Conservation group makes major relief donation
It’s a newly formed umbrella organisation that deals with the management of our nation’s protected areas: not the kind of group that immediately comes to mind in wake of a hurricane. But the folks at APAMO today delivered … in a very big way.
Janelle Chanona, Reporting
While many of the assessments of Hurricane Dean’s damage have focused on the impact on homes and farms, the Association of Protected Areas Management Organizations is tonight voicing concern about the storm’s after effects to the country’s natural resources.
Edilberto Romero, Chair, APAMO
“Our rapid assessment has been that the impact on the marine environment has been not too significant, in the forest there has been a little more significant but again the forest can recover. But if the people’s needs are not attended to their impact would be even greater than what the hurricane did on the environment, so it only makes sense to deal with the emergency human needs at this point.”
With that in mind, APAMO teamed up with its financial backer, the Oak Foundation, to contribute two hundred thousand Belize dollars to the Red Cross to assist in relief efforts.
According to the society’s Disaster Management Committee Chairman Kevin Castillo, so far the Red Cross has distributed food packages to five hundred families but today’s donation should enable them to help an additional four hundred families in the villages of Chunox, Copperbank and Sarteneja.
Kevin Castillo, Chairman, Disaster Management Committee, Belize Red Cross
“Understand that we provide provisions for a family of five for two weeks at a time, so that we are just about at the end of the first two weeks and then supplies for the other two weeks is about to go out.”
“It covers the very basic things: rice, beans, flour, oil, salt, baking powder. Basically, things that people will need to live for the next two weeks.”
According to the Red Cross, cash and in-kind contributions from the Belizean community have been overwhelming. But officials stress that their efforts are to support the most vulnerable storm victims.
Kevin Castillo
“It’s not a blanket distribution and we are unable to distribute to everybody, although we’d like to do that, we are unable so to do. It is those people who are really in need that we really provide the relief supplies for. And so I would like them to understand that whenever we do what we do, it is because we get an assessment done to ensure that those people are really in need and thereafter we go ahead and provide that relief.”
While the Red Cross is one of the first to response to a disaster, the organization has also been involved in community disaster preparedness. According to Red Cross President Karen Diaz, the idea is to help residents be resilient to threats by identifying vulnerabilities. In the latest program, over a ten month period volunteers will share construction tips for homes and teach people how to protect food and water sources before disaster strikes.
Karen Diaz, President, Red Cross Belize
“The cost of a response far outweighs the cost of being prepared and reducing those risks. Over the years we can see that we are more prepared, we have a lot less loss of life and property in Belize than we did in let’s say in 1961 when Hurricane Hattie hit us. Because people now know you must be prepared, you must listen to the warnings, must have your food ready to go into the shelters, so we are much better prepared.”
And while the Red Cross is concentrating on risk reduction, APAMO used today’s ceremony to highlight the need for natural resource preparedness to be incorporated into the national hurricane plan.
Edilberto Romero
“The natural resources should be included in that planning, especially the mangroves and the Belize cayes should not be cleared up completely just for development because the impact of the hurricane is greater and it’s even greater in local communities like Sarteneja, Chunox and Copperbank.
APAMO is made up of eighteen members who supervise twenty-five percent of national lands classified as protected areas. Meanwhile, Red Cross officials say they stand ready to dispatch volunteer teams to the south should flooding concerns materialize. Reporting for News Five, I am Janelle Chanona.
And despite the rapid rising of a number of rivers in Toledo, we are today told by hydrologists that peak levels were reached last night and are now receding. No unusual flooding events were recorded.
