Santo Domingo Savio Salesian Center provides ongoing food donations to help support 40 families

(MissionNewswire) The Santo Domingo Savio Salesian Center in Cartago, Costa Rica, has an ongoing initiative to collect food donated by parishioners and provide it to poor families in the community. Those who wish to donate are able to drop the goods off at the center. Donations often consist of cereals, eggs, canned products, oil and water, among other items. A delivery of the food is made every first Friday of the month to those in need.

Currently, the initiative reaches 40 families near the Salesian Center. The initiative is supported by Salesian collaborators and aspirants and members of the Mary Help of Christians Association, who divide the food into packages.

“This initiative is important now more than ever especially as people are slipping more into poverty in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic,” said Father Gus Baek, director of Salesian Missions, the U.S. development arm of the Salesians of Don Bosco. “This provides an opportunity for Salesians and those in the parish who are able to give back to those in the community who need a helping hand.”

According to the World Bank, more than 1.14 million Costa Ricans live in poverty, which is more than 21 percent of the population.

In addition, poor Costa Ricans are more likely to live in a single-mother household and have a higher than average number of children under 5 years old as well as other dependents living in the same home. Dependents include other children under 14 years old or adults over 65 years old. More than 77 percent of poor Costa Ricans work in the informal sector and have roughly three years less schooling than their peers who are not living in conditions of poverty.

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Sources:

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ANS – Costa Rica – Santo Domingo Savio Salesian Center offers food to poor families

Santo Domingo Savio Salesian Center Facebook

Salesian Missions

World Bank – Costa Rica