150 route de Ferney, P.O. Box 2100 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland Tel: 41 22 791 6033 Fax: 41 22 791 6506 Appeal E-mail:
[email protected] Coordinating Office India – Follow-on Tsunami Project (year 2) Disaster Risk Reduction & Social Empowerment – IND093 Appeal Target: US$ 890,239 Contributions/pledges received: US$ 492,386 Balance requested: US$ 397,853 Geneva, 28 September 2009 Dear Colleagues, Under the Tsunami Response ACT Appeal ASRE51, the Lutheran World Service India (LWSI), responded to the needs of the Tsunami victims in Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry. Under this project the main activities were construction of hazard resistant permanent housing, community infrastructures, environmental regeneration and community based disaster preparedness and psycho social care capacity building, which has been implemented in a total of 25 communities, four of which are exclusively for the deprived communities of the dalits. These four communities were covered under a permanent housing programme also. Eight other fishing communities were also covered under the permanent housing programme. Most of the relief and rehabilitation assistance from the government and NGOs has initially benefited only the fishing communities as they were directly affected by the tsunami, while dalits and other poor and marginalised families living in the area were left out. During the rehabilitation phase, LWSI identified a number of villages with resource poor, non-fishing communities, whose livelihood opportunities are also directly or indirectly affected by the tsunami and the floods. These are mostly unskilled daily labourers in the fish processing sector, agricultural fields or construction sites who are forced to migrate to the neighbouring towns and states in search of employment.