Humanitarian Emergency in Pakistan

Mohamed Mechmache, Action Against Hunger’s Emergency Field Coordinator, reports on Action Against Hunger’s response to the crisis


What is the current situation?



Pakistan was hit by the worst flooding in its history, affecting an estimated 20 million people. The flooding began in the north but has since moved south, washing away homes, bridges, roads, irrigation systems and some of the country’s most fertile and productive lands. In the southern province of Sindh, the Indus River has spilled over its banks, leaving fields and entire villages buried in muddy water. Millions are displaced and families have lost literally everything—their homes, their crops, their livestock and their livelihoods or small trades.





In 2009 over two million civilians in this area were already displaced by ongoing fighting, so this was another blow to families who have already suffered through a lot. The situation is much worse than the 2005 earthquake in Kashmir that left three million people homeless, in part because flooding in the northwest hit a population that was reeling from last year’s drought and conflict between the Pakistani Army and the Taliban insurgents. In 2009 over two million civilians in this area were already displaced by ongoing fighting, so this was another blow to families who have already suffered through a lot.


What are the biggest concerns?

In Pakistan, like other places that have experienced natural disasters, deadly water-borne illnesses can spread exceedingly quickly. The death toll from these diseases might exceed the current death toll from flooding itself (over 1700 have died) if we do not address this concern properly and rapidly. Water and sanitation infrastructure has been damaged and destroyed throughout Pakistan, forcing people to drink from contaminated sources and use the bathroom out in the open. I can’t emphasize enough how big a risk this is to public health, as thousands of cases of acute diarrhea and cholera have already been reported. Right now, we are very focused on stemming these kinds of illnesses.

How is ACF controlling water-borne disease outbreaks?


In the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in northwestern Pakistan, our teams are responding to the urgent needs of 52,000 people sheltering in temporary camps or returning to their villages. We have begun organising daily distributions of 32,000 liters of drinking water through a range of methods, including water trucking, installation of pumps and portable reservoirs, and the restoration of 100 water points and damaged irrigation systems. We’re constructing 600 emergency latrines, hand-washing stations and showers to help make sure conditions are sanitary in the camps and nearby villages. And to meet basic hygiene needs, we are distributing 7,500 kits with essential items like buckets, soap, detergent, sanitary pads and water purification tablets.



Our teams are responding to the urgent needs of 52,000 people sheltering in temporary camps or returning to their villages. We’re also training families on effective emergency hygiene practices and launching programmes to spray affected areas with insecticide. In addition, we are beginning a cleaning campaign to clear areas of dangerous, unsanitary debris through cash-for-work activities that will help community members select adequate food, improve their livelihoods and recover their autonomy.



In the Sindh province in southeastern Pakistan, where hundreds of thousands of people were recently evacuated because of surging floodwater, we are gearing up to deliver emergency programmes in water, sanitation and hygiene to help 80,000 people. Similarly, we’ll be trucking in water, repairing water points, distributing hygiene kits and constructing latrines, along with other activities to help make sure deadly diseases like cholera and diarrhoea don’t spread.

Our cash-for-work and fresh food voucher programmes are going to provide financial support to more than 10,000 families in the months to come. What other help will people get from Action Against Hunger?



As mentioned briefly before, our cash-for-work and fresh food voucher programmes are going to provide financial support to more than 10,000 families in the months to come. These programs are focused on helping restore their ability to feed themselves. In the same spirit, we will support hundreds of traders and small business owners, including women, through access to business restart grants while rehabilitating small scale community and market infrastructure. We’ve also identified the most vulnerable households in the areas where we’re working to receive cooking utensils, blankets, sheets, mosquito nets and mattresses so that they can slowly begin to rebuild their lives.

From Trickle to Torrent

A blog by Action Against Hunger’s Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Advisor, Nick Radin


"The road to Hombo is a muddy mess. When it rains in D.R. Congo, driving a few miles, even in a four-by-four vehicle, can take hours. I’m travelling to see our water installations in Hombo with Mamady Camara, who began working with Action Against Hunger seven years ago in his native Guinea, and now manages our water, sanitation and hygiene programmes in the zone. We’re also accompanied by two national staff, Congolese water technicians named André and Bonaventure, who grew up in the area and know it inside and out.

Over the last six months, the people of Hombo have taken in a wave of new arrivals coming to escape violence and seeking refuge with local families. Compared to surrounding villages, Hombo is perceived as relatively safe because of its close proximity to a base of U.N. Peacekeepers. This recent influx of displaced people has increased the village’s population by nearly 40 percent and put enormous pressure on local resources.

Before Action Against Hunger arrived, the only clean water source for all of Hombo was an unprotected spring - barely more than a trickle, really. You had to stand there for more than two minutes just to fill one 20-litre jerry can with water. This may not seem like a long time, but because there were 5,000 people that needed water every single day, they would sometimes have to wait in line for hours to get it.

Since each family was only permitted to fill one jerry can of water per day, not nearly enough for all their daily needs and far below minimum humanitarian standards, they were forced to draw much of their water from a nearby river.
This is the same river where people bathe, mothers wash their families’ laundry and animals drink and defecate. You can get a whole host of illnesses from drinking dirty water like this, including cholera, diarrhea and dysentery, which kill thousands of children in D.R. Congo every year.

We get out of our vehicle by the river in Hombo and are greeted by a group of women ecstatically whooping and hollering. They are gathering clean water from the tanks Action Against Hunger has installed by the river, and the joy on their faces is contagious.

In June, our teams set up a series of tanks to treat and fully decontaminate water that’s drawn from the river. The clean water from these tanks is then fed directly into a row of taps, where the women and children of Hombo now come to collect water each day. These taps provide more than enough water for the whole village, including the 2,000 newcomers that have arrived over the last few months, which means that all families now have access to as much safe water as they need.

I’m introduced to Bashige Dorcase, who, full of relief, no longer worries about having enough clean drinking water for all her children. Mamaday shows me the place near the river where our hygiene promoters are conducting sessions on practices like hand-washing, safe water handling and latrine usage. These are crucial steps in stopping the spread of water-borne illnesses that have ravaged communities across Congo, and they’re part of our integrated approach to fighting hunger and disease.

In addition to caring for her own children, Bashige has taken in her three young nephews. Full of relief, she tells me how she no longer worries about having enough clean drinking water for all her children. She also says that the residents of Hombo are getting along much better since they don’t argue any more over access to the limited water supply.

Bashige and her family aren’t the only ones whose lives have been changed. Two months after Action Against Hunger came to Hombo, the number of people seeking treatment for diarrhea at the local health centre was cut by more than half. There’s been a dramatic 95 percent drop in reported cholera cases, too.

My job takes me to villages across East and Central Africa just like Hombo. But seeing hope and gratitude on the faces of women like Bashige never gets old for me. At home in New York, it’s sometimes easy to forget how something as simple as a glass of clean water can make a world of difference. But today, it’s obvious. I hear it in the joyous shouts of the people of Hombo”

Action Against Hunger | ACF International is an international humanitarian organisation committed to ending child hunger. For more information, please visit: www.actionagainsthunger.org.uk and become a fan at http://acf-uk-facebook.tk/