HOTLINE - week of May 09, 2005

May 15 is the UN’s International Day of Families. CWS focuses on providing emergency and development assistance for families – particularly mothers and children – wherever we work.

"We own nothing, however, we are lucky because all of our family survived," says Aysha, who now lives, along with her husband Baharudin and their children, in Ujong Tanjong camp for displaced people in Meulaboh, a town on the west coast of the large island of Sumatra, Indonesia.

CWS continues its tsunami relief efforts in Indonesia, and is working in displacement camps and communities in Banda Aceh, Aceh Besar, and Meulaboh, where food, tents, blankets, health and school supplies have been distributed to more than 23,300 people.

Food distributions are focusing on children under five and their families, as they are most at risk of malnutrition. The CWS mobile health clinics have so far provided health care to more than 3,070 patients in remote areas. In Meulaboh, CWS is focusing on providing water for 17,200 people in camps and in communities where water access has been cut off. In addition, some 7,000 people have received trauma counseling, the focus of which is on providing play therapy and education for children.

In Sri Lanka, CWS, working through local partners, has helped to provide food and water, tents, mats, sheets, mosquito nets, health supplies, kitchen utensils, clothing, and medicine to 14,000 families. Activities, planned to continue through 2006, include continuing distributions, providing temporary shelter and shelter repair, pastoral counseling services, educational support for children, and livelihood assistance that includes boats, nets, engines, and other needed supplies.

Through local partners in India, CWS is providing assistance in Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. To date, 50,000 people have received disaster assistance including cooked food and drinking water, dry food rations, clothing, bedding and kitchen utensils, tarpaulins, and basic medical aid. Assistance to communities transitioned quickly to include housing rehabilitation, school supplies and uniforms, fishing boat repairs and motors, food-for-work and cash-for-work projects, trauma counseling and pastoral care, livelihood support, school repairs, irrigation pumps, agricultural supplies, as well as assistance with community organization, capacity building, and disaster preparedness. Activities will continue through 2006.

In Thailand, CWS is assisting our partner, which is working primarily in Phang Nga and Krabi provinces, to provide food, water, cooking supplies, baby food, hygiene items, and other necessary assistance. Longer-term support, through 2006, will include pastoral counseling, livelihood support such as fishing boats, nets, and vocational training, as well as educational support for children. CWS is also assisting people in need who lack identity documents and are unable to access government assistance – particularly ethnic minorities and migrants from neighboring Myanmar (Burma).

CWS also provided 100 Interchurch Medical Assistance (IMA) medicine boxes for the relief efforts of the Thai Government. The medicine boxes, each assisting about 1,000 people for three months, have been donated to the Thai Red Cross.

In Somalia, CWS is helping to provide water, sanitation, and livelihood assistance for 11,200 people in Beinda Bela and Eyl districts. Our partner is assisting communities in constructing water systems, training water committees on bookkeeping, and supporting the construction and rehabilitation of 20 shallow wells for livestock usage. CWS is also helping to provide tools for digging and building latrines and the technical support that goes with it. Fishermen are receiving boats, nets, hooks, and education.

Church World Service has provided more than $11 million in support (both financial and in-kind) for tsunami recovery efforts and continues to seek support for long-term recovery needs.

Some 550 campesino (farmer and farm worker) women and men in 20 rural communities in Nicaragua are being helped by CWS and our partner, Center for Inter-Ecclesial, Theological, and Social Studies, to grow more food with aids like improved cultivation techniques, while training the farmers to be leaders in their communities. As part of the training, they are learning about interpersonal relations, human rights and laws related to municipal and community management, how to create community work plans, and how to present their ideas and plans before municipal authorities and other groups.

Your prayers and support - and your participation in CROP WALKS and the TOOLS & BLANKETS Program - make possible these and other life sustaining programs. For information on how to get involved, please call your Church World Service/CROP Regional Office toll-free at 1-888-CWS-CROP, that's 1-888-297-2767.

For information about free loan videos, please call 1-800-297-1516, ext. 338, or e-mail us at: videos@churchworldservice.org.

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