With sure and quick steps, Ayelen Torres walks the streets of a Buenos Aires neighborhood, where she and her friend Sabrina Sosa collect cardboard and plastic, which they skillfully stack in a cart. With these scraps, they are able to supplement their monthly income and thus provide food for their children. The so-called "cartoneros" (waste recyclers) emerged in 2001, when the country experienced the worst economic, social and political crisis in its recent history. Today there are more than 150,000 of them, according to the Argentine association of garbage recyclers (FACCyR). Poverty affects 40% of Argentines and is a central theme of Sunday's presidential election campaign in one of the world's richest countries a century ago, which today suffers from an annual inflation rate of nearly 140%. IMAGES AND SOUNDBITES