UN Says Not Enough Tents In The World For Quake Survivors

[Barrett808]

UN Says Not Enough Tents In The World For Quake Survivors
by Danny Kemp
Islamabad (AFP)

A senior United Nations official said Tuesday there were not enough tents in the world to protect refugees from the coming winter after the October 8 earthquake in South Asia.

Tents are a priority item with around three million people made homeless, many of them forced to live in the open in plummeting temperatures in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir and parts of North West Frontier Province.

"It is fair to say the indication is that there are not enough tents in the world available to support the requirements," Andrew MacLeod, chief operations officer in the UN emergency response centre in Islamabad, told AFP.

Pakistan on Tuesday banned all exports of tents, a day after it said it would even buy tents from its rival India.

The UN has said it had already exhausted the supply of the vital items in Pakistan, which is itself the world's biggest producer of so-called winterized tents.

(more)

http://www.terradaily.com/news/disaster-management-05zz...

[phantom power]

1. That pretty much says it all. Not enough tents in the world.

It's been a long time since the world has seen a period of major upheaval, climatic, geologic, or otherwise. Our civilization grew up during a very benign period. We have yet to re-learn how bad "bad" can really be. Even what we've seen this year is nothing special.

[semillama]

2. this is gonna be bad.

How many thousands of people are going to die of exposure in the coming months?

How many tens of thousands of Americans will be surprised to hear about this if you talk about it?

[Lisa]

3. I guess this is what they mean by the world entering a "tents situation"

Seriously -- this is a bad sign. I wonder what else we will be running short of, as the disasters continue to mount up ... vaccines, transportation aircraft?

The UN has projected 50 million people displaced and on the move, well within our lifetimes ... and that's just the environmental refugees, not ones from existing and future conflicts.

[Barrett808]

4. As the price of oil continuously increases, disaster relief cost...

...will increase greatly.

[Lisa]

7. excellent point ...

Canada sent a bunch of stuff earlier this week. It's probably costing us as much in fuel to get the supplies there, as the supplies themselves. I wonder how many aid agencies are having to spend money on transportation costs (international and within the affected areas) which would otherwise have gone to buy more stuff?

Thanks for posting the article, by the way. Very informative.

[JoFerret]

5. Identify a good relief org that is there

and send money.
Oxfam has my check (pitiful though it is.)

[Angry Girl]

8. Here's a list of organizations

http://nightweed.com/pakistan_victim_aid.html

I personally like

Médecins Sans Frontières
Doctors Without Borders
http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org

[MADem]

6. You can build an emergency shelter with poles, plastic sheeting

and duct tape. We have plenty of plastic sheeting and duct tape, don't we???? They are doing it in AFRICA now:
http://www.farsudan.org/feature_shelters.html

A total of 22,500 plastic sheets were donated by CVHW, ICCO, ECHO, and the British Embassy in Khartoum for distribution in the camps. With the cooperation of FAR, Medair, CARE, and CVHW, by the end of March one emergency shelter kit had been distributed to 20,144 households who had been affected by the demolitions, while the balance is being distributed to individuals who experience on-going demolitions in Omdurman El Salam. With the plastic sheets provided, the beneficiaries are able to cover their makeshift shelters and protect their homes from the approaching rainy season, while they follow the process of further construction or acquisition of plots. This protection reduces their vulnerability to contamination and other health and sanitation related risks.

[cantstandbush]

9. OK, who are the tent-makers? Seems like a ripe job market to me.

Why hasn't some enterprising person asked for a grant to build a tent-making business? I guess Halliburton in working on it now?