AmiableAID Volunteering Women’s Empowerment

When amiableAID began working with the women in the tsunami-affected areas, discovered to surprise that although they lived near the sea, the women and girls did not know how to swim. This was one of the reasons why many women died during the tsunami.

After the tsunami, the physical safety of widows and single women was at risk as cases of domestic violence increased. Due to the death of male breadwinners, widows were forced to take on a dual role: They earned the family income while caring for children and the elderly.

AmiableAID worked to restore the earning capacity of women widowed by the tsunami whose livelihoods were damaged or destroyed.

AmiableAID encouraged, trained, and arranged financial assistance for these women to engage in economic activity, which resulted in these women’s were able to take charge of their own recovery and are not seen as helpless victims and passive recipients of aid.

They are able to take care of their household needs and are recognized as responsible and rational economic actors.

And they have regained their dignity. They are the driving force in the restoration – not only of the physical infrastructure, but also of families and communities.

AMIABLE AID’S TSUNAMI RESPONSE

The fast-moving wall of water that rolled in from the ocean on December 26, 2004, break with terrifying force over the once quiet and beautiful district of Nagappattinam with terrifying force.

The December tsunami acted with hazardous impartiality, wrecking fishing villages, killing tourists and subsistence level coastal farmers, flooding the sites of past colonial elites, and wading away relics.

Having extracted a toll of thousands of lives while leaving behind much more homeless, emotionally devastated survivors, reminded the people of the Indian Ocean of the rim road of the capricious natural forces against which all hopes for development are phrased.

Our Amiable Aid Foundation, volunteered/participated/organised/performed/sponsored in collaboration with relief organisations and government officials working in the aftermath of the disaster to address the larger death toll, the damage to settlements, the reorientation and rehabilitation of those who were spared, and the rebuilding of a sense of safety and community. Our area of operation was the coastal districts in the state of Tamilnadu, India.

The list of activities carried out since the first day of the tsunami is provided here to give an overview of the services provided.

• Establishment of special homes for orphaned adolescent girls between the ages of 14 and 18 and unmarried girls over the age of 18, providing them with clothing, social protection, and skill development activities that will lead to income-generating programmes and enable them to study.
• Re-chanellising surgical procedures to reproduce mothers who lost their siblings to the tsunami waves.
• Removal of debris, recovery of bodies, preparation for burial/cremation of the dead.
• Rescue of survivors, medical care for the injured, provision of clothing, food and water
• Construction of makeshift bridges and roads for access to coastal villages inundated by seawater.
• Housing survivors in safer places such as schools, wedding houses and public buildings, providing food and clothing.
• Setting up emergency shelters where each surviving family received a boot, kerosene, palm oil, salt, turmeric powder, tamarind, sugar, tea dust, powdered milk, and dry chilies.
• Free books and uniforms were distributed to affected children, duplicate school certificates were issued to those who had lost their original certificates in the tsunami disaster, and exemption from school, special and examination fees was organised for tsunami-affected students.
• A comprehensive counselling and support programme was initiated to restore confidence in the affected people.
• Men, women and children nursed back to a normal level of self-confidence after the trauma.
• Capacity building and implementation support in the form of planning, construction, monitoring, technical advice and phased disaster management.
• Approval of the relief package for families returning to Nagappattinam from the comparatively worst affected Andaman Nocobar Islands.
• The Tsunami Emergency Relief Programme accelerated economic growth and poverty reduction in tsunami-affected areas by supporting livelihood restoration, especially for the poor, and complementary rehabilitation and reconstruction of damaged public infrastructure; restored livelihoods; improved transport infrastructure such as roads, bridges, and ports; and improved rural and municipal infrastructure such as water supply and sanitation.
• Emergency assistance for implementing agencies for partially damaged mechanised fishing boats and for the construction of new boats to replace fully damaged boats – approved.
• Assistance package for fishermen who lost their landing sites, ports and launching sites damaged by the tsunami – provided.
• Assistance package for owners of mobile/temporary stores and pukka stores – approved.
• Assistance for property damage to small business owners, such as owners of shrimp and crab farms, owners of fish farms, owners of marine materials transportation companies, ice cream manufacturers, etc., who lost their assets to the tsunami – appropriated
• Restoration of cross walls in salt pans damaged by the tsunami.
• Assistance to small businesses that were affected by the tsunami – provided
• Acquisition of land for construction of permanent houses, repair/reconstruction of damaged houses – arranged.
• Support for reclamation of tsunami-affected sand and salt marshes, assistance for loss of livestock and support for affected farmers – organised
• Construction of walls to prevent water from entering coastal villages, planting of organic areas.
• Construction of schools, day care centres, hospitals, primary health centres, community centres, vocational training centres, etc. in tsunami-affected areas. Establishment of special kindergartens in the tsunami-affected areas.

As is evident from the worldwide response to the tsunami emergencies which brought out best in human nature, compassion, determination and heroism come out on behalf of others.

The Amiable Aid Foundation’s immediate efforts and rehabilitation efforts have been recognised from many quarters around the world.