$375,000 Funding from Emergency Response Fund
Immediately following the 7.5-magnitude earthquake that hit Afghanistan last week and affected Pakistan and India, Qatar Red Crescent Society (QRCS) was the first humanitarian organization to respond.
Within one hour of the disaster, the Disaster Management Information Center (DMIC) was convened to monitor the situation. QRCS allocated $375,000 from its Emergency Response Fund to launch an urgent intervention there.
To relieve the victims of the earthquake, the worst in decades, QRCS issued an emergency appeal to raise QR 7 million (nearly $1.9 million) for urgent assistance in health care, shelter, food and nonfood aid, and water and sanitation. The six-month relief program is targeting 125,000 victims.
Shelter and nonfood aid: At a cost of $1,350,000 over six months, 6,000 families (42,000 people) will receive tarpaulins, blankets, mattresses, winter clothes, lambs, kitchenware, and water tanks. Also, 400 destroyed houses will be rebuilt.
Food aid: QRCS teams will provide 2,600 families (18,300 people) with one-month food packages to meet their needs and reduce malnutrition. The food packages will be purchased from the local market at a cost of $170,000 and will be distributed over one month.
Health care: The plan involves offering primary health care to protect the community against contagious diseases, supporting secondary health care facilities with medicines and medical consumables purchased from the local market, and sending mobile emergency clinics in coordination with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). This part of the plan will serve 15,000 people over two months, at a cost of $100,000.
Water and sanitation: To ensure the availability sources of potable water and improve personal hygiene, QRCS will build toilets, launch awareness campaigns, distribute hygiene kits, and provide clean water to 50,000 people. This $297,808 aspect will last for three months.
From day one, QRCS's mission in Afghanistan sent teams to assess the situation on the ground, in coordination with the Afghan Red Crescent Society. They distributed humanitarian assistance to 4,030 beneficiaries in Badakhshan and 3,950 beneficiaries in Nangarhar, Kunar, Nuristan, and Laghman.