ADRA Report: Haiti One Year Later

January 12, 2011

SILVER SPRING, Md. — Exactly one year has passed since the devastating earthquake struck the island nation of Haiti on January 12, 2010.

The Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) has provided more than USD$4 million in aid, personnel and assets to assist Haitian survivors in the months since the earthquake.

Through out the twelve months that has passed since the January earthquake, ADRA has been focused on managing displaced persons camps, water purification, food, the distribution of non-food items, sanitation and hygiene, psychosocial support, education, and semi-permanent shelters. The international news program 60 minutes, a news program aired on the CBS network, highlighted ADRA’s work.

To see the 60 minutes segment click here.

To date, ADRA has built over 2,500 shelters for displace families, benefitting more than 15,000 displaced persons. These efforts have been focused in the Carrefour district, just outside the city of Port au Prince, close to the epicenter of the quake. The following list of activities briefly summarizes ADRA’s work over the past year:

Camp Management:

ADRA managed a camp of more than 20,000 displaced Haitians in the Port-au-Prince neighborhood of Carrefour.
Activities included the training of zonal community leaders and counselors, providing security, water, health and psychosocial programs, food, and non-food item distributions.

Water:

ADRA and Canada-based partner GlobalMedic purified more than 130,000 liters of water a day in Carrefour during the initial phase of the response using 64 water purification units, including 62 motorcycle-powered mobile units.
The mobile units were dispatched to approximately 50 sites a day in Carrefour, Port-au-Prince, Jacmel, and Cap Haitian.
Assistance also included more than 5 million water purification tablets, 110,000 water purification sachets, 55,000 Oral Rehydration Salt units, and 86,000 Aquatabs donated by UNICEF.
Since the earthquake, ADRA has purified more than 18 million liters of water.
A water purification system called Nomad continues to purify and provide nearly 50,000 liters of clean water each day to the ADRA-managed camp in Carrefour.

Food:

ADRA worked with the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) to distribute 4,802 metric tons of food to more than 776,000 people during three massive food distributions between January and March.
A donation of 16.5 tons of baby food from Germany was distributed in the Carrefour camp.

Non-food Items:

ADRA distributed more than 50,000 non-food items to earthquake survivors, including shoes, hygiene kits, jerry cans, kitchen sets, shelter tool kits, solar light kits, tarps, tool kits, medicines, and flashlights. Upcoming distributions include mattress pads, blankets, and mosquito nets.

Sanitation and Hygiene:

A total of 75 latrines were built in six camps and one permanent latrine was improved benefitting a total of 3,396 families. The project also provided cash-for-work for 86 individuals who dug the latrine holes.
ADRA constructed 95 new bathing places and rehabilitated one previous bathing space in eight camps, assisting 7,241 families.
ADRA secured support from UNICEF to provide 221 mobile latrines and daily servicing of waste removal from mid-March until the end of June. In July, ADRA received 150 mobile latrines from the Clinton Foundation on behalf of UNICEF.
A team of 50 sanitation workers from among the camp population cleaned the sanitation facilities twice a day.
ADRA constructed two solid waste pits and employed a team of 50 from the camp to pick up and collect waste on a daily basis.
Eight cash-for-work projects where completed, benefitting 169 workers with livelihood support.
Some 15 truckloads of trash were removed from one camp in Carrefour.
Seven camps received tools for camp cleaning.
A total of 35 stations were built for laundry washing.
ADRA built a bridge to improve the safety and convenience of camp residents walking to collect filtered water.

Health:

Between January and mid-April, ADRA operated two free primary medical clinics in the Carrefour camp. One was set-up inside a mobile tent and the other in a local primary school in Carrefour. During this period, more than 7,000 people received assistance. After April, the two mobile clinics were consolidated and have so far treated more than 5,500 patients.
ADRA conducted a one-month immunization campaign, which vaccinated more than 12,000 infants, children and adults with vaccine materials provided by the World Health Organization.
ADRA community health nurses were based in each of the 12 designated zones inside the Carrefour camp. They were trained to triage patients, recognize infant and child malnutrition, and to educate mothers in lactation and optimum nutrition.
Cholera prevention education project trained individuals in the community of Carrefour on preventative measures and emergency treatment of the disease.

Psychosocial:

Between February and early April, ADRA ran Child Friendly Spaces in the Carrefour camp, involving 200 children each day who participated in various activity centers. A second phase targeted 220 children in two other camps.
ADRA tracked unaccompanied minors living in the camp, including supporting host families who cared for these minors.
In May, a Training of Trainers program was conducted in two additional camps in Carrefour, where ADRA operated Child Friendly Spaces.
From February to April, a team of 50 peer counselors worked in the Carrefour camp to advise families on post-trauma issues. Another team of advanced psychology students also provided group and individual counseling to families.

Education:

ADRA installed 30 tent classrooms at 13 educational institutions. These were outfitted with 301 school desks and 101 chalkboards. A total of 4,845 school kits were distributed to the students.
From June to August, 250 non-schooling children and teens from the Carrefour camp participated in afternoon non-continuing education classes. ADRA provided tents, benches, uniforms, and school supply kits.
Information, education, and communication materials were distributed in Carrefour, including brochures on proper mosquito net use, shelter weather proofing, and facts about the earthquake.
More than 120 adults participated in an adult literacy and numeracy program between June and August.

Shelter:

ADRA provided 900 large family-size tents throughout Haiti, including 453 in Carrefour.
More than 2,700 semi-permanent shelters have been constructed in Carrefour and Petit-Goave

ADRA’s focus remains on the long-term reconstruction of Haiti. Operating in Haiti for 30 years, ADRA is committed to the Haitian people and their country’s recovery.

Your support makes this progress possible. Thank you for your continued prayers and your contributions.