ECUADOR: 400 meals are served daily in this RHU diner

UNHCR staff, partners and volunteers take part in a drill exercise at the San Juan de Dios shelter in Quito, Ecuador, to ensure COVID-19 biosecurity measures are working properly before the free hot meals canteen service resumes. ; UNHCR has installed an expanded Refugee Housing Unit (RHU) to be used as a canteen for refugees and the host community at the San Juan de Dios shelter in Quito. The shelter’s free meals service was forced to close at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic because it could not implement bio-security measures. But now with the RHU installed outdoors with two handwashing basins the service can resume supplying vulnerable individuals and families with hot meals. Ecuador is the Latin American country that hosts the largest population of recognised refugees. The majority are Colombians who fled armed conflict at home. Ecuador has also received some 400,000 Venezuelan refugees and migrants in recent years.

Together with partners, UNHCR, the city’s firefighters and youth volunteers have built three super-sized Better Shelters (each made up of four standard Better Shelters) to increase the size and capacity of a municipal community diner in Ibarra, Ecuador.

©UNHCR/Ilaria Rapido Ragozzino 

Now, the diner will be able to serve more than 400 meals per day to people at risk, both Ecuadorian and refugees (especially Venezuelan).

©UNHCR/Ilaria Rapido Ragozzino 

According to UNHCR, it took more than 15 hours and about 40 volunteers to build the Better Shelter dining rooms.

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