Bread-lines getting longer and longer in Helsinki area

By Anna-Riitta Sippola
     
      As many as 3,000 people are standing in the queues for food aid in Helsinki’s suburb of Myllypuro every week.
      The number of people queueing for food has gone up considerably since last spring.
      Driver Jukka Enckell and his assistant Henkka, who does not wish to give his real name, are making the rounds of shops in order to collect food.
     
Those stores have reserved withdrawn food items for the Myllypuro Food Service Group of the Herttoniemi Parish of the Lutheran Church.
      Such withdrawn items are not past their sell-by-date, as such food could not be given to a charity organisation. This has been jointly agreed upon by the retail sector.
      Enckell has been working for the food service group already for eight years.
      Henkka is working under the so-called vocational rehabilitation system, receiving EUR 9.00 per day plus a monthly travel card from the social services. He does not know whether or not the employment office will let him to continue this work after May. He also gets a loaf of bread from the bread-line every day.
     
Monday is always a rewarding day. In the back room of the first supermarket, there are six two-metre-high piles of bread crates waiting, and Henkka begins to carry them into the van.
      A small amount of grapes, some pale lettuce, small boxes of tomatoes, and even some eggplants complete the load.
      Three bunches of flowers are left behind, as the men consider them past their best.
      Onions, celery, a large batch of ready-prepared foods, and packets of frankfurters come from the second stop on the route.
      When they reach the third supermarket, the van is already full.
     
The Myllypuro Food Service Group of the Herttoniemi Parish is run by a number of volunteer workers and trainees sent by the employment office. Even the Criminal Sanctions Agency has sometimes sent a couple of men to expiate their offences.
      In charge of the operation is Sinikka Backman, a former business executive and a current volunteer worker.
      The loading platform is cold, and the men carry the food boxes from the vans inside the building. The workers sort them out rapidly and then carry them forward to distributors.
     
Silent people in a long food-line are coming in through the broad doors that are meant for trucks. These are ordinary-looking people. No bums or derelicts among them.
      The number of distributors is three. The first one puts a bag of pears or a head of lettuce into the open shopping bag.
      The next distributor hands out a packet of frankfurters or a small portion of ready-made food. Or a small packet of minced meat.
      The third one has this time at least lemon muffins and Karelian pasties.
      Next comes a large table full of bread.
     
There is only a small amount of food for each person seeking relief, and he or she has no choice but to take what is given.
      On Monday, the last people in the queue got only bread, as everything else had already run out. The puzzled people had to return to the snowstorm almost empty-handed.
     
”How would rich people know that they are wealthy, unless there were poor people?” Backman says, admitting that after having heard people’s stories for ten years, cynicism is raising its head.
      In Finland, the level of social security is lagging far behind the development of Finns’ income level.
      ”If they gave people more money, we would close our doors immediately”, Backman comments on the level of the basic social assistance provided by the Finnish social welfare system.
     
     
FACTFILE
     
     
Bread-lines appeared in Finland along with the great recession in the early 1990s.
     
The Salvation Army had been distributing free bread already since the 1970s.
     
When the recession was over, the bread-lines did not go anywhere, but remained as part of city life.
     
Among the Nordic cities, currently even Reykjavik has a bread-line.
     
Since 1994, the basic unemployment allowance, labour market subsidy, national pension, and the basic social assistance have all lagged behind the development of Finns’ income level by 20 to 30 per cent.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 9.3.2010


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Rise in standard of living does not shorten bread-lines in Helsinki area (19.5.2006)
  Many Finnish localities run out of EU food bags quickly (2.4.2009)

See also:
  Helsinki breadline offers Mayor Pajunen food for thought (27.2.2007)
  Higher food prices bring longer breadlines (22.4.2008)

Links:
  The Social Insurance Institution of Finland
  Employment and Economic Development Office