The Canadian Red Cross-funded activities in the tsunami-affected Indian State of Tamil Nadu have seen the completion of several projects, working in close partnership with the Indian Red Cross Society. These projects are linked to the restoration of livelihoods in a region of India where the coastal population is largely dependant on sustenance fishing.
Five large net mending sheds have been constructed, where damaged nets are repaired in cool, shaded facilities protected from the intense heat and glare of the sun.
These sheds are accompanied by the provision of new fishing nets and also light-weight cargo autos that transport the daily fishing haul to market where the fresh catch gains a higher price.
Recovery also includes ice boxes to ensure freshness, and an ice-making plant is also part of a comprehensive livelihoods recovery plan.
Each of these livelihoods capital assets is managed by a local community development group formed to ensure long-term sustainability. Additional funds will be provided in 2008, so that these livelihood groups can create viable small businesses to strengthen family and village economic security.
In October 2007, the handover of 40 long-lasting, fibre-reinforced plastic fishing boats, complete with motors, and – true to Red Cross thinking – life jackets and First Aid kits.
“The community development groups who manage these boats will help secure stable incomes for the families who are helping through our partnership with the Indian Red Cross,” says Chris Rosene, director of Canadian Red Cross development programs who attended the handover of the boats.
To complement the livelihoods initiative, a small Skills Trade Institute will provide a venue where Tsunami-affected family members can learn new marketable skills in the rapidly-changing economy of 21st-century India.
All of these wide-ranging activities are centered on the original pre-school classroom (“crèches”) projects in 12 most severely-affected villages, where children traumatized by the tsunami receive emotional wellness support through play-oriented activities such as arts & crafts, story-telling, singing and dancing, bolstered by supplemental nutrition.
Canadian Red Cross also provided emergency relief supplies during the Tamil Nadu floods in February 2008, when 5,000 family packs and 5,000 hygiene kits were distributed to beneficiaries already impacted by the tsunami.
|
 |
 |
|
|
The Secretary and the Treasurer of one of the community development groups display the group's bank savings book from their livelihood earnings and the minute book that records their intra-group loaning decisions. (p17910)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
|
Chris Rosene, Canadian Red Cross Director of International Development and Howard Arfin, Canadian Red Cross Country Coordinator for India, giving life-jackets and boat ownership certificates to fishermen during the handover ceremony. (p17911)
|
|
|
 |
|
|
Emergency-ready Red Cross cyclone shelters in coastal Tamil Nadu also serve as classrooms for the pre-school crèches and meeting rooms for the Red Cross community development groups. (p17912)
|
|
|
 |
|
|
Fishermen haul their nets up to the Red Cross-funded net mending sheds for repair in time for the next day's rounds. (p17914)
|
|
|
 |
|
|
A community development group responsible for one of the five net mending sheds stands at the entranceway of their new livelihoods business. (p17915)
|
|
News
