About poverty in Curaçao

20% of Curaçao’s residents below poverty standards

Currently about 25.000 residents of Curaçao receive earn below poverty standards, most of them living in piteous circumstances. At first glance this does not seem much, but out of an entire population of 130.000 it counts for about 20 percent of the population. This causes serious issues like illicit drug trade, single teen moms and drop-outs. Most kids are raised by single mothers that are also responsible for the flow of income, leaving many kids with minimal or no care when school wraps up (at noon).

Sleeping on an empty stomach without a meal

Many children that go to sleep without a meal on a regular basis, go to school without breakfast and live in slums full of holes in walls and roofs along dirt roads. Whenever it rains, there’s leaking, no power or fresh water, meagre dogs roam the area. These parts of Curaçao look very much alike a third world country and are just a few kilometres away from tropical beaches and expensive resorts. The gap between rich and poor is much wider than in Western countries, like the Netherlands.

Poverty is often invisible

Too often it is hard to judge the circumstances people and their families live in when you meet them on the street. People do not like to show their poverty. According to the report Pobresa, ban atake (Poverty, let’s take it up), of the Reda Social Foundation, in slums like Seru Grandi, Kanga, Dein, Montaña, Rooi Santu, Otrobanda, Wishi, Souax, Seru Fortuna, Soto and Berg Altena, there’s large scale poverty. About three quarters of the working population in those areas is unemployed.

Nobody in Curaçao perishes from hunger. Most families with just a few hundred to spend per month to spend, not leaving any money to buy food, are being supported by relatives, friends or acquaintances in better situations. Others fill the gaps taking up various loans but an estimated thirty percent is involved in criminal activities. If none of these options work out, there’s only one possibility left: going to the Netherlandswith its higher incomes and and relatively wel kept welfare system.

Various relief organizations

Various community centres and organizations are active on the island, their activities aimed at helping those in need, like providing food to children, assistance with homework, playing games and other educational forms. Goal is youth outreach to guide them to a more positive future. Curaçao Aid Foundation is one of these organizations, providing this kind of aid and is aiming to expand its work, for which your help is needed.