Update as of 18 April 2006

Country in focus: Indonesia | Operational focus: Indonesia | Latest operational developments |
Printable version (PDF Document, 284kb, 5 pages) | Previous facts sheets

This fact sheet is the second in a short series where the tsunami operation
in a specific country is given particular focus.

Indonesia is the fourth most populated nation in the world, with some 240 million people inhabiting 6,000 of the country’s 17,500 islands, spanning 6,500 kilometres from end to end. Most people reside on the five major islands of Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan, Sulawesi and Papua. Its location on the edges of the Pacific, Eurasian, and Australian tectonic plates results in frequent earthquake tremours across the archipelago.

Northern Sumatra is the region of Indonesia worst-affected by the tsunami of December 2004. The massive relief operation took place under the most difficult conditions imaginable, but the recovery operation is being undertaken in more secure circumstances. Within the political context of the tsunami recovery operation, the security environment in Aceh continues to remain stable as the peace agreement signed on 15 August 2005 between the Government of Indonesia and the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) makes steady progress. The government has extended the exit date of the European Union and ASEAN-sponsored Aceh Monitoring Mission (AMM) for a further three months beyond the current 15 March 2006 deadline, with the intention to have an AMM presence in Aceh for the first round of local elections under the new accord.

Indonesia, the world’s fourth most populous country and the most volcanic nation on earth, lies in the volatile region susceptible to earthquakes known as the Pacific `Ring of Fire`

The Indonesian Red Cross (Palang Merah Indonesia – PMI) is an integral part of civil society in the country and recently celebrated its 60th anniversary. Since inception, PMI has contributed to the health and well-being of communities throughout Indonesia. The younger generation, nurtured as Red Cross volunteers through special units called Palang Merah Remaja (PMR, Red Cross youth), are provided with disaster preparedness training and organized into field response teams (Satgana). Today PMI has a nationwide presence in 31 provinces with 385 branches, 2,500 staff and over one million volunteers.

With more than half a century of history, PMI remains committed to supporting the most vulnerable amongst the people of Indonesia through programmes for improving health, reducing risks from disaster, and improving quality of life through awareness-building of the Movement’s humanitarian principles and values. The national society’s mission includes the promotion of the Movement’s Fundamental Principles, the Geneva Conventions, and the tenets of international humanitarian law.

Disaster preparedness and mitigation are PMI’s priorities. Other objectives include the implementation of community-based health and water sanitation facilities, blood services (PMI operates 165 blood transfusion units throughout the country), and plans to strengthen capacity at community level with programmes that guide branches and chapters towards ever better functionality.

At its 60th anniversary on 17 September 2005, PMI introduced a new motto: “With you for humanity”. The commemoration took place in Banda Aceh, recognizing that PMI and its Red Cross Red Crescent Movement partners in the country continue to work together on the post-tsunami reconstruction programme in Aceh and Nias.

The Federation and PNS are supporting PMI branches to expand ambulance services in Aceh Barat and Aceh Jaya districts.

The tsunami and earthquake response have placed extraordinary demands on PMI’s human resource capacities, while the tsunami itself damaged and destroyed PMI branch buildings in Aceh and took the lives of many staff and volunteers. Consequently, the internal focus of the national society over the past year has been on managing the tsunami operations with the close support of Red Cross Red Crescent partners, re-staffing the branch offices, recruiting new volunteers in Aceh and Nias, and planning for the rehabilitation and reconstruction of its damaged or destroyed buildings.

In the aftermath of the tsunami, more than 2,200 PMI Satgana volunteers from 27 provinces of Indonesia travelled to Aceh and Nias on two-week rotations, retrieving the bodies of fellow countrymen, women and children. Three months later the rotations resumed when a second earthquake struck Nias Island.

The effective inter-dependency of PMI provincial chapters, evident by Satgana team rotations into Aceh during the emergency phase, is currently being bolstered with new emergency preparedness stocks and improved warehousing facilities that help strengthen PMI’s ability to respond to disasters.

In the weeks following the catastrophe, Red Cross Red Crescent emergency water teams helped tens of thousands of people avoid water-borne diseases such as typhoid, cholera and diarrhoea. Working side by side with PMI volunteers, they delivered safe drinking water to affected communities using trucks, water bladders and emergency storage tanks and erected tap stands in tent and barrack camps. At the same time PMI counterparts were trained to test water quality and maintain the purification equipment.

To help communities understand the importance of water hygiene and to identify water sanitation needs for subsequent support, the Federation continues to train PMI volunteers to deliver participatory hygiene and sanitation transformation (PHAST) programmes.

Immediately after the tsunami struck, PMI volunteers distributed emergency rations from pre-positioned stocks, combined with local donations and supplies from the International Committee of the Red Cross. Within the first 30 days, PMI volunteers had distributed food including biscuits, water, noodles, rice, oil, tea and sugar to 345,000 people, with an additional distribution of family kits, hygiene kits, blankets, tarpaulins and mosquito nets to 29,000 people most critically in need.

After the urgent need to sustain lives with food, water, medical attention and rudimentary shelter, PMI volunteers working together with Federation staff began the huge task of registering beneficiaries across the widespread tsunami-impacted area, in order to procure sufficient supplies for the interim emergency period. To date, PMI volunteers, supported by Federation relief and recovery specialists, have registered more than 600,000 beneficiaries across Aceh and Nias. By keeping an accurate count of recipients of food and relief items, PMI and the Federation are able to plan for future needs, have sufficient stocks ‘in the pipeline,’ and maintain a continuous accountability to donors and the public.

The PMI/Federation relief programme that sprung into action on 26 December 2004 has since transitioned into an early-stage recovery programme. In late 2005, PMI, the Federation, partner national societies (PNS) and implementing partners from non-government organizations began replacing 27,000 of the most worn-out tents in Aceh and Nias, a process that is now completed. Construction of 20,000 steel frame and wood-walled transitional shelters (semi-permanent structures that will replace tents until people can move into permanent homes) also started during this time.

PMI volunteers register the names of the missing in the early days after the tsunami.

• To date over 667,000 beneficiaries, about 158,000 families, in Aceh and Nias have received food and relief items.
• Distribution of relief goods (food parcels, hygiene kits and kerosene lamps) in 2006 has started and will reach the more densely populated areas of Meulaboh, Teunom, Pidie, Lhokseumawe, Lamno, Calang and Aceh Besar.
• Data from assessments carried out on beneficiaries living with host families, in tent camps and barracks, and other settlements is currently being processed.
• Detailed assessments conducted by PMI branch staff and volunteers have identified 90 vulnerable villages on Aceh’s west coast in need of improved water and sanitation systems.
• Two public washrooms, two shallow wells, three septic tanks and a water storage tank have been constructed in Aceh Barat. Drainage projects were also completed at Desa Moon temporary living centre in Aceh Besar and in Sabang on Pulau Wey. On Nias, community members cleaned two spring catchments and assembled materials for repair work.
• Production of drinking water from the Federation’s mobile water treatment plant, located at the local administration water company (PDAM), averages 252,000 litres per day. More than 7,600,000 litres of water was distributed last month through PMI/Federation delivery points.
• A further 23 PMI volunteers from Aceh Barat Daya and 60 community volunteers from Aceh Barat and Nagan Raya districts have received PHAST training. Community members are expected to promote hygiene awareness in their respective villages.
• Under the PMI/Federation integrated community based risk reduction programme, a week-long training-of-trainers (ToT) session on techniques and methodology for hazards, vulnerability and capacity assessment was conducted in Banda Aceh for staff and branch volunteers. A similar programme will follow on from this in the second half of April with 65 villages in seven PMI branch areas.
• Radio equipment for the early warning system has been procured and installation is underway in the respective branches.
• The PMI video on disaster preparedness was shown in 30 villages in Aceh Besar and Banda Aceh districts in the past month. Additionally, 15,000 calendars with relevant messages and paintings were distributed by ten PMI branches.
• The Federation and PNS are supporting PMI branches to expand ambulance services in Aceh Barat and Aceh Jaya districts. Four volunteers from each PMI branch attended ambulance training.
• The PMI/Federation health assessment team on Nias Island has completed a survey of 30 selected villages comprising 600 households; analysis and reporting will take place within the next month.
• To date, 4,855 transitional shelter frames have been constructed in 35 villages, with 597 transitional homes completed with wooden walls and flooring.
• PMI is providing traditional vaccination campaign support services comprising social mobilization, cold-chain logistics, and door-to-door follow-up to ensure all children have been reached.
• PMI distributed 400,000 leaflets on avian influenza across 13 provinces during the past month.

For 60 years Palang Merah Indonesia has supported the most vulnerable in the country.

• Over 1,900 homes are under construction on 74 sites across 11 districts. The housing programme continues to face delays due to allocation of inappropriate land, lack of beneficiary lists to ensure end ownership of constructed homes, revisions to the buffer zone and implications of the revision on the number of people eligible for the donor- and community-supported housing programme.
• Forty vocational training courses have been successfully implemented for 1,000 beneficiaries in Kalutara, Matara and Galle. Participants received tool kits tailored to their specific trade (tiling, landscaping, wall-painting, carpentry power tools, aluminium partitioning) and formal course certificates from the Vocational Training Authority. An impact assessment has been conducted in the three districts for courses completed over one month ago; analysis of results will guide project extension and expansion.
• Permanent construction of health facilities and purchase of equipment is underway. Designs have been approved for 31 projects, consultants selected, and the tender floated for procurement of medical equipment for ten health facilities.
• Water and sanitation facilities in transitional shelters are undergoing renovation as part of an extended programme to improve daily living conditions. In Galle, drainage has been improved and rubbish cleaned for 117 beneficiaries; drainage has also been constructed for a further 74 beneficiaries. In Matara, two latrines are under construction for 60 beneficiaries and upgrading and construction of drainage and sanitation facilities is ongoing. In Ampara, sanitation facilities were renovated as part of the disaster preparedness plan at two schools and a mosque.
• Disaster preparedness stocks have been procured and repositioned as part of a contingency plan and include 1,000 rolls of plastic sheet (60m x 1), 10,000 hygiene parcels, 20,000 saris, 20,000 sarongs, 10,000 hurricane lamps and assorted agricultural tools.

• A needs assessment on psychosocial support requirements for the tsunami-affected population and national society staff and volunteers rendering services in the disaster area has been conducted. This will be followed by a ToT workshop and eventually integration of psychosocial support activities into other Somali Red Crescent programmes.