The Mamama association helps women who fall into poverty

It's a shed cluttered with shelves, pallets, tables, 100% recycled. There are stored small pots, formula milk, strollers, clothes sorted by size and season, around which a handful of volunteers from the Mamama association are busy, on this Sunday at the end of April, in Aubervilliers (Seine-Saint- Dennis). In the aisles, there are also sofas, where young women sit with their babies. So that everyone feels a bit at home, in this food aid association created especially for them.

Sadia chooses clothes for her seven-month-old daughter. It's the second time she's been here, whereas not so long ago she was getting by. “I was a general-purpose administrative officer in a company,” explains the young woman who earned enough to live on. Then the Covid passed by, just after the birth of his daughter: bankruptcy, dismissal… Since then, keeping his apartment is a daily struggle. “My money is to pay my bills. That's all,” she explains.

Families in a survival situation

Bénédicte is there too, with her nine-month-old son, who chooses a rattle. She lost her apartment several months ago. “Usually my husband works on construction sites, but there are more now. She is therefore housed in a social hotel and scours the associations.

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A refugee family from Bangladesh shows up: the three children need clothes. Only the eldest, 10 years old, speaks French. So he translates the questions of the duty volunteer to his mother: “Do you need cereal for the baby? What is her diaper size? »

Kabia, 50, accompanies them, and tells how the Covid broke their wings. He shows his papers in order and cites his references, recounts a dream of Europe that he has almost touched with his finger. "I arrived in 2011 and worked as head of clerks for a great Parisian chef until 2019," he says. Then the restaurants closed, dooming families like his to survival.

Bugets that turn into a puzzle

The Mamama association, which celebrates its first anniversary on May 6, is one of a kind. It distributes food parcels for children under 3 and their mothers in Île-de-France. Initially launched by three volunteers from Parisian hospitals, it quickly developed in the face of the scale of the needs.

@jpsingh1572 @rwac48 @Vedmalik1 @atahasnain53 @majorgauravarya:Stone pelters can be faced by bamboo shields, tear gas&water cannon.Y shoot?

— Markandey Katju Mon Dec 17 03:13:25 +0000 2018

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A dazzling "success" that cannot be denied - with 5,000 families helped and 800,000 € of product donations in kind, a waiting list of 1,000 people - and illustrates how women who lived on the wire before the Covid are now victims of the crisis. “Sometimes, it just takes a little for them to get out of it. Many, for example, managed thanks to solidarity, or only bought second-hand. Isolation, the cancellation of garage sales and clearance sales, for example, was enough to plunge them into the red. »

In extremely tight budgets, the birth of twins or triplets could turn into an insurmountable headache. "We receive a lot from these mothers who cannot buy double or triple everything," recalls the volunteer.

The profile of the beneficiaries above all illustrates the fragility of female employment. Young women seeking help have escaped the safety net put in place by the state. Either because they were working on the black market, or because their fixed-term employment has disappeared, or, finally, because they were paid by service employment check and are therefore not eligible for partial unemployment.

A million people are affected, the vast majority of them women, whether they are child minders, housekeepers, etc. "They held out for a while on their small savings, but there's been nothing left for a long time," concludes Magali Bragard.

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Women's employment weakened

Frequent job loss. Of all the people in employment at the start of the first confinement, 33% of women were no longer employed two months later, compared to 25% of men.

Structural precariousness. "Women represent 70% of the working poor, occupy 82% of part-time jobs and 62% of unskilled jobs", noted the Economic, Social and Environmental Council in its report "Health crisis and gender inequalities". , in March.

Increase in family expenses. According to a study by Unaf, 55% of families suffered an increase in their expenses during the 2020 confinement, + €200 per month on average.