IOM starts pilot shelter repair programme

With more than 3 million quake survivors facing winter without a roof over their heads, the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), together with the International Federation of the Red Cross (IFRC) and other organisations, has launched a pilot project to provide shelter repair kits to victims of the South Asian earthquake. "Presently, at least two expert teams are on the ground in the remote valleys of Muzaffarabad district. The whole idea is that they'll carry out an assessment and afterwards, if local communities agrees, they will call through satellite telephone to drop shelter material in the area," Chris Lom, head of the IOM emergency shelter programme in Pakistan, said in the capital Islamabad on Wednesday. Estimates of those left homeless by the quake are as high as 3.2 million, scattered in some 15,000 villages of North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and Pakistani-administered Kashmir, according to the latest UN situation report. At least around 500,000 shelters are required according to aid agencies, to meet immediate needs with night temperatures dropping significantly across northern Pakistan as the harsh winter rapidly approaches. The IOM shelter repair kit includes sheet iron roofing, plastic sheeting, hammers, nails, spades, pickaxes, saws, stoves, blankets, mattresses, kitchen sets and children's clothing. This joint pilot initiative involves the distribution of some 600 locally produced shelter kits on an experimental basis primarily to remote villages, which, if proved successful, would be increased, as long as funding and procurement hurdles can be overcome. Another prototype emergency winterised tent option - made of locally available material - has already been implemented in quake-affected areas in Indian-administered Kashmir through the UK-based international charity Oxfam. The tents are a low-cost option, are easy to construct and can easily endure one winter season, said Sarbjit Singh Sahota, an emergency shelter expert from Srinagar, capital of Indian-administered Kashmir. Additionally, the use of winterised tents could help limit the negative impact on the environment, Sahota said, given that displaced people living in the open were more likely to use more wood for heat in colder parts of Kashmir. This idea could also be considered in Pakistan, where the government is planning, according to the Federal Relief Commission (FRC), to set up more emergency tent villages in valleys below 1,500 metres in mountainous areas. But the race against time to supply adequate shelter is being hampered by supply problems. In Pakistan, there have been problems in acquiring locally made tents. "IOM ordered some 3,000 tents from a factory in Lahore with 50 percent advance payment. However, after the government ban, our order is now stuck, though we are trying to negotiate," Lom said. "Supplies from outside Pakistan are bottlenecked due to logistical problems - there are a lot of difficulties. So, something locally available would probably help us more in these conditions," Lom noted. The IOM has ordered 7,500 tents from India and 1,500 from Turkey, but another 1,000 from China may be delayed. "Presently, the IOM has the money - which we'll put into these shelter kits, if the idea proves feasible and if the helicopters can deliver them to the mountains where there is no road access so far," Lom said.