The Federation's mission is to improve
the lives of vulnerable people by mobilizing the power of humanity. It
is the world's largest humanitarian organisation and its millions of volunteers
are active in 178 countries. For more information: www.ifrc.org
Launched on 24 September 1999 for
3.3 million for 4 months for 100.000 Beneficiaries Budget
increased to CHF 55.4 million and the rehabilitation programme will be
extended to July 2005
Disaster Relief Emergency Fund (DREF) Allocated: 200,000 (already reimbursed) Beneficiaries: 100.000
Period covered: June - December 2002 ; Last Update: Report no 8 issued June 10th 2002); Next Update 10 expected July 2003
IN BRIEF
Appeal coverage: 100%
Related Appeals: East Asia regional programmes 01.69/03
Outstanding needs: None
Summary: The 1999 earthquake caused widespread misery and the massive subsequent relief and reconstruction effort has made a huge difference to the lives of many of those affected. Donor support for the Federation's appeal have been magnificent and as a result, impact at the community level has been significant.
Operational Developments
The "921 earthquake" is now history. This is the official attitude in Taiwan A museum has been inaugurated this autumn in the earthquake area. Life in Taiwan in general has returned to normal. The infrastructure has been restored . The temporary housing units constructed by the Rehabilitation programme are now only half occupied and had to be abandoned completely according to government decision latest end of September 2002.
But the government was not able to find alternative houses for the remaining inhabitants so they still live in these temporary villages, that now has turned in to a kind of ghost villages. However, unemployment rate in the areas hit by the earthquake has remained higher than Taiwan average, partly because of the structural problems which Taiwan is facing but also because of the disaster. It has been assumed by Taiwan Education specialists that the decrease in education opportunity in compulsory education was caused by the fact that some households could not afford to pay the education fees. There has been a general economic downturn in Taiwan and in particular the plight of low income aboriginal people has been more deteriorated.
Based on discussions among the Taiwan Red Cross Organization (TRCO), relevant Taiwanese authorities, and the Federation, it was proposed to use a major part ( Apr. CHF 9 million) of the funds earmarked for the activities for the 1999 Taiwan Earthquake, for cash disbursement programme for aboriginal people, who are deemed most vulnerable even now.
Coordination
The TRCO has continued to work closely with the relevant local authorities on the implementation of the rehabilitation projects in Taiwan and to make regular visits to the earthquake affected areas where the programme was implemented.
The Federation programme manager ( Danish Red Cross consultant to Taiwan) has liaised closely with the TRCO, Regional Finance Unit (RFU)-KL, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), and the Secretariat in Geneva on programme issues.
Red Cross and Red Crescent Society
A: The rehabilitation programme
The rehabilitation phase, in which the TRCO and the Federation have been involved, has been divided into three main areas:
1. Support to communities where houses were destroyed during the earthquake
2. Support to local authority health and education projects;
3. Strengthening the capacity of the TRCO in disaster preparedness and response.
The original Federation's financial commitment was USD 29.2 million (approximately CHF49 million). During the process of programme implementation, this was reduced to USD23.5 million (approximately CHF39.5 million) mainly due to the cancellation of Federation commitments for 4 school reconstruction as was explained in our previous Ops Update. The projects were:
| Name of the Project | Status |
| Community support | |
| Construction of temporary housing units (1.341 units) | Completed/ February 2000 |
| Provision of basic household items(5.205 units) | Completed/February 2000 |
| Financial support to families ( 2.341 families) | Completed/May 2000 |
| Community Welfare activities ( 81 communities) | Completed/ December 2001 80 out 81 has submitted their final reporting. Among them 5 was yet to be validated To be finished by the end of year |
| Psychological support and social welfare | Completed/September 2002 |
| Health and Education projects | |
| Construction/renovation of schools (6 units) | Completed/November 2002. From the Fung Shan school still some bills has not been submitted. To be fully completed end of 2002 |
| Construction/renovation of health facilities ( 3 units) | 1 under construction, will be finished
December 2002 2 in the bidding process. Will be finished in March 2003 |
| Disaster preparedness | |
| TRCO disaster preparedness project( 4 DP centers) | Completed/ June 2002 |
As indicated above, all projects except the health facilities have been completed. The Federations programme manager made a monitoring visit to 3 of the schools that had recently been finished and the one health clinic under construction during September. In particular 2 of the schools presented themselves very well. Rather small primary schools but with a very interesting and inspiring architecture. Talks with head masters, teachers and pupils left the impression of a high degree of satisfaction. PWC also made a monitoring visit to this school in October 2002.
Health and care
What remains to be done in this programme was the renovation or reconstruction of three health care stations. The selection was done based on the amount of damage sustained, geographical location, accessibility and their situation in the most densely populated areas of Ren Ai district.
Objective 1 To renovate or reconstruct three health care stations in Ren Ai district and to provide basic medical equipment for the three clinics. In addition, the Ren Ai central hospital will be provided with one medical car and one mobile dental car.;
Construction work on the three health care stations in Chin Ai, Huchu and Jinyin tsuns ( settlements) was due to start in December 2000 and should have been completed by June 2001, but has been delayed. This was partly because the administrative procedure to change the land utilisation has been protracted. All issues about the use of aboriginal land has been settled. The Huchu clinic is constructed on the original site, Jinyin and Chin Ai clinics will be constructed on new sites. The Huchu clinic was finished in December 2002. The design and blueprint for Jinyin and Chin Ai has been completed and the bidding process has started. The 2 clinics are expected to be finished in the end of March 2003.
Both the PWC, the Federation programme manager and TRCO has done monitoring visits to the Huchu clinic, and confirmed that the construction was 55% finished. Good materials. A combination of concrete, wood and glass. Nice design It is very nicely located, and will be a major asset for the community once it is completed. The clinic will also be provided with a dental unit.
B. The Cash disbursement programme for low income Aboriginal People
The Federation's commitment in this programme is NT$ 200,000,000 ( Approximately. CHF9 million).
The objective :
To give general cash support of NTD 50,000 per family to lessen the financial burden of household spending to 4,000 aboriginal low income families.
The beneficiaries are :
- either single parents with school children and/or family members with disability,
- families with school children and/or children with disability and
- elderly or senior citizens without any income or assets.
In co-operation with the Aboriginal Bureau, the list of 3,992 beneficiaries was provided to the TRCO in the end of October. After checking the eligibility of each beneficiary by the TRCO, 500 names had to be excluded from the list. The Aboriginal Bureau was asked to come up with alternate 500 new names as beneficiaries. First distribution started in the end of November and is expected to be finished end of March 2003.
Through a very well organized distribution process which took place in the end of November, 3,440 postal cheques were actually handed over by the programme manager or the SG of TRCO to the beneficiaries. After careful checking of ID, the postal cheque was handed over to the beneficiaries. They signed a receipt and further received information material that clearly indicated the intended use of the money and the purpose of this programme done by the TRCO. The distribution was very smooth and handled with great respect and dignity for the beneficiaries. Both the Federation Programme manager, and the PWC made monitoring during the distribution.
C. The Disaster Preparedness and Organisational Development Programme.
The MoU for the first Phase of this programme was signed in June 2002. The 2nd phase budget has been discussed, and will be agreed between the TRCO and the Federation soon. The Federation's total commitment for the programme running from June 2002 until June 2005 is NTD 141.614,050 ( Approximately CHF 6.5 million). The Federation placed one programme manager to assist the TRCO with the implementation of the programme.
The goals of the programme are
- To provide the TRCO with staff and volunteers trained in DP and DP management on all levels.
- To improve the overall capacity of TRCO using Federation standards in all departments, by infusing manpower and material in the project period
- To repair and upgrade existing training facilities
- To equip the remaining 11 branches with relief supplies, equipment, transportation and communication material.
The delegate has in particular been active in providing the necessary basic manuals and guidebooks in the training. The manual for Disaster Preparedness covering authority and legal basis, policies, Standard Operating procedures, general guidelines and role delineation's has been produced. At present it is in the proof reading phase. To be printed beginning of spring 2003. Collecting material and writing parts for a Guidebook has been initiated.
All necessary forms for logistics according to Federation standards has been translated and new ones created fitting in to the Taiwan context. All forms are collected on a CD distributed to the branches. All staffmembers has during the workshops received instructions in the use of the forms and different reporting requirements. Templates produced.
All professional staff have been through elements in Disaster management, SWOT analysis, Management in general, Disaster Incident Critical debriefing, etc. during 3 week-long workshops. The delegate put his huge input into these material for the workshops. All materials are now in translated into Chinese on CD-ROM and distributed to the participants.
The delegate has further given extensive assistance regarding topics on governance and management, both when it comes to knowledge and skills.( mandate of the board, reporting, project planning, recording, evaluation) . With the assistance of the delegate, job descriptions have been created for all staff at HQ.
Upon the request of the SG, Communication/Team Building Programme has been started on a monthly bases under the guidance of the delegate. The organisational development initiatives have so far in general only been targeting HQ staff.
Objective 1.: To repair and upgrade existing training facilities and provide training equipment to HQ, chapters and branches.
- Activity 1.1 and 1.2 The training facilities on Hsing-Shen S.Road is under renovation. There has been a delay because the engineer informed us that the original renovation plan was not feasible according to their Construction Law. A new plan was drafted and renovation will be finished by the end of January 2003 and then the new equipment will be installed. The costs for renovation has been smaller than was originally planned because of the changes. The money has instead been used to increase the training equipment with 2 PC's.
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