(extract)
The Oxfam Emergencies Bulletin aims to give an overview of Oxfams current emergency work world-wide, for use in communications work. It appears monthly.

For further information, contact Maurice Herson in the Emergencies Department.

[ Telephone 01865 312540; e-mail mherson@oxfam.org.uk ]

Peru / Bolivia

Floods affecting these two countries, as well as the contiguous far western Amazon area of Brazil, have exacerbated as a result of very high rainfall in the first three months of this year. In Bolivia they are reported to be the worst floods for over 50 years,

(Excerpt)
Heavy rains over the mountains of central Bolivia in January have caused mudslides and flooding over more than one million square kilometres, affecting eight of the country's nine provinces. More than 100,000 people have seen their houses damaged or destroyed, their crops lost and their livestock killed. All branches of the Bolivian Red Cross have been assisting victims, as part of Bolivia's national response to the disastrous floods, providing first aid and organizing campaigns to collect food and clothes.

(1:02pm AEDT)

More than 60-thousand people in Bolivia and Peru have been left homeless following nine days of torrential downpours, which have also destroyed thousands of hectares of crops.

Greg Watters reports:

The central Andean countries have been lashed by wild storms for more than a week which have destroyed homes and crops in jungle, coastal and mountainous regions. In the southern Bolivian city of Cochabamba 14-thousand people are homeless and medical authorities have reported outbreaks of Malaria and Yellow Fever. In the mountains of