A Salerno Many, some unsuspecting, turn to the San Francesco Soup Kitchen. With the terrifying energy crisis and skyrocketing inflation here—where 140 meals a day are served—the number of patrons has doubled, and new faces are showing up, from divorced fathers to illegal carers, from the unemployed to pensioners like Antonio Mela.
"I get a minimum pension, so I pay rent, I pay electricity, I'm left without money to eat—that's the situation," Mela explained to AFP. Industry insiders are sounding the alarm: if the next government were to abolish the Citizen's Income, things could only get worse.
Mario Conte, 70, founder of the San Francesco Soup Kitchen in Salerno: "Because obviously there are people who receive basic income, others who receive a minimum pension, but they still can't make it to the end of the month due to this increase in both food and utility costs.
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This is why we'll see many of them coming here," he explained in an interview with France Presse. Officially founded in 1994, the San Francesco Soup Kitchen has been located in new, larger premises made available by the Salesian community and renovated by Caritas since 2004. The head of the local Caritas, Rocco Papa, said: "A recent survey revealed that as many as one in 13 people is at risk of extreme poverty. In reality, our province, and the city in particular, are experiencing a difficult period following the pandemic and then the outbreak of war."
"National policies in recent years have not focused on income structuring; they have been stopgap measures, which have helped families for a while, but they are not structural interventions," Papa concluded.
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