Desperate times, desperate measures for children

Dozens of children of the Van Kieu ethnic minority group are forced to find food wherever they can.

In Ka Tang hamlet, of the town of Lao Bao in Hung Hoa district, northern Lao Cai province, the children will gather and walk around the market to look for scraps of food.

If they find something, even a piece of rotten fruit, they eat it thankfully.

Ho Van Huong, who’s in the 2nd grade, said, “I heard some of my friends were finding something to eat here, so I followed them. If you don’t come early you might have to fight for some fruit.”

Ho Thi Xa, Huong’s mother, has four other children. Xa said she warned her daughter not to eat rotten fruit. But hunger trumps parental authority.

Some images of children in Van Kieu:

Happy for scraps

Some people’s trash, these children’s food

Sifting through a garbage bin

A meagre find

Sharing

Fighting

Humble bounty

Live goes on amid humble surroundings