“Ministry will bear no meaning if you don’t address the poor’s needs,” said CEDAR’s Indian partner

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CEDAR Fund’s partner EFICOR distributes emergency supplies to flood-affected families in Kerala (Photo credit: EFICOR)

 

“If we don’t address the needs of the poorest people in the community, then our projects will have no meaning,” said Ramesh Babu, programs director of EFICOR.

 

EFICOR, the Evangelical Fellowship of India Commission on Relief,  is our Indian partner accumulated 51 years of experience in poverty alleviation and disaster relief. In India, climate change is closely linked to increased poverty. More than half of India’s working population is farmer, and around 30% of total population lives below the poverty line. While it is most affected by climate change, it frequently suffers from severe floods and droughts. Farmers’ annual harvests are also greatly reduced because of the impacts of global warming. Last year, several hundred peasants committed suicide because they could not bear the huge economic pressure brought by the drought in Tamil Nadu, South India.

 

When facing disasters, poor farmers are usually the most vulnerable as they lack knowledge, economic capacity and reliable social infrastructure to deal with natural hazards.

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CEDAR Supports Post-flood Relief in Kerala State

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CEDAR Fund’s Indian partner EFICOR provides food and non-food aid to flood-affected families in Kerala (Photo credit: EFICOR, 27th August, 2018)

 

“This is a wonderful moment as this act of love is a great and timely support for my family to survive for one month… It is a god-given comfort for my family.” Indu, resident of Kerala in southern India, says.

 

Last month, Kerala suffered the worst floods in a hundred years. Indu is still reeling from fear. The floods took away all her belongings and destroyed her house. Indu and her family temporarily stayed in a relief camp. Since her husband has been living with kidney disease, Indu could not imagine when their house could be rebuilt and when her sons could continue school.

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Disaster Prevention is Not Easy: Villagers building dam in northwestern Bangladesh

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Floods cause sand to cover agricultural land, forming sandbar one by one like this

 

If you have read SHARE July 2018, you are not unfamiliar with the concepts of Disaster Management and Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR). Through the ePrayer this week, we are going to have a look at Kurigram District in northwestern Bangladesh to understand the challenges of poor community doing disaster management work.

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Let Indians voice their right to information: Christian group bridges government and villagers

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CEDAR’s partner EFICOR formed and supported the Disaster Management Committees(DMC) in 15 villages of Hasanpur block of India. DMC mmember Mr. Buchi Thakur (centre) is helping women, widows, old people, and people with disability in his village to access pension and other government entitlements

 

When confronting natural disasters, impoverished people are often the most vulnerable group. It is especially difficult for them to cope with disasters due to a lack of resources and knowledge, resulted from limited education. Although public resources are available, they may not be aware of it and do not know how to access. CEDAR’s partner organisation in India has witnessed the difficulties of poor people in obtaining information and government assistance.

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The Church playing a part in DRR work is most effective and sustainable

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A PADR facilitator (first right) is explaining a ploughing method

Stanley Enock Hanya is the Coordinator of Church and Community Mobilisation projects at Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe (EFZ), which is one of the biggest evangelical alliances in Zimbabwe. He hopes to equip faith leaders in churches to teach their congregation to facilitate community development based on biblical principles.

 

Written by: Stanley Enock Hanya (Church and Community Mobilisation Coordinator, EFZ)

 

The EFZ embarked on Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) after calls for relief from previous project communities that had been affected by 2015/2016 El Niño induced drought. Realising that disaster response was not sustainable, the organisation began to intently look at the word of God for inspiration on issues of disaster prevention. It was after some soul-searching effort that we were able to adopt the Participatory Assessment of Disaster Risk (PADR) as a tool to guide the implementation of DRR initiatives in communities.

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Wish Them Health!

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40-day-old Muhammad was carried by his cousin to the Mother and Child Healthcare Centre for check up

According to UNICEF, neonatal mortality rate stands at 46 deaths per 1,000 births, and 81 in every 1,000 children do not live past their 5th birthday in Pakistan. 178 of every 100,000 pregnant mothers die during or after delivery. These numbers tell us that surviving and living healthily is a challenge to Pakistani children and mothers.

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