1.14.2005 ET

(CSRwire) Portland, OR - International humanitarian relief agency Mercy Corps' relief teams in Southeast Asia are adding recovery and community reconstruction programs to their tsunami response efforts this week. Recovery strategies aim to involve local communities in identifying their own priorities and building their capacity to meet their own needs.

"The chaotic early days of the response have given way to the long, hard months and years of helping devastated communities come back to life," said Neal Keny-Guyer, Mercy Corps' CEO. "As governments and humanitarian groups plan for this critical next stage of the relief effort, we need to prioritize the restoration of victims' economic livelihoods: get farmers back in their fields, fisherman back in their boats, and small businesspeople back in their shops."

With an emphasis on economic development and jumpstarting stagnant local economies, Mercy Corps is currently creating jobs that employ local Indonesians in a variety of recovery activities: debris clean ups, opening road access and repairing bridges, fishing boat repair, school reconstruction, and recycling lumber to build usable products (warehouse pallets and latrine slabs), among other projects.

Success Story From Banda Aceh
Last week, the small village of Eumperum that stands among lush rice paddies outside Banda Aceh was a virtual ghost town. Residents who fled the onslaught of the tsunami could not return to search for relatives or salvage possessions because mounds of debris, mud and brush blocked their way. Mercy Corps staff employed 95 local citizens and put them to work with picks and shovels. After a day's work, they had cleared the roads and earned enough to feed their families for awhile. The following day, the crew returned to find a half dozen trucks and cars on the scene, and residents already starting to sift the wreckage. The crew then turned to its next job: digging mass graves for bodies that were being pulled from destroyed homes.

In one week, the number of people signing on for the cash-for-work program has tripled to 280 participants, with the goal of 1000 laborers by the end of the month. Seven villages are already involved.

Schools Program Helps Children
Teams of local people in Aceh province begin work this week on rebuilding 14 schools so that they can re-open by January 26, which will help children find some sense of normalcy amidst the rubble. Mercy Corps will also supply students with education packets that include school supplies and help organize a back-to-school celebration. Aid workers also hope to help re-start PTAs in the schools and involve parents and teachers in small grant programs for their schools.

Restoring Fishing Livelihoods in Meulaboh
Mercy Corps is working on a livelihood program in Meulaboh, a town on the west coast of Sumatra that was 80% destroyed. Local fishing boats were washed far inland by the huge tsunami waves, and teams of workers in a cash-for-work program will move 79 repairable boats back to the shoreline and restore them for use again. Mercy Corps is also working on supplying fishing kits that will include rope, nets, poles, among other supplies.

Trauma counseling is an additional need in every community Mercy Corps works, especially for children. "Everyone we talk to lost someone in this disaster," says Pete Sweetnam, Mercy Corps' Global Emergency Operations team member in Meulaboh. Counselors that speak the local languages are being deployed to help heal psychological wounds.

Mercy Corps currently has ten Southeast Asia offices located in Indonesia, India and Sri Lanka. The agency's tsunami response team in the region numbers more than 60 aid workers and is growing daily. Field worker updates are posted daily to Mercy Corps' website at www.mercycorps.org.

How To Help
Mercy Corps is partnering with the international business community to support long-term recovery in Southeast Asia. We encourage other companies to join this effort.

For further information on corporate partnerships, please contact: Kim Johnston at 503-796-6831 or Hayley Hawes at 503-796-6830

To donate:

By phone: 1-800-852-2100

By mail:  Mercy Corps
              Southeast Asia Earthquake Response
              Dept. NR
              PO Box 2669
              Portland, OR 97208

By internet: www.mercycorps.org

For more information please contact: