Help for the Needy in Decline

In the morning of August 25, at Sunjae Dongjawon, a welfare institute for children, in Howon-dong, Gyeonggi Province, where the makeshift lodging building had disappeared in a recent fire, the large temporary tent set up before the site seemed it would break down in a minute due to the continuous heavy rain.

There were 69 guardian-less children busily running about.

On the opening day of the school term, children were occupied searching for their books that got tangled up like garbage, and two long lines were formed in front of the two toilets.

Until April, these children were excited, for they were scheduled to move out of the temporary building and into the newly constructed dormitory. As the construction began, children anticipated the day of leaving the makeshift building. However, since May, the number of sponsors has plummeted to less than a third, and everyone had to begin worrying about managing meals, let alone carrying on with the construction.

What`s worse, on August 21, the boys` building caught fire due to electric leakage, and children had to live in tents. Buddhist priest Jisan, the manager of Sunjae Dongjawon, let out a deep sigh, saying that, “Children do not have a place to sleep in, in the rain, and the debt is accumulating.”

Likewise, with the prolonging recession, welfare institutions, such as orphanages, and children of poor families, elderly people, and handicapped people are receiving much less assistance. Some organizations say that this is an unprecedented case, considering that even during the foreign currency crisis, the number of sponsors rose.

According to the Korea Welfare Foundation, an exemplary social welfare institute that links the needy people with sponsors, 9000 people ceased to sponsor by the end of July 2003. This number surpassed that of last year, by 30 percent.

Consequently, the number of sponsors registered in the KWF, as of end-July, is now 87,432, which is 3.6 percent smaller than last year’s figure of 90,674. Since the recording began in 1997, it was the first time to see a decrease in the number of sponsors.

The situation is the same for the Social Welfare Society. New subscribers only accounted up to 70 percent of last year`s figure, and increasing number are hoping to pay smaller amounts.

As the result, the organization is trying to find ways to provide fixed assistance to the needy. Choi Nag-chang, an official of the Society lamented that, “Currently we cannot even dream of providing extra support, such as medical costs for the handicapped children and child-rearing costs to single mothers.”

Bulmart of the Holt Children`s Service Inc., a Korean children protection foundation, and other social welfare institutions are also posed with difficulties due to the sudden decrease of sponsors.

The situation of small or medium sized welfare institutes and unauthorized facilities are particularly worse.

Kim Jung-ki, head of social welfare policy team of Seoul city said that, “Unknown welfare institutes are experiencing much worse managerial difficulties,” and that, “In Seoul city alone, there are 120 unregistered welfare facilities.”