especially difficult because the price of olive oil has skyrocketed as well, so more people use vegetable oil now. Same with sugar, which is now mainly important from a neighbouring country, for double the price. Even if some items are slightly available, or available yet suddenly very expensive, I think this still talks under the umbrella of shortages, because the supply is still limited. And since we're dependent on importing that's another uncertainty- the border of Libya has been closed for a few months now. For a good reason, but it still affects the shortages even more. 

This whole situation does affect us more than one would expect. I think it's the uncertainty that is particularly difficult for me. And it brings back memories from our toughest financial situation.We could live without these products obviously, but since they are staples they're just used a lot by many people, including us. It's just having to be creative all the time and look for solutions, which can be quite tiring. And having to cut back even more for a lot of people since so many foods are a lot more expensive. It's always on your mind. It's being afraid you can't buy that flour anymore next week, and not knowing how long it'll be gone. 

There was a time that most pasta, couscous, and every kind of rice weren't available all at the same time. Now we were fortunate that we build a stockpile, but for those that didn't, it was quite a challenge. And for some reason, stockpiling isn't something most people here do, even after these years of shortages. What do you eat if all your go to staples aren't being sold anymore? At that time, even bread at the bakery was very limited. You could buy oatmeal or ground sorghum and make porridge of course. But at least for us, that's not really considered dinner foods- I know, it's food and very filling, and if that's all you have it's certainly better than nothing but it is an adjustment to switch to other types of foods. Also, sorghum and oatmeal are quite expensive here, much more expensive than pasta and couscous, so some people (especially with large families) can't afford to eat that three times a day. Fortunately, the couscous and pasta shortages didn't last long, which was a big relief for many people.

This is an important lesson. Despite the difficult situation, and it being a trigger because of our previous poverty situation, I think you truly learn to be appreciative, be even more frugal and resourceful and to come up with creative solutions. When there were milk shortages, I made oatmilk to use in pancakes, French toast etc or to just make some hot chocolate (I don't lile drinking oat milk as is). Despite milk shortages, there was always yogurt so we had that regularly, as well as sesame seeds and sardines for our calcium. I came up with rice substitutes, such as wheat/barley burgul and orzo pasta. I drink more herbal tea to stretch the bags of loose leaf tea that we still have at home as much as possible, herbal tea is better for you anyway I guess. In many recipes, I halved the sugar.  And I'm still planning on trying to make date pit coffee. Apparently it's quite good and almost similar to the real thing. My husband will need to test that, as I'm not a coffee drinker. I must acknowledge that we're privileged not to be poor anymore (and our poverty being very different from the poverty where we live now anyway), so if we do want to splurge on an expensive product, like rice imported from the neighbouring country, we can do that. The sad reality is that for many people, this simply isn't possible. It's either buying the regular, cheaper products and if they're short of those, poor people just have to go without. I sometimes feel sorry for people whose only "splurge" was coffee with homemade cake or something, can't even buy that anymore because sugar has become too expensive. Or they have to cut back on other essentials even more. That's the sad reality for many people. But if you're living in absolute poverty, things like a nice drink once in a while isn't a luxury but an essential to feel human (in my opinion), as being poor really takes a toll mentally and physically and you really need such a "splurge" sometimes.  

I truly learned to appreciate that we do have. Although we might not always have exactly what we want, it's always much more than we actually need. I also learned that as much as I like planning, sometimes it's best to just take things as they come- by just buying what's available instead of having everything planned ahead. We obviously went never without anything we needed, even if it meant that the type of food wasn't our first choice necessarily. It makes one very creative. As aforementioned, I found a lot of substitutes for everyday items. Even though my anxiety is still there, I've tried to be a bit more relaxed about it- trying to relativize, because we're not going hungry. It's just that we're going without some food items. Yes, that can be hard, but there are many people in much more difficult situations. 

What's interesting is to see how people in general deal with this situation. People tend to gift each other bags of sugar as if it's the most valuable thing they possess, or coffee, etc. It's both funny and heartwarming at the same time. But unfortunately, as always, there are people trying to take advantage of the situation- I've heard of people trying to sell one kg of sugar four times higher than the original price. It's just ridiculous. But as long as people are willing to pay that price there are others that continue to do these things I guess. Witnessing less foods being wasted is something that really excites me. In the past, many people would buy their bread fresh everyday, usually more than actually needed. Leftover bread would be put near the trashcans on the streets "for the cats".  Only, stray cats (and dogs) couldn't finish all the foods being put on the streets- because it wasn't just bread, but also lots of leftover cooked pasta etc. It was just so much. Because of the way that hospitality is ingrained in the culture, people are used to cooking more than necessary for unexpected guests. But guests showing up unexpectedly isn't a daily occurrence, which is why sadly that extra food is thrown away. This is at least one thing in which a difficult situation still had some positive impact! It makes me happy to see that people are becoming a bit more conscious about food waste, even if the reason isn't necessarily the most fun. I do hope that once this shortages situation is over, people will remain this waste conscious. 

So, all in all, it's a tough situation but it had taught me gratitude at the same time, as well as ways to deal with my trauma based anxiety when it comes to food insecurity, food shortages etc. All we can do is pray that the situation will improve and in the meantime we'll just have to find ways to be creative and come up with substitutes and alternatives. There is however so much to be grateful for.