The Haiti crisis in numbers
Haiti is experiencing record levels of hunger and displacement as armed gangs expand their control of the country and services collapse. Children are most at risk.
At the heart of the Crisis In Haiti are its children. With food being used to lure hungry children into armed gangs, the need for Mary’s Meals is more urgent now than ever.
Gang violence in Haiti
- In the absence of a functional government in Haiti, armed conflict has intensified and gangs now control an estimated 90% of the capital city, Port-au-Prince, as well as dominating areas that were previously deemed safe, including places where we work in the Centre and Ouest [West] departments.
- Gang violence in Haiti is soaring – murders, kidnapping/extortion, arson, looting, freeing prisoners, disrupting livelihoods – there is chronic instability. Criminal gangs are not just fighting one another for territory but also targeting citizens.
- The number of children recruited by armed groups in Haiti tripled in 2025 and the UN now assumes half of all gang members are children.
Hunger in Haiti
- More than half of the population in Haiti – 5.7 million people – are currently experiencing acute food insecurity.
- Out of a population of 12 million (around 30% of which are under 15 years old), at least one million children are thought to be facing emergency levels of food insecurity.
Mary's Meals school feeding in Haiti
- Under normal circumstances, the Mary’s Meals school feeding programme serves more than 196,000 children in over 670 schools in Haiti every school day.
- Gang violence and control spread from Port-au-Prince into the Central Plateau last year. The Central Plateau, where most of our schools are located, is badly impacted, since gangs invaded and took control in March 2025. Our partner, Summits Education, had to flee Mirebalais in the Central Plateau in March and set up elsewhere in the region.
- The cost of delivering school meals in Haiti has increased: delivering food has become more complex as gangs are controlling more and more key access roads and food prices have significantly increased over the last few years.
- Deliveries are taking much longer. Some suppliers are having to transport food in boats and food that used to be able to reach the Central Plateau in a matter of hours is now taking days.
Right now, your gift does more than provide food — it helps children stay in school, where they can learn and grow into the leaders that will transform Haiti’s future.
