I’m sure some mothers never thought that one day their bodies would become a resource. Nor did my dear grandmother, handing down that silver necklace to my mother as the last glimmer of our rich past, that her only daughter and last descendant would use it to buy themselves a bag of maize flour. But here in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, I’ve realised that what you have isn’t yours, that you do what you have to do to survive and that the best secrets aren’t the ones you tell but those you don’t, to stay alive. It has been ten years since the war began and has ravaged this country. I am 24 now and have found a stable, albeit temporary home in a camp near Goma, but my story begins 14 years back, in my small village in North Kivu, when the sound of gunshots replaced the usual sound of the roosters crowing. Being in the middle of an endless war between militias, Congo’s army and whoever wants to claim our home today, the hunger of an empty stomach isn’t the only thing to fear. Instead, you have to be wary and careful when you decide to tread in the shadows.

In early 2025, people were again forced from their homes as violence spread to more towns, with over 400,000 people displaced to Goma alone. That was when my family left for the third time. I had heard horror stories through the weeks that the fighting was growing, about militias not letting people out of cities, stealing their crops or forcing them to pay “taxes” at checkpoints, but nothing ever prepares you for something until you witness it firsthand . The World Food Programme estimates that 26.6 million people are projected to face acute food insecurity or worse by early 2026. People are already dying of hunger in the East, where the raging conflict is even worse compared to other areas. The UN forewarns that the ongoing violence has devastating effects on people’s livelihoods, which means that food systems are at a breaking point and given that air access is yet to be reestablished, they will only be able to help a fraction of those in need, which is around 300,000 people. For us farmers this meant that we were not able to tend the fields and we could not go to the markets34

Food prices soared – flour, beans and oil increased by 18 to 160 per cent since January 2025, when fighting blocked food supplies to Goma. Initially, we had to ration the little food that we got, mostly from NGOs. With 1.7 million people being displaced in Ituri alone, only a small fraction received assistance. Queues were endless. Portions were small. My mother, my sister and I split one meal a day between us. We pretended it was enough. Then came the murmurs, the ones that you can’t say out loud. Women in the camp spoke of “arrangements” with soldiers or aid workers: a night for a ration card, a favour for extra maize. At first, I wanted nothing to do with it, clung to the shame that burned, acid-like, inside me. But when I watched my sister’s eyes sink back into her head, hollow with hunger and heard my mother’s cough, choked by blood from malnutrition, I did cross a line.

It started small, with trade. I’d creep along the outskirts of the camp to the informal markets that sprouted like ghosts – places where no questions were asked. There, I would barter work for scraps: one day digging latrines for a handful of beans or carrying water for a militia checkpoint in exchange for safe passage to pick abandoned fields. In other conflict zones – such as Minembwe in South Kivu – households will do “land-for-labour” deals, providing services to landowners who then allow them access to a plot or a share of the harvest, as formal markets collapse. But, in our zone, it ran deeper than that. Armed groups demand “voluntary” contributions – the submission of flour, firewood, small goods – to circumvent outright looting. And when you say no, they take everything in return.

My grandmother’s necklace, etched in patterns reflecting our Banyamulenge heritage, was our last heirloom and the only inheritance we had. We had been forced to tuck it away into a cloth bundle as we fled our village, a poignant emblem of the life we had let go of. But hunger doesn’t honor symbols and memories. I sold it to a trader at a checkpoint – a man associated with the rebels – for two sacks of flour and some oil. He smirked, knowing full well the worth of the necklace far exceeded the flour and oil. But in the black markets that thrive in places like eastern DRC, value is the currency of continued existence. These exchanges happen regularly in places such as eastern DRC; where soldiers, themselves hungry, sell ammunition or looted goods in exchange for something to eat. They are feeding this war and themselves. I told no one, not even my family, about the necklace. Shame slithered through me like a viper: how can you ever explain to others that you’ve sold a piece of your soul? But if selling my grandmother’s necklace was bad, worse were the personal favors.

In the camps, women such as me have the unspoken option: transactional sex in exchange for survival. It’s not love; it’s exchange. A soldier approached me one evening as dusk fell. He said he could provide additional rations that he had acquired from his unit’s supplies. He asked me in a low voice if I could “visit” him at the army tent in the evening. I did, twice and hated it but it meant that my sister ate that week.

In conflict-affected areas like South Kivu, we see this as a desperate survival strategy— women trading sex for money or food, which in turn exposes them to STDs and more trauma, but allows them to keep their families alive. In Ituri, 41% of households turn to begging, others sell off their assets or go to live in aid camps. These aren’t choices; they are signs of resilience in a system which sees us as commodities. The Global Hunger Index reports DRC’s hunger level as “alarmingly high” at 37.5 in 2025, with conflict being the main cause. Also, we have 1.4 million children with severe acute malnutrition, which puts great pressure on women to “provide”. Yet in the shame, there is a quiet strength. I have seen women come together, sharing secret tips on safer exchanges or pooling what they barter for.

One night after a risky trade for some beans, I helped a neighbor hide her earnings from her husband, who did not know about the cost. These secrets, which we keep, connect us even as they break us. The conflict has taken our homes, but not our will to survive. As aid organizations call for urgent action— which they say is of a 20% increase in children facing severe hunger due to displacement—I hold to the hope that one day survival won’t require us to be silent.

Also, I tell my story in the hope it resonates beyond these zones. Because in DRC, where 81% of households in places like Ituri are food insecure, the real crisis isn’t just hunger, it is the hidden trades we are put into to fight it.