Emergency Disaster Relief
When four storms struck Haiti in a period of two weeks in August/September 2008, the Artibonite (the Department in which the City of Gonaïves is located) was severely affected. Serious and widespread erosion and floods resulted in the collapse of basic infrastructure and prevented access to the North West of Haiti. With destroyed bridges and roads, the City of Gonaives and much of Haiti's North West were unable to access food and experienced a massive lost of income generating assets. AMURT-Haiti immediately began operations to assist residents of Gonaives and surrounding Commune in developing and reinforcing community structures in order to help residents meet their basic needs. |
Gonaives Emergency Food Distribution
AMURT’s intervention in Gonaives in 2008, immediately after Hurricane Hannah, utilized a community-based approach in the distribution of emergency food to 75,000 city residents. The multiple purposes of AMURT’s emergency food distribution activities in Gonaives were to: ensure equal and fair access to food for 1,700 families in Gonaives per day; enable grassroots networks to assess and meet the needs of local communities; identify fragile populations within AMURT’s distribution zone; identify community leaders and community associations with whom short and long term partnerships could be formed. Due to the success of its community-based approach, AMURT’s operations quickly grew to encompass more than a third of the City after the first month of emergency food distribution.
| Community Basis: AMURT assisted in the organization of and worked in partnership with community associations and committees to assess the most immediate food needs of and the most vulnerable households and populations within the City of Gonaives and throughout the affected area. AMURT organized community leaders, committees and volunteers to execute its Emergency Food Distribution activities, which enabled the NGO to deliver food to more than a third of the City of Gonaives as well as to isolated communities throughout the NW Artibonite. |
Gonaives School Cleaning
At the outset of the emergency in September 2008, AMURT utilized existing grassroots networks in Gonaives to execute Food For Work programs, organizing the cleaning of 100 schools that were severely damaged by the cyclones. As a result, more than 50 of these schools were ready to receive students at the beginning of the school year and the remaining schools were opened only one month behind the traditional school schedule. AMURT is currently preparing to transition its activities to Canteen Scolaire activities, partnering with community groups to oversee school feeding programs throughout the City of Gonaives.
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