Oxfam America Blog

New arrivals are streaming into Bulengo Camp in Democratic Republic of Congo every day. The UN is seeking $7 billion in 2009 to help some of the millions of people around the world caught in conflict--like those in Congo. Photo by Oxfam

Here’s some food for thought as Thanksgiving approaches. On Wednesday, in its 2009 humanitarian appeal, the United Nations made its largest request ever for support in the coming year for 30 million people snared by disaster and conflict: $7 billion. That’s just one-hundredth of what we have agreed to spend here in the US to bail ourselves out of our own financial troubles. Read the rest of this entry »

Three years ago in Biloxi, Miississippi, Oxfam America made an unusual grant following Hurricane Katrina. We gave Hands On, a group that mobilizes volunteers to undertake cleanup and rebuilding, money to purchase a mini excavator.

FEMA had claimed that it could not deliver desperately needed trailers to those who’d lost their houses until their yards were cleared of debris. Fifty Hands On volunteers were working from dawn until dusk cutting trees and moving rubble to facilitate this.  The addition of the excavator eased their work considerably, speeding the cleanup and denying FEMA an excuse for delays in delivery of the trailers.
In the days following Katrina, Oxfam America worked with Bill Stallworth, the city councilor for East Biloxi, to set up a coordination center that would serve as the focal point of those arriving to help with relief and reconstruction.

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Do you remember the earthquake in Peru last August? That was 10 months ago, and by now you might have only a hazy remembrance of the 8.0 quake, especially given the fact that so many other emergencies have since dominated the news—including the devastating quake in southwestern China earlier this month and the deadly cyclone that hit Myanmar.

But the people of Pisco, Peru, think of little else other than the disaster that struck their communities in August. For them, those 10 months have felt like a really, really long time. Not much has changed since the day that earthquake hit and their lives and livelihoods were sent crashing into a heap. After being in Pisco in August, immediately following the earthquake, I went back in March to talk to community members about the progress of their livelihoods recovery. Read the rest of this entry »

Before she left on a field visit to India and Sri Lanka, a colleague dropped off a present at my desk: three red-skinned potatoes in a plastic sack—the remains of the stash she keeps handy for lunch. She didn’t want them to rot while she was away, and being a spud fan I was glad to get them, especially now that I’ve learned that 2008 is the International Year of the Potato—so named by the United Nations at the behest of Peru.

In a year that’s experiencing a frightening global food crisis, choosing to promote this stalwart tuber—people in the Peruvian highlands have been eating them for more than 8,000 years—seems more than serendipitous. It’s imperative. There are lots of reasons why. Read the rest of this entry »

Before landing in the Democratic Republic of Congo in March, I was pretty sure I knew what the French word formalité meant. About the same thing it means in English, I thought: a formality, a little bump of inconvenience, something you have to do when you pass from one country to the next, the flash of a passport, the thump of a stamp, and you’re done.

Wrong. All wrong.

In the DRC, Belgian-inspired formalités snag you at every border crossing, every airport arrival gate, every ferry terminal. It’s the Congolese word for time suck, and its synonym is dread. Read the rest of this entry »

What a week to launch a blog about humanitarian work.

It’s been a week that has seen the death toll from the May 3 cyclone in Myanmar inch upward as Oxfam worries about the outbreak of disease among survivors and the United Nations warns that 2.5 million people are now in urgent need of aid. Read the rest of this entry »