http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/geted.pl5?eo20050622db.htm
WHILE GOVERNMENTS DEBATE
Private aid opportunities
By DOUG BANDOW
NIAS ISLAND, Indonesia -- The flotsam of disaster was everywhere: trash,
bricks, splintered wood, household effects, clothes, debris. Buildings by the
ocean were mostly leveled. Across the road several structures survived, barely:
Only their side walls, perpendicular to the water, still stood. Plastic sheets
replaced missing walls.
Known for its idyllic surfing, Indonesia's Nias Island suffered from the Dec.
26 tsunami even before the more devastating earthquake of March 28. The
island's losses -- hundreds of dead, thousands of homeless -- were small
compared to the casualties on much larger Sumatra Island next door. But the
human suffering was the same.
Although governments began publicly competing to promise the most official aid
to the tsunami zone, international assistance largely bypassed Nias. The hotels
in Sumatra's Medan, a short hop away from devastated Banda Aceh, were full of
aid workers from a dozen nations and scores of agencies, public and private.
Traffic into Nias' capital of Gunung Sitoli was much less.
But small private organizations stepped in to meet what were still very real,
public needs. Shortly after the tsunami, Jim Jacobson, president of Christian
Freedom International, a lean humanitarian group based in America, made the
lengthy trip to Nias, an overwhelmingly Christian island in an equally
overwhelmingly Muslim country.
CFI ( www.christianfreedom.org) had to surmount the administrative challenge of
transporting donated goods to a distant, rugged island, and then on to west
coast disaster areas separated from east coast air and port facilities by a
crude road. Nearly impassable to anything other than a four-wheel drive
vehicle, the 80-km drive took four hours.
The earthquake damaged Binaka airport and destroyed homes, businesses and other
buildings all over the island, making the challenge even greater. In response,
CFI drew on surplus goods collected earlier while stepping up collection of
medicine, tools, blankets, clothing and other items -- even children's toys.
Private aid shows up in many forms. Some money runs through large charitable
groups. The Red Cross, Catholic Relief Services, Doctors Without Borders, Oxfam
America, Save the Children, World Relief and CARE all raised tens of millions
of dollars in the aftermath of the tsunami. Many such organizations support
ongoing development projects around the world.
Big foundations and companies also contribute. The Gates Foundation supports
extensive AIDS treatment programs throughout Africa and recently announced a
$750 million grant to increase access of poor children to vaccines.
The pharmaceutical giant Merck works with the Gates Foundation, providing
pharmaceuticals for AIDS treatment in Botswana. Pfizer, an even bigger
drugmaker, donated $25 million worth of medicine and $10 million in cash to aid
tsunami victims in Southeast Asia.
Proctor & Gamble has developed the PuR Water Purifier, which makes contaminated
water drinkable. Each powder-filled packet cleans 2.5 gallons (9.5 liters) of
water.
The purifier is useful most anywhere in the developing world, but especially in
disaster areas. P&G has worked with nongovernmental organizations and
faith-based groups, such as Samaritan's Purse, to distribute its product at
cost. In the aftermath of the tsunami, the company donated millions of packets
and made millions more inexpensively available, providing enough purifiers to
clean more than 150 million liters of drinking water.
But size is not everything. The most nimble and creative are the small
organizations like CFI. Devoted to saving individual lives rather than entire
societies, CFI collected materials for Nias before large organizations were
even thinking about the island.
CFI runs orphanages and schools for ethnic Karen refugees from Myanmar now
living in Thai refugee camps. The group also builds simple clinics, termed
"freedom hospitals," and trains medics to work inside Myanmar, where the
Myanmar military routinely destroys villages and terrorizes residents.
In the aftermath of extensive Muslim-Christian violence in Indonesia's Moluccan
islands, CFI provided aid to refugees in camps on nearby islands. And the
organization is currently raising funds to create a training center for
handicapped (many blind) Christian converts in the largely Islamic nation of
Bangladesh. They suffer what amounts to a dual disability, enduring both public
and private hostility.
The world is simultaneously awash in tragedy and opportunity. The poor will
always be with us, but those who possess much have moral responsibilities to
those who possess little. While presidents and prime ministers debate the
efficacy of new government aid initiatives, a multitude of private assistance
programs make it possible to give both generously and effectively.
Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute near Washington D.C.
The Japan Times: June 22, 2005
(C) All rights reserved
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Lebih Baik, in Commonality & Shared Destiny. www.ppi-india.org
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