In a new report, “The Tsunami Two Years On: Land Rights in Aceh,” Oxfam urged the Indonesian government to find a fair and just way of re-housing the landless.
The rebuilding of Aceh is the largest reconstruction project in the developing world. While much has been accomplished to date, land rights issues are proving to be a major obstacle.
Many of those without title to land, such as renters and squatters, are languishing in government barracks, where living conditions are cramped and often unhygienic.
“Aceh has made enormous strides toward recovering from the tsunami,” said Raymond C. Offenheiser, president of Oxfam America. “But two years after the tsunami struck, the poorest Acehnese – squatters, renters, and women – are still facing a crisis over when and where they will be resettled.”
“The lack of a clear policy for landless people has led to a huge amount of uncertainty and delay. There’s a risk these people will end up in the slums of the future, despite the generous donations given after the tsunami.”
Aceh, the northernmost province of Sumatra, was the region worst affected by the tsunami of Dec. 26, 2004. More than 167,000 people died there in the disaster, 600,000 were made homeless, and 141,000 houses were destroyed. So far, more than a third of the houses needed have been built.
Oxfam’s new report highlights some of the difficulties that must be tackled:
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“Rebuilding homes without knowing who owns the land could create problems in the future,” said Offenheiser. “But establishing titles can be a desperately difficult and slow process. Oxfam has been working with many villages in Aceh to help people decide how to reallocate land so everyone has a place to live.”
Around 10,000 families living on property they owned before the tsunami now need resettling because their land was ruined or submerged. The Indonesian government has bought 700 hectares of land for them but progress is slow: only 700 of the planned houses have been built and occupied.
Oxfam is advocating for the Indonesian government to adopt and effectively implement a range of new policies that would offer more protection for renters, squatters, and other landless groups.
The agency is calling for:
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Early reports from the disaster zone indicate that more than 800,000 people have been affected, 28,000 homes have been destroyed, and 21,000 people have moved to evacuation centers. Six hundred people are believed to be dead or missing, mainly due to mudslides.
Oxfam will be focusing its initial aid efforts on providing clean drinking water, safe sanitation, and public hygiene to reduce the risk of waterborne disease among those who have been displaced from their homes.
]]>Much has been achieved in the aftermath of the earthquake and a second humanitarian crisis amid sub-zero temperatures was averted last winter, according to the agency. However, the scale of the catastrophe, difficult mountainous terrain, poor infrastructure, extreme weather conditions, problems with disseminating public information, as well as gaps in support for some vulnerable groups, have hindered the pace of reconstruction. As a result, many are still at risk with snow already falling in one of the highest regions in the world
“With snow already falling, this winter seems to have arrived early. Besides materials that will strengthen their homes against the harsh conditions, people in temporary shelter in rural and mountain areas need sustained access to safe heating and other essential items,” says Farhana Faruqi Stocker from Oxfam International.
According to the Pakistan authorities, only 17 percent of the 450,000 affected households have begun building permanent homes. Oxfam estimates at least 80 percent of the remaining families, equivalent to 1.8 million people, are still living in temporary shelters with the rest staying with friends and relatives. More than 40,000 people are known to be in tents in official camps. Thousands of others are believed to be in unofficial camps and tents close to their home villages.
A recent Oxfam survey of 17 earthquake-hit villages found that virtually all those who were living in tents lacked adequate protection against winter weather. Oxfam believes up to 60,000 people could be forced to move from their mountain villages because of harsh winter conditions and would need accommodation in camps. Thousands of others in remote rural areas also remain at risk because routes to access vital supplies of food, fuel and medicine are often blocked by winter snow and landslides.
Pakistani authorities have belatedly taken some positive steps. Local officials plan to upgrade camp facilities to deal with a likely influx. The government has also very recently decided to allow international aid agencies to distribute materials such as corrugated iron sheets to help rural dwellers winterize their shelters.
The Pakistani government’s reconstruction strategy makes homeowners responsible for rebuilding their homes. The government is helping families by providing financial support plus technical guidelines and training on earthquake resistant construction. More than 30,000 builders have been trained and money has been distributed to more than 370,000 families to help them begin rebuilding. Aid agencies were recently allowed to build homes for the most vulnerable groups such as widows and the disabled.
However, owing to difficulties in disseminating the building guidelines, problems linked to cost, availability and transport of materials, as well as a host of administrative problems, reconstruction has been slow and problematic.
“When we see that one year after Hurricane Katrina, the world’s richest nation – the US – is still struggling with the reconstruction of the areas affected, it is no surprise that Pakistan has faced difficulties in the recovery across a much more difficult terrain,” says Stocker.
Worryingly, almost a third of those who have begun rebuilding have not complied with official guidelines – sometimes unwittingly. Besides leaving themselves vulnerable to future earthquakes, such people may also become ineligible for financial support. The challenge of delivering information on earthquake-resistant construction has now been passed to the UN.
“People need to be clearly informed about financial and technical support they’re entitled to and the guidance on building earthquake resistant homes must be easily available and understandable.
“Better information is also needed to monitor and analyse what is happening to women. They face particular challenges to access their entitlements. For example, many women are dealing with institutions such as banks and government offices for the first time,” says Stocker.
Oxfam is also concerned that there is still no government support for rural survivors who lost their land during the earthquake to rebuild their lives.
In the six months after the earthquake, Oxfam provided water and sanitation facilities for approximately 580,000 men, women, and children. It distributed winterised tents and transitional shelter kits to 370,000 people and helped nearly 60,000 people rebuild their livelihoods.
Oxfam is now repairing and building water and sanitation systems for around 220,000 people, including in 130 hard-to-reach mountainous areas and village schools. Oxfam is also providing water and sanitation assistance to around 10,000 people still living in camps. Oxfam is helping over 90,000 people to rebuild their livelihoods through cash for work, providing agricultural support, and helping village traders re-establish their businesses.
]]>The agencies—CARE, International Rescue Committee, Oxfam International, and World Vision—joined together to express alarm at the rising violence and deteriorating humanitarian access since the signing of the Darfur Peace Agreement on May 5. They warned the increasing insecurity is crippling their ability to reach people in need, with potentially disastrous consequences.
Besides the eight deaths, July saw many other aid workers attacked and intimidated, and there were more than 20 incidents of humanitarian vehicles being hijacked or stolen.
“The targeting of humanitarian workers is completely unacceptable,” said Paul Smith-Lomas, the regional director for Oxfam, one of several organizations to have a staff member killed in recent weeks. “Since the signing of the agreement, Darfur has become increasingly tense and violent, which has led to the tragic deaths of far too many civilians and aid workers. A full and comprehensive ceasefire must be implemented immediately.”
Tensions within many of the camps for the region’s two million displaced people have risen steadily due to opposition to the Darfur Peace Agreement (DPA). Violence is increasingly quick to break out, putting at risk aid workers who are delivering vital services. Meanwhile, the under-resourced and poorly supported African Union police and troops who are supposed to be providing security appear to have reduced the scope of their efforts to protect civilians since the DPA’s signing.
The four aid agencies called upon those responsible for protecting civilians and creating a secure environment for humanitarian workers, particularly the African Union, to prioritize having a presence around the clock and regular patrols in areas around the camps.
The humanitarian response in Darfur is the largest in the world and has managed to stabilize the horrific health and nutritional conditions that were seen in the early stages of the conflict. However, the agencies warned this response is now under threat. Some areas of Darfur are seeing levels of malnutrition once again on the rise and outbreaks of acute diarrhea in the vast camps.
“The danger is clear. If we cannot access the people who need assistance then the humanitarian situation is going to rapidly deteriorate,” said Kurt Tjossem, a spokesperson for the International Rescue Committee. “ As usual in Darfur, civilians are the ones to suffer, from being attacked, displaced, and also from being denied access to the assistance that they urgently need.”
In the last month, more than 25,000 people have fled their homes in North Darfur in the face of fighting and attacks on their villages. Three and a half million people throughout Darfur are dependent on humanitarian aid, yet vast areas such as the Jebel Marra mountains and virtually the entire northwestern region are almost completely inaccessible to aid agencies due to the violence and insecurity. Recent fighting has forced many agencies operating in and around Kutum in North Darfur to temporarily suspend their programs.
The agencies called on all parties engaged in the conflict—those who have signed the DPA and those who have not—to immediately adhere to the ceasefire and allow humanitarian operations unhindered access to the people in need. They urged the international community to do more to pressure all sides to end the ongoing violence.
]]>Three months to the day after Cyclone Sidr killed 4,000 people and destroyed millions of homes, Oxfam is concerned that despite an energetic initial response the current recovery efforts are not meeting the massive needs of cyclone-affected communities.
Hundreds of thousands of families are living under plastic sheeting, tarpaulins and other basic shelters which leave them at the mercy of the elements.
The cyclone also destroyed crops, livestock and fishing gear. Many communities lost both their incomes and their assets, and a quick and effective recovery depends on restoring people’s livelihoods quickly.
Oxfam has spent approximately $7 million supporting 193,000 people in five of the worst-affected coastal districts. It is providing 'emergency shelter kits' of iron sheeting and building accessories to nearly 10,000 households as a temporary measure until more permanent shelter is provided, as well as working on livelihoods projects.
Heather Blackwell, Head of Oxfam in Bangladesh, said: “Bangladesh's early warning and preparation saved up to 100,000 lives. The number of people killed, although high, was not as large as in previous similar disasters. This is a tribute to the disaster preparation work done before the cyclone.
“But now more than 1.3m people are facing terrible monsoon weather with completely inadequate shelter. Having suffered from the elements once, they could soon suffer again. It is vital that the Bangladeshi government and the international community—including the UN—urgently devise a better plan for giving these people proper shelter.
“At the same time they must help those people affected by the cyclone to start working again. People need more than just food aid—they need to start farming and fishing again if they are to recover from the havoc wreaked by Cyclone Sidr.”
Oxfam would like to see the Government of Bangladesh, the international community and civil society work together more closely to reduce the vulnerability of those living in disaster-prone areas and tackle the problem of climate change that threatens more and bigger disasters.
Rich countries must implement the commitments made at the 2007 UN Conference on Climate Change and start delivering on pledges to set up a fund that will help developing countries adapt to the burgeoning cost of climate change.
]]>Oxfam says the government has coordinated well with the National Institute of Disaster Management (INGC) in helping to evacuate more than 10,000 families in the central provinces of Tete, Sofala and Zambezia.
Around 72,000 people have so far been affected by the floods. At least 22,000 houses were submerged and an estimated 92,145 acres of crop land are affected by the floods. By far the worst affected area is Mutarara district in Tete province, where the INGC says that some 29,000 people were forced to flee their homes.
“The INGC’s search and rescue operations have been successful thus far,” said Michael Tizora, humanitarian coordinator of Oxfam International in Mozambique. “Most affected people have now been moved to resettlement sites. But with further rains forecasted throughout February many more people could still be at risk.”
For the second time in less than a year, tens of thousands of people have seen their crops destroyed. Oxfam is concerned about the long-term fate of these poor farmers.
“Donors need to be generous in the long-term, as well as with initial funding for the emergency response. People were only just beginning to re-build the little they had after the 2007 floods. They now have to start again,” Tizora said.
The flooding so far experienced in the Zambezi valley has exceeded last year's levels and some people fear it may well be worse than the 2000 and 2001 floods. However on Monday (Jan 14) the Cahora Bassa dam reduced its discharge from 6,600 to 5,500 cubic meters a second.
Oxfam is working in collaboration with the INGC and other local actors. Oxfam’s priority is to ensure that affected men and especially women and children have access to clean water and sanitation facilities in resettlement areas to avoid the risk of the spread of diseases such as cholera and diarrhea. Oxfam is currently gearing up to assist in the districts of Mutatara, Marromeu, Machanga, Govuro, and Tambara.
As part of its post-emergency program, Oxfam International is working in the resettlements centers from populations affected by 2007’s floods in Marromeu district to supply of safe water, adequate sanitation and public hygiene promotion. Oxfam is attending about 7,000 people in Chupanga, Amambos and Chiburiburi resettlement centers. Since early January 2008 another 2,500 people have sought shelter in these camps in face of the new floods.
The heavy rains and increased river levels have come earlier than usual. With several weeks of the traditional rainy season still to come, and more rain forecast for the Zambezi valley there is a risk of increased flooding. Oxfam is monitoring the situation and if flooding escalates is committed to respond. Rains have also displaced families in Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
]]>“Just days after recognizing the plight of poor people impacted by increasing food prices, President Bush missed the opportunity to offer real solutions to tackle one of the major threats to food security worldwide. In fact, the initiative he announced today could make matters worse.
"Scientists predict that climate change will result in more frequent droughts. It is clear that droughts in places around the world and the shift from food to fuels for commodities like corn and soybeans are partly responsible for the meteoric rise in food prices over the past year. With food shortages causing social unrest in dozens of countries, the President needs to offer more than a short term fix to the food crisis while doing little to curb our dangerous emissions. Aggressive action is urgently needed to reduce CO2 emissions and the effects of climate change on poor people and their ability to feed themselves.
"The shift to biofuels may exacerbate the problem if major investments are not made to encourage the production of non-food based energy sources such as cellulosic ethanol. The President points to ingenuity and enterprise as keys to the solution, but ingenuity without investment capital won't get it done.
"We also need to recognize that it's not just polar bears and glaciers that are affected by climate change. Climate change is affecting people throughout the developing world. The UNDP estimated that it would cost $86 billion a year to help poor countries adapt to climate change. Yet the President made no mention today of the need to help them adapt to the effects of global warming.
"While technology may be part of the solution to our climate crisis, we need to be certain to focus some of this technological innovation on helping developing countries meet their growing energy needs without substantially increasing greenhouse gas emissions. It is not fair to ask poor countries to sacrifice their economic growth because of potential climate impacts. It is reasonable, though, to help them grow in more carbon neutral ways. Providing this support is one of the foundations of the Bali roadmap, and financing should be an essential part of that negotiating process.
"What we need now is a substantial reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, as well as assistance to poor communities here and abroad to adapt to the severe consequences of global warming already taking place. In this respect, high food prices may simply be the tip of the iceberg.
"It's been nearly a year since the major emitters process was kicked off. Unless this week's meeting sets out constructive proposals that will advance UN negotiations under the Bali Roadmap, it will be apparent that this Bush initiated process is simply a distraction from the global task at hand.
"The reality is that US leadership is sorely needed to reduce our impact on the planet and to help those who are suffering the consequences of our unwillingness to cut our own greenhouse gas emissions. If not, food scarcity will increase, food prices will continue to soar, and nations large and small will suffer the consequences."
]]>Devapiriam is the director of Anawim Trust, a rural development organization that undertook relief efforts when the tsunami struck the coast of Tamil Nadu, India.
“Right after the tsunami," she says, "we provided people in the area villages with food, medical aid, and then temporary shelter."
But while she and her staff labored to get aid to everyone in need, she never lost sight of the particular struggles of women and children.
"Already we were working with women and children before the tsunami, because they were the most oppressed in the community. After the tsunami, initially most rehabilitation aid was given to men, who received fishing boats," says Shanti. "So we focused on the women."
She first helped women form self-help groups—community organizations where members save, lend, and invest money together. She then provided trainings to group members in both job skills and how to run a business.
In one highly successful joint venture with Anawim Trust, three self-help groups of Dalit women have come to own fifteen 30-foot fishing boats, which they rent out to local fishermen. At an impromptu meeting on the beach of Senthilveethi in March 2007, several of the women talked about the impact boat ownership has had on their lives.
"Earlier we used to work as laborers, but now we are the owners of boats," said Devika, who like many people here goes by only one name. "Now men are working in our boats. And we have confidence that we can be the owners of more."
"Now the other boat owners respect us as owners," added Maragatham, another self-help group member.
The police, too, are paying more attention to the rights of these women.
"In the past, the police didn't respect us. They ignored our complaints," said Muthulascmi, an elderly member of a self-help group. But when a motor from one of their boats was stolen, the police responded quickly. "We got it back immediately."
And with past hurts fresh in their minds, the women have taken steps to right some old wrongs. "We feel that we treat our laborers better than we used to be treated," said Maragatham. "Laborers now prefer to work with us because we always give them their fair share."
The experience of the women of Senthilveethi illustrates the impact that gaining access to high-value assets can have on impoverished women, and why gender researcher Chaman Pincha considers it a particularly effective tool for empowering women in the wake of disasters.
In June of 2006, Pincha and a team of independent researchers undertook a study—initiated and funded by Oxfam, and managed by Anawim Trust—to help document how gender affected the experiences of tsunami survivors, the various ways tsunami aid providers have integrated gender sensitivity into their programs, and what impact those programs have had on women and men.
Collaborating with a group of ten non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that share the goal of ensuring gender equity in aid delivery, she and her team carried out discussions with tsunami survivors in 45 villages served by the NGOs in the hard-hit districts of Kanniyakumari, Cuddalore, and Nagapattinam.
The field work revealed aid efforts that had missed the mark, but Chaman and her team put greater attention on practices that can serve as models for NGOs responding to future disasters.
“It was unfortunate that for the sake of avoiding bias, we couldn't hold focus groups in the areas where Anawim Trust works," says Pincha, "because a number of their programs reflect the best practices that emerged from the study."
Training women in nontraditional trades, for example.
In a spacious, well-lit room of the Anawim production center, a young woman named Selvakani sets up a job on a printing press. After two trainings followed by two years of hands-on experience, she handles the tools and equipment with ease—cleaning and installing rollers, positioning the image plate, and then running off a stack of flyers, somehow managing to keep her sari clean throughout. She prefers this work to her other alternative—agricultural labor—and with job offers at printing companies beginning to roll in, she has given herself a foothold in a relatively secure and well-paid line of work. Selvakani enjoys telling people about her job and says they respect her unusual skills. "They say, 'it's a good job that you're doing,'" she says with a smile.
"Training women in nontraditional skills breaks stereotypes and can enhance women's self-esteem. It helps them fetch better wages, and over time helps them achieve positions of leadership," says Pincha. "It's one good strategy for aid providers who are committed to women's empowerment."
The gender study, which is now being finalized, is one of several that Oxfam has carried out in the wake of the tsunami.
"By undertaking studies that draw out the experience and perspective of community members and combining that with the knowledge that aid providers have to offer, we hope to strengthen not only Oxfam programs but also those of the aid community as a whole," says Russell Miles, Oxfam America’s Tsunami Research Program Manager. "Sometimes the results confirm our hunches, sometimes they elaborate on existing knowledge, and occasionally they surprise us."
For her part, Devapiriam is looking forward to the completion of the gender study, whose recommendations she believes will help strengthen her already-impressive array of programs for women. "It's very important to us to have a chance to learn from the best practices of other organizations."
She takes her Oxfam guests to one last gathering before they leave town. In the village of Mangalawadi, a self-help group has purchased a collection of new chairs and utensils to rent out on big occasions, and today they celebrate the launch of the new business. It is a joyful event, where in amongst the formalities, spontaneous speeches erupt.
"Before we founded the self-help groups, we never had confidence in ourselves, and we had no assertiveness," says Alli, an elderly group leader, who has helped local groups collaborate with one another. "Forming a self-help group is not such a great thing in itself. Everyone is doing it. But here we don't just focus on money. Here we have created unity."
]]>The work is part of Oxfam America's new public health initiative launched by the humanitarian response department. Its aim is to deepen the effectiveness of its emergency programs and to start building a bank of scientific data that the agency can use to advocate for changes that will improve the lives of poor people.
"Public health assessments provide true evidence of a problem, and they are a lot more effective than rhetoric in focusing attention on the issues," said Miriam Aschkenasy, an emergency medicine physician and Oxfam America's first public health specialist.
Hired in July to head the initiative, Aschkenasy will work on a variety of projects as the agency begins to map out its public health priorities and build a network of specialists who could respond in humanitarian emergencies when the need arises.
"Public health was going on, but no one was calling it public health," said Aschkenasy. "Some of the grants Oxfam awarded to partners were addressing problems such as diarrhea, HIV/AIDS, and access to care. All of these are public health issues, but they didn't fall into a particular person's portfolio. As the humanitarian response department did more of this work, it became apparent it needed someone who specialized in this area."
But Aschkenasy is not undertaking this task alone. A key component of the new program calls for collaboration between Oxfam and top medical facilities, many of which are located in Boston, the agency's headquarters. A formal partnership with the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative is the first of these relationships. The initiative, or HHI, is a joint academic program involving multiple entities within Harvard's academic and medical community. It combines expertise in public health, medicine, social science, and humanities to advance research, practice, and policy in the field of humanitarian assistance.
"Here in Boston we have access to some of the most skilled public health specialists in the world," said Michael Delaney, Oxfam's director of humanitarian response. "We give them the history, the politics, and the culture of a situation--the key ingredients to an effective humanitarian response--and they give us the voice of authority on public health matters when we meet with government officials to push for change."
Twice since last summer, teams from HHI have been dispatched to Ethiopia to quickly study a problem and make recommendations on situations in which people's lives were at grave risk.
In the first instance, an outbreak of ethnic fighting in the southern part of the country had forced tens of thousands of people to flee their homes and seek safety in the bush. Hunger, exposure to the elements, and extremely limited water supplies had begun to take a toll on many of those who had fled. Oxfam and HHI sent a small team?two doctors and a humanitarian response specialis--to conduct a rapid assessment of the situation and offer ideas for improving it.
"The humanitarian needs among the internally displaced people in both the Guji and Borena zones are significant," said Jennifer L. Chan, one of the Harvard doctors, after the visit. "At the time of the HHI/Oxfam assessment, immediate food, shelter, and non-food items were needed as well as establishment of long-term peace building activities." Oxfam had already provided some emergency assistance prior to the assessment.
Three months later, Oxfam and HHI sent a second team to Ethiopia to investigate and respond to the outbreak of cholera.
"The idea behind the assessments is to provide a superior response," said Aschkenasy. "Our affiliation with HHI does that. It provides us with a cadre of cutting edge public health professionals, academics, and their resources. And the evidence they help us gather strengthens our ability to call for change."
Aschkenasy will help lay the groundwork for some of that change when she travels to Ethiopia in mid-January on a prevention mission that may help stop a repeat of the widespread suffering that affected millions of people across East Africa last year. Their lives stood in the balance as a devastating drought gripped the region, killing the livestock on which they depended for food, drying up their water sources, and plunging countless families into debilitating hunger. By the time the extent of the drought became clear to the rest of the world, it had already caused profound damage.
In Moyale, a dusty border town between Ethiopia and Kenya, Aschkenasy and Chan will launch a drought early surveillance system developed by Oxfam America and HHI. Their goal is to help officials in the region track public health trends that will warn them in advance about which droughts could become killers. How much food do families have access to? Are they plagued by diarrhea? Do their children have respiratory problems? Do their goats, cows, and sheep have enough pasture? How much rain has fallen? Is the price of grain climbing?
They sound like simple questions, but their answers--plotted on a chart that can make trends frighteningly clear--could be key to getting people in this drought-prone region, many of whom are herders and extremely poor, the help they need before it's too late.
"If we can determine quickly what the effects of limited rainfall are, then we can start doing interventions long before things get so bad that severe malnutrition becomes widespread and feeding centers are our only recourse," said Aschkenasy.
A fellow at HHI, Aschkenasy keeps her medical skills honed by working four eight-hour shifts a month at the Boston Medical Center. But she knew long before arriving at Oxfam that public health was where her heart was.
"When I was in my second year of residency, I had a chance to go to Nepal and work in the Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital in Kathmandu. It doesn't take you long to realize that public health has a much greater impact on people than one-on-one patient care. I also realized how much I loved it," said Aschkenasy. "There's a role for one-on-one clinical care, and I enjoy it. But there's something much more satisfying about public health work. It has a broader impact. You're preventing something from happening."
And that's a central objective for Oxfam?s humanitarian response department: preventing events--natural or man-made--from cascading into disasters.
"Public health ties right in with our preparedness and livelihoods work. That triad is what development is all about," said Aschkenasy.
]]>Drought, flooding, internal conflict, and displacement of tens of thousands of people were among the many challenges I witnessed during the nine months I was in Oxfam America's Horn of Africa office. Through work with the humanitarian team, I saw firsthand the impact Oxfam can have on communities before, during, and after emergencies.
For a nation that is seen so often as a place of drought and famine, it was the rainy season from June to September that presented the most challenges.
Over those few months, Oxfam, partnering with the Ethiopian Red Cross, was a first responder to a clan conflict that left thousands of people displaced in the south of the country. Immediately following that, our humanitarian team was confronted by flooding throughout the country.
We responded quickly, traveling around the country, assessing the situation in different flood-affected districts and visiting camps to see what was needed by the displaced. Many of those at the temporary shelters had been evacuated by boat during the peak of flooding and left with virtually none of their belongings.
In other areas, flash floods had devastated communities, resulting in a disproportionate loss of women and children and a traumatized population. People were worried about their future, their children's education, and how long they would have to live in a temporary shelter.
In each area, Oxfam worked with our local partners and with other groups to tailor the most appropriate response. In Dire Dawa, a city that suffered many fatalities, Oxfam worked with the city administration to provide psycho-social support to more than 9,000 flood-affected people, while offering protection from assault to children, women, and others people from vulnerable groups. Recognizing that the needs in the community would be long-term, Oxfam helped rehabilitate schools and purchase school supplies to ensure the right to education would not be denied to those who had already lost so much.
In other areas where basic items were lacking, Oxfam provided blankets, soap, plastic sheeting for shelter, jerry cans for water, and cooking pots to meet the needs of families who had lost everything. Longer-term initiatives were also set up, including the provision of seeds for farmers, livestock vaccinations, and veterinary care for animals to ensure that people would be able to continue making a living.
As the floods continued, Ethiopia also faced an increasingly serious outbreak of acute watery diarrhea (AWD), a common result of poor sanitation. According to the United Nations, as of November 13, 38,007 cases of AWD and 404 deaths had been reported.
In addition to providing medical supplies, clean water, and non-food items, Oxfam partnered with the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative and deployed public health experts. Oxfam took it one step further, providing training to water committees, community leaders, and community members on precautionary and preventative measures as well as good hygiene practices. By training community leaders, Oxfam remained sensitive to the traditional community structures, using the most appropriate methods for maximum impact.
This is only a small piece of Oxfam's work over the time I was there and much of it still continues. There are still reports of flooding, and AWD continues to affect many. Security concerns around Ethiopia are increasing as early warning systems monitor the potential for upcoming drought.
I've been home for a month and still can't sleep at night. I wait for the sound of the planes at Addis Ababa's Bole International Airport, almost expecting them to land on my house. I wake myself up fighting with imaginary mosquito netting. When it rains I toss and turn, wondering if it's the beginning of a flood and what new challenges this will present.
But in typical Oxfam fashion, I'm ready to go back, to do more, see the incredible work that my colleagues do on the ground even in the most remote locations. Through my work with our Horn of Africa office, I saw people at their most vulnerable, forgotten by systems and institutions, who relied on Oxfam not only to save lives, but to preserve their dignity.
]]>Many experts thought these tight-knit communities were relatively safe from the AIDS epidemic, but with the death and displacement of hundreds of thousands, the social landscape—like the coastline itself—was recreated in a moment.
The rumors reached Jose Michael, director of Oxfam's HIV program in India—that people living in crowded temporary houses and communities were experiencing new pressures that could increase their risk of HIV infection.
"There were many possible triggers, but we had no evidence," says Michael, so while he continued the Oxfam HIV/AIDS awareness program, he and Hari Krishna, an Oxfam disaster response specialist, engaged a well-known Indian health research organization to determine whether and how the tsunami disaster and its aftermath was increasing the vulnerability of the coastal communities to HIV infection.
"We did not set out to determine actual rates of HIV infection in the villages," says Hari Krishna. "That would have revealed very little about the changes precipitated by the disaster and even less about how and why they took place." Instead, the research focused on how people felt their own HIV-related behavior had changed since the tsunami, and what brought about those changes.
The central difficulty in carrying out the research is obvious: who wants to talk about your own behavior if it's something dangerous or strongly condemned in your community? But the inventive staff of the Swasti Health Resource Center, Oxfam's research partner, came up with a plan and a new research tool, which they call the polling booth.
Eight women sit in a circle, each with a cardboard box in front of her to conceal the choice of cards she places in a jar. In the center of the circle stands a facilitator who asks a set of questions aimed at determining how vulnerable these women are to contracting HIV.
This is a demonstration of the polling booth technique. The equipment involved is simple: a jar, a cardboard box, and a stack of numbered cards—green to indicate yes and red for no—are all it takes to build a "booth." But with willing participants—and researchers who have earned their trust—it can be used to carry out the very delicate task of eliciting honest answers to tough questions.
After the polling booth survey, the facilitator and participants tabulate and discuss the results. In a real-life situation, the facilitator might begin by saying, "Two people answered that they use condoms and six said they don't. Why do you suppose people in this village might choose not to use condoms?" Such a question could launch a valuable discussion of community perceptions of condom use and the spread of HIV—with no one having to reveal his or her own personal decision.
"What we share in a polling booth is fact," says S. K. Shashikala, who participated in the Swasti research and later helped demonstrate the technique to observers. "In this process, there is no inhibition."
Researcher Manoj T.J. led groups of men in these polling booth sessions. "The participants had a chance to talk about issues that they might otherwise be silent about," he says. "The discussion often revealed realities on the ground. When you know those realities, you can plan accordingly."
A research participant named Vasanthamma added a gender dimension: "This is good for women where we come from a culture of silence."
Although the researchers were successful in their mission, they had bad news to report. After interviewing around 1,000 people in 30 tsunami-affected communities, they determined that in 10 out of 11 of the temporary shelter settlements studied, HIV vulnerability rose in the aftermath of the tsunami. (Read a summary of the report.)
The lingering trauma of the tsunami disaster combined with life in the crowded temporary shelter settlements and disruptions in employment triggered changes in sexual behavior which, in the absence of strong knowledge about safe sex practices, put men and women at risk. Strict community standards of behavior were unenforceable when villages were scattered into temporary camps, and many survivors were drawn to alcohol and extramarital relations—including commercial sex—as a means of coping with stress, boredom, and overwhelming grief.
Now that the tsunami recovery is well underway, many of the conditions that caused HIV vulnerability to spike have been resolved. The need for AIDS education and services remains acute, but most people can report that they've moved out of temporary shelters and are back to work, and that the trauma of the tsunami has subsided. But for emergency aid providers, the research has implications far beyond the coast of India.
"If aid providers don't supply enough water or food or shelter after an emergency, it's clear to everyone what's wrong, but a rise in HIV risk after a disaster can go undetected until it's too late," says Mike Delaney, Oxfam America's Director of Humanitarian Response. "Now we know much more about how responders in future emergencies can help communities reduce their vulnerability. This is research that could save lives."
]]>This examination of three communities emblematic of longstanding poverty and exclusion— the urban neighborhoods of East Biloxi, Mississippi, and the rural communities of Vermilion and Plaquemines parishes in Louisiana—reveals that government neglect at all levels extends beyond the well-publicized failures in New Orleans to encompass an entire region in distress.
Access to opportunity remains unequal—and unfair. In Biloxi, government officials acted first to save the city’s battered casinos by convincing state lawmakers to allow gaming on land. Not ensuring that the low-income residents of East Biloxi shared in the economic benefits, however, has made them victims of an enormous land squeeze, forcing them out of their neighborhoods and homes.
False assurances undermine future visions—and current optimism. The self-reliant residents of Erath, a mostly Cajun community in rural Vermilion Parish, began rehabilitating their houses the moment they returned after Hurricane Rita’s flood waters receded. After confusing signals about new flood elevations, plans for the town’s future, and possible homeowner grants, their progress has slowed and in some cases has been reversed by the agencies meant to facilitate it. Institutional neglect leaves communities at risk of losing everything—even their way of life.
Few state or federal funds have assisted the recovery of independent commercial fishers, who for generations have made Plaquemines Parish the center of their trade. Their inability to continue is draining Louisiana’s usually robust commercial fisheries, normally second in the nation only to Alaska.
These communities, and many like them, teeter on the brink. They are being rendered invisible.
Left behind. Forgotten.
The pattern of inequity in receiving recovery assistance from the government has been well established by past disasters. Federal disaster assistance tends to favor people who have economic assets at risk—that is, the affluent. Though the pattern may be familiar, it need not be inevitable.
Making sure the billions designated for recovery benefit the region’s most vulnerable communities remains a matter of political will. Action can and must be taken immediately.
It is, after all, what the nation promised them. That they would be rendered whole. Get ahead. Thrive.
]]>Seventy-two hours after a powerful earthquake struck central Java near Yogyakarta, Oxfam is rapidly scaling up our response. Teams have been installing water tanks at three hospitals and distributing tarpaulins for temporary shelters.
Crowded, makeshift camps are springing up around hospitals and elsewhere in the stricken region; Oxfam is providing these displaced communities with clean drinking water and hygiene kits in order to prevent the outbreak and spread of deadly waterborne disease.
Despite miserable weather conditions and torrential rain, many survivors are afraid to return to their homes, as small-scale aftershocks continue to rumble across the region.
Much concern is focused on Mount Merapi, the volcano overlooking Yogyakarta, where volcanologists have observed marginally increased levels of activity following several months of high alert.
Oxfam has been playing a lead role in working with the Indonesian government, local authorities, and partner organizations to plan an emergency response in the event of an eruption. This preparation has enabled us to respond immediately to the earthquake-affected communities in and around Yogyakarta.
To ensure that we are able to meet the immediate needs of the earthquake survivors, we are also drawing supplies and expertise from Oxfam operations in Jakarta and Aceh, Indonesia, as well as West Timor and elsewhere in South Asia.
"As the expected influx of organizations in coming days brings much-needed aid to victims of the earthquake, it is vital that efforts are well-coordinated to ensure that appropriate aid reaches those people most in need," said David Macdonald, Oxfam's country program manager.
Oxfam is preparing an initial three-month disaster-response plan, which we hope to announce by mid-week.
"With estimates of 150,000 to 200,000 people homeless following the disaster, this is not going to be a quick-fix relief effort," said MacDonald. "Right now, the focus continues to be on emergency help -- but with a huge challenge ahead in coordinating the resources of agencies and governments to rebuild homes and rebuild lives."
Donations to help with the relief effort may be made to Oxfam America’s Indonesian Earthquake Fund.
]]>The matriarch of the family, Chisero's mother, was in Harare, 300 kilometers (about 186 miles) away getting medical treatment. She has been living with HIV for seven years'a long time for a farmer in rural Zimbabwe to survive with HIV—which makes Minor Chisero a very good daughter indeed. There is a lot of pride in Minor's voice when she says, "Yes, I am the one who takes care of her."
It is a close-knit group. "We work as a family in the fields, and we eat as a family," Chisero explained. "It is a little better now, we can eat three meals a day, compared to last year when we were only eating once a day."
The increase in food is due to an increase in crops they grew this season with seeds supplied by the Single Parents and Widows Support Network, through a grant from Oxfam America. The family had recently harvested five 50-kilo bags of groundnuts (about 550 pounds), seven bags (770 pounds) of sorghum. They were still harvesting their corn in late May, and were hoping to have as much as five bags.
This 2005-06 harvest was a lot stronger than their 2004-05 yield, when they grew only one bag of corn, three bags of sorghum, and two bags of groundnuts.
The increase in groundnuts this year is not only helping their diet, but their income as well. It is also making it possible for the children to attend school. Chisero and her sisters are roasting and grinding part of their groundnut supply to make peanut butter, which they are selling to cover their health care and school fees for three of their children. "All of the children here are in school," Minor said. "We pay the school fees by selling groundnuts, maize, and livestock."
School fees are 1.5 million Zimbabwean dollars per year, or about $US 15 at the official exchange rate. Peanut butter demands a high price in Mudzi: Chisero said they can get about a million Zim dollars for a liter of peanut butter (about $US 10 a pint).
Minor and her family are making the best of a tough situation. Although they are eating more than they were last year at this time, their meals consist primarily of sadza, or ground corn meal, the main staple food in Zimbabwe. As Chisero puts it, "Our meals are a little bit better—three meals a day, but it is still sadza in the morning, sadza at noon, and sadza at night. It is not a balanced diet."
But in between the sadza and peanut butter revenues, the family is coping for now. Chisero expects their food supply to last through September.
"This program helped us a lot," Chisero said. "If it was not for this seed we got last year we would not have been able to plant our fields, because we have no money."
]]>But now Hanshaw, and a growing number of other women in the Gulf Coast community, have a new foundation from which to begin rebuilding part of their lives: Coastal Women for Change, or CWC, a fledgling group of newborn activists determined have a say in the recovery of their neighborhoods.
Whatever the 2006 hurricane season brings, CWC may serve as a buffer to additional hardship. It has taught many of the women that each of them has a voice, and those voices count—individually and collectively.
"Our mission is to empower these women with knowledge of what they can do," said Hanshaw, the group's new director. "It's unlimited. You can build. You can go back to school. You can call your local officials. You can talk to them. They're there for us."
Now numbering about 25 regular members, with a core group of 10, CWC was launched with the help of Safiya Daniels, a community development specialist for Oxfam America, who has been working chiefly in Biloxi and Gulfport.
"One big difference that I saw between these two cities was the existence of organized community groups," said Daniels. "I realized that outside of the churches, Biloxi had none. I also noticed there was very little institutionalized female leadership in Biloxi."
Daniels also worried that there seemed to be few community gatherings in Biloxi to discuss what direction the city was taking as it began recovering from Katrina. Long-range community planning was not on anyone's neighborhood radar screen.
"This was a dangerous situation," said Daniels. "Everyone else was making a plan: casino developers, condo developers, and the city, but there was very little evidence of broad community participation."
She knew the concern was there—"in every community there are lots of concerned women who want a vibrant, healthy, and safe community for their families to live in"—but how to turn that interest into action was the missing piece. So, Daniels called a meeting.
"I brought a group of women together to talk about what was happening in their community, what issues and problems they faced, and how these could be addressed," said Daniels.
That first meeting grew into a series of sessions which blossomed into action, spawned weekly gatherings, attracted new members, and finally gave birth to an official group with a name and stated mission. Its goal is this: "to make a difference in our communities through securing and revitalizing our neighborhoods." Information sharing is the critical tool in achieving that end.
"I don't want people to be left out," said Hanshaw. "I want to give them knowledge. Knowledge is power."
Knowledge starts with asking questions, and one of the first events CWC sponsored was a Biloxi community forum to which it invited the mayor, city councilors, and members of the city planning department. Questions abounded—about flood elevations mapped out by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), about affordable housing, about displaced people. Nearly 200 residents showed up for the forum.
Attendees not only got some answers, some of them learned a deeper lesson as well.
"Democracy works only if people make it work," said Daniels. "And we do that by holding people accountable. There possibly has never been a time during the mayor's 13-year tenure that he found himself in such a position, being watched and held accountable by this particular community, and in such a public way."
Asking questions is the first step. Having a say in the answers is the next step. Right away, CWC members sought seats on a planning commission formed by Biloxi Mayor A.J. Holloway. Called Reviving the Renaissance Committee, it was given 90 days to come up with a plan for the city's recovery.
Five CWC members have been weighing in on matters of finance, education, land use, and affordable housing—the subcommittees for which they signed up. And people are beginning to listen to CWC's opinions.
"We are in the paper every week," said Hanshaw, adding that she gets the sense she is even making some of the powerbrokers nervous.
"They try to turn their heads when I come up," she said. "Especially the developers. They don't want to talk to me. They know where I stand."
For Cass Woods, working with CWC has given her a direct link to her community, and that link is allowing her to make things better all around.
"It makes me feel good to help someone," said Woods, who has been living in a government issue trailer—the size of a matchbox, she said—parked in her back yard for months. "That's what has helped me get through my loss."
With a $30,000 seed grant from the 21st Century Foundation, CWC will be able to pay Hanshaw a salary, purchase office supplies, and begin to look ahead at how to fund itself into the future.
Meanwhile, the organization is undertaking a new task: a survey of East Biloxi to find out the childcare needs of the community's residents. To renew its license, a local day care organization is being required to assess the need for its services in the area.
"This is our first project," said Hanshaw. "Another accomplishment under our belts."
And it's just the kind of project Daniels had a hunch a group like CWC could offer the community.
"The needs of the community will drive what CWC takes on," said Daniels. With those needs being constant—as they are in every community—Daniels expects the new organization to have a long and productive life.
"It's going to stand on its own. I am confident of that," she said. "I could see it truly growing into a coastwide organization."
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