Waves of Relief In South Asia

In the wake of the massive tsunamis that killed over 150,000 people and left millions displaced, international relief efforts continue to face challenges, say Tufts experts.

Medford/Somerville, Mass. [01.03.05] With more than 150,000 dead and millions displaced, international aid groups are facing what may be the largest relief effort in history, following the deadly earthquake and resultant tsunamis that slammed into a dozen countries bordering the Indian Ocean last week. Despite the scale of the disaster, Tufts experts say the effort has gone relatively smoothly so far. But many expect the cost of the recovery – like the death toll in the region – to continue to rise.

"We should not expect great precision in [the total death toll]. There has been no great accurate count of these people while they were living" and one is not likely since their deaths, William Moomaw, professor of international environmental policy in the Fletcher School, told The Boston Globe.

For those who survived the tsunamis – millions of whom have had their homes destroyed and face the threat of wide-scale disease outbreaks – relief efforts have been coordinated on a global scale with relative speed and efficiency, one Tufts expert says.

"Given the geographic scale, and that it happened at a time when loads of people were on vacation, I think it's coming together extremely well," Peter Walker, director of the Feinstein International Famine Center at Tufts, told The Christian Science Monitor. "That's because we've developed international standards on what people should expect - how much water, food, shelter."

Since Dec. 26, millions of dollars have been raised both by international aid organizations like UNICEF and the Red Cross and Internet-driven donations by individuals via Amazon or Google.

“The flow of cash is not really the problem. The problem is how to spend it effectively,” Walker told the National Public Radio program Marketplace.

Need, he says, will dictate the allocation of funds, but given the wide swath of destruction, it may be hard early on to determine where money is needed the most.

“The problem is how do you measure that, particularly in the first few days?” Walker told Marketplace. “You know, there is chaos, and the people who would do that sort of measuring are themselves caught up in a disaster.”

Even after the initial relief efforts are carried out, the region faces a very long road to recovery.

"We tend to forget what's going on outside the spotlight," Walker told The Christian Science Monitor. "That will need the attention of governments and the international community for a long time to come."

The United States was criticized earlier in the week for President George W. Bush’s public silence on the disaster and a perceived stinginess in initial promises of aid. One Tufts graduate says the criticism was somewhat merited.

“When you look at everything we do in the world, our government, humanitarian and disaster aid, about $2 billion last year, more than double that amount in private and business giving, we give far more than any other country,” Leslie H. Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations and a Tufts graduate, told CNN. “On a proportional basis we don't, and we get criticized for that. But the total effort is enormous. And we give in lots of other ways, too.”

Gelb was critical of Bush’s delayed response to the tragedy, given the scale of the destruction involved.

“All he had to do was stop shoveling the sage brush and go before the cameras and say what he said at the end of his statement [Dec. 29], that the United States will be there for disasters, that we care about the human race,” Gelb told CNN. “He could have said that right out of the barrel. He didn't. And because he didn't, it looked like we were pulling teeth. That the whole world had to apply pressure on him.”

A public expression of solidarity and sympathy is important, Gelb contended.

"When that many human beings die – at the hands of terrorists or nature – you've got to show that this matters to you, that you care," he told The Washington Post.

The U.S. has since come forward to promise $350 million in contributions and to announce it will coordinate a worldwide relief effort comprising monetary, military and humanitarian aid.

An earlier statement could have boosted the status of the U.S. in the eyes of foreign nations, Gelb – a former official in the State Department and Department of Defense – told MSNBC.

“This was an opportunity to exercise real humanitarian and moral leadership at a time when we really need it because our standing in the world, and particularly in the Muslim world, is so bad,” he said. “President Bush is a good war leader, but he has got to learn to be a good humanitarian and diplomatic leader as well. And this is just that kind of opportunity.”