The high level of poverty in Haiti is affecting a lot more than imagined. The poorest of the poor in the country never think of buying clothes. In the present critical situation where parents cannot afford to feed their families for days, buying clothes for their children is not a second thought. Many of the younger children in Haiti lack good cloth to wear to cover their malnourished bodies. For many, the only clothing options they have are ragged casuals and discarded old clothes of the adults that they can amend to fit the size of the children. It is very common in Haiti that most children have little clothing to wear until they become adults.
The need for clothes in Haiti and some other parts of the world is critical and persistent. Interestingly, children grow faster and, most times, outgrow their clothes before a year clock. Although some children pass their clothes down to the younger ones, the consistent wearing makes the clothes wear out quickly.
For some families, it is not top of mind. The little money they can gather is what they take to the market to get a few foodstuffs. The general view, especially for the poor and uneducated, is that the need for clothing is to cover one’s nakedness. Many of them are ignorant of the fact that clothing serves medical needs as well. Meanwhile, the vulnerable children always sit on the bare dirty ground, making them highly prone to parasites and worms that occur due to the dirt that flies everywhere.
Poverty becomes more heightened when the lack of clothing is involved, and children become more vulnerable to disease when there’s no cloth to cover their bodies. Lack of clothing, as simple as it sounds, will bring more devastating experience for the children who are living in a cold environment. Many villages in Haiti are so penurious that the children in all the communities are either moving around wearing tattered clothes or nothing. Those that can boast of something to cover their bodies either get it through the kind donations of charitable organizations or from an older adult who is tired of wearing the cloth.
Lack of clothing is a big issue in the present day in Haiti. In so many communities, good clothing is completely out of reach. Many children who received parts of the clothes we donated said it was their first new clothing they have ever received in a very long while. That’s so sad!
For children, it is very harmful to go around without clothing. Lack of clothing may cause a lot of problems for the naked children. Medical practitioners unveiled that many of the children broke down by sickness contacted the problem while sitting naked on bare dirty grounds. For instance, children who do not have many clothing options will resolve to wear the dirty ones repeatedly, which may result in contacting one disease or the other. Medically, clothes prevent our bodies from some infectious diseases.
Many children in Haiti wear dirty clothes to school. Although they wish that they could change the dirty cloth when they get home and wash but since there’s no cloth to change into while washing the dirty ones.
Lack of clothes in Haiti has a link to poor performance and mass failure in schools. Sometimes, the snow might be too much for the children to go to school. Many parents, out of fear, will ask their children to stay at home rather than allowing them to take a long walk to school in thin clothes while snows are falling. Some parents who cannot afford winter clothes prefer keeping their children at home to prevent health hazards even if it means missing schools.
Children need a large variety of clothing that suits different weather and seasons. During winter, children who lack jackets can neither play around nor go to school when the cold is much. The outfits of many children are limited play pants, some pajama tops, and some thin spring jacket. Some don’t even have a jacket at all. The children lack words to express their feelings during winter. Many even with it never comes.
Not having good clothes to wear also deprives the children of social participation. Children love to go out and make friends, but when there is no good cloth that fits the events, they will be forced to stay indoors.
The right approach
We love the poor, and we constantly strive to attend to their needs. As the need for clothing among the underprivileged children around the world rises, we take trips to right affected communities (including the most remote ones) to donate high-quality brand new clothes to the children that lack growth.
Through the help of our donors, we are establishing a mini clothing factory where some handmade clothing items are made. Many of the handmade designers are beneficiaries of our women empowerment program, where we teach several skills and vocations.
In Haiti, where many children go around naked, clothing the vulnerable children amount to saving lives from contracting diseases. Through our clothing program, we have been consistently providing beautiful shirts, trousers, gowns, skirts, shoes, caps, hats, scarfs, underwear, and other clothing items both for the adults and the young children.
We fervently focus on providing a wide variety of clothing for people to make them look more beautiful and improve their social participation. Many adults don’t go to church, attend occasions for lack of good clothes. We take it as a responsibility to clothe them and replace their old, tattered clothes with beautiful ones.
We supply clothing items to different communities, both in Haiti and other countries around the world. We believe that when we clothe a needy, we do it for God, as confirmed in Matthew 25:36. By supplying clothes and every other basic necessity to the needy, you are acting according to the heart of God.
