Peering though a window below the line

Four pieces of bread with jam, a handful of rice with daal and one mashed potato. If Rushika Bhatnagar was to write a food diary these days, it wouldn’t take up much space.

This week, the 20-year-old University of Auckland student participated in the Tearfund’s Live Below the Line campaign. It saw almost 1000 people live for under $2.85 a day in order to raise money for victims of human trafficking.

Miss Bhatnagar said the exercise helped her understand the situation the victims are in.

“When you are actually living in their shoes, even though it is just five days, you can get a bit of a taste of how hard it is to do just a fraction of what millions of people around the world go through,” she said.

The meagre amount is the New Zealand equivalent of the global extreme poverty line. According to the United Nations, 836 million people live in extreme poverty.

Tearfund communications coordinator Ella Rudin said the organisation set the challenge to offer insight on poverty - although five days is a very small window.

“It is an open window,that you can peer through,” she said. “When you are fundraising, you are not just asking people for money, but doing something yourself to show you are committed.”

She added that the majority of those affected by human trafficking live in extreme poverty.

Every year, Otago University conducts a survey of what it costs to cover food costs in four cities in New Zealand. In 2016 that figure was put at $55 dollars a week or $7.86 a day to cover an adult woman’s basic food costs in Auckland.

Editor-in-chief of HealthyFood Guide, Niki Bezzant, wrote in an email that participating in the Live Below the Line challenge for a week probably wouldn’t hurt.

“Longer-term, it is likely that someone trying to live on $2.85 per day would not get the nutrition they need. In NZ it would be very difficult with the cost of food.”

So far, the Live Below the Line campaign has raised $90,000. Tearfund expects that figure to top $100,000 before the week is over.