There are many residents od Bihac who live on the edge of existence and whose only meal is the one from the public kitchen.
There are two Merhamet soup kitchens in Bihac, two public kitchens with about six hundred users, to whom they have managed to provide regular meals so far. The rage of prices and fewer and fewer donors is felt, which is why they reckon that the representatives of local and cantonal authorities will understand their problems and will be on their list of priorities.
Most users of public kitchens tell us that they survive thanks to this help, because it is mostly their only meal.
“I’m struggling, I can’t see well, they brought me here from Merhamet, I don’t have anyone of my own, I don’t have real estate,” said Sadika Plesa, a public kitchen user.
“I have a disabled brother without arms, and the other is disabled, we have no parents, this is our only help, we are going to Merhamet,” says Haseda Kadic, a public kitchen user.
In addition to six hundred regular users, another hundred appear occasionally, when they can’t do it on their own.
“We are currently able to meet all the requirements of people seeking to be included in the program of public kitchens, but the problem is transport to end users. I hope we will have the support of local and cantonal authorities to expand our capacity if necessary,” said the director. Regional Committee of Merhamet Bihac Alen Prosic.
Rise in price is felt, there are more users every day, and there are less donors.
“Because of the crisis, more people will be in a state of need, so social policy should be put in the forefront, to make any agreement about it, to see what we will do with people who have no source of income,” said Fikret Draganovic, president of Merhamet City of Bihac.
Over the past year, these public kitchens have distributed hot meals worth about 200,000 marks, relying mainly on the help of humanitarian organizations and good people. It is high time, they say from both public kitchens, that the state starts thinking about the most endangered citizens, who, unfortunately, are more and more every day.
At the session of the Government of Canton Sarajevo (CS), at the proposal of the Ministry of Labor, Social Policy, Displaced Persons, and Refugees of CS passed the Decree amending the Decree on the recognition of the right to hot meals in soup kitchens of the CS.
Amendments to the decree have enabled food in soupkitchens to be provided to the youngest, that is children up to one year of age, but also that the hot meal for the beneficiaries is enriched with fresh fruit, Klix.ba writes.
”In the challenging time of rising food prices on the market, it is important that we provide strong support for the functioning of soup kitchens. The Ministry especially recognized the need to propose an amendment to the Decree, in order to provide food for our youngest fellow citizens, which has not been the case so far. Within our competencies and financial possibilities, we continue to implement activities that will improve the social protection system,” Minister Ivana Prvulovic pointed out.
We remind you that these soup kitchens operate in CSaccording with the Decree: Central Soup Kitchen – Red Cross of CS, SoupKitchen “Merhamet”, Soup Kitchen “Kruh svetog Ante”, SoupKitchen “Stari Grad” Sarajevo, Soup Kitchen “Jelo na kotacima” – Caritas of the Vrhbosna Archdiocese and Soup Kitchen “Dobrotvor”, and whose work is financed from the budget of the CS.
This year, over 2.6 million BAM have been set aside to finance the work of soup kitchens with checkpoints in Sarajevo.
