heks

Unusually heavy monsoon rains in July and August 2010 led to Pakistan’s biggest flood disaster in 80 years. Millions of people lost everything they owned. According to information from the UN, over 20 million people have been directly affected by the disaster. More than 1700 people have died and 1.7 million houses were seriously damaged or even destroyed. An area of agricultural land five times bigger than Switzerland was swamped. One million people lost everything they owned. Animals belonging to many farming families were drowned and the fields were left under a one-metre-high layer of sand and mud. The water did not spare towns and villages either. Numerous schools and health care centres were damaged or destroyed.

HEKS provided emergency aid immediately after the floods in collaboration with Caritas Switzerland and its local partner organisation Anatolian Development Foundation (ADF). The people affected were provided with food, household items and warm clothing. Longer-term reconstruction projects in collaboration with partner organisations are now being planned.

Aims, points of focus, initiatives:

A point of focus of the rebuilding work is the repair and reconstruction of schools in Sindh province, which has suffered the most damage: classrooms were destroyed or filled with mud and playgrounds were ravaged, latrines collapsed and school benches and tables were washed away. A total of 36 schools are to be rehabilitated: thirteen of them need to be demolished and rebuilt. All the buildings will be strengthened to enable them to withstand future natural disasters such as floods, storms and earthquakes. The schools are being kitted out with new furniture, toilets and water tanks. Playgrounds and the areas surrounding the buildings are also to be refurbished. Temporary school buildings will ensure that teaching can continue during the building works.

The next step will be a health education programme for schools to ensure that buildings and toilets are properly managed and maintained.

Further reconstruction projects are currently being examined.