The sudden influx of aid agencies after a conflict or disaster can hinder rather than help the rebuilding of devastated countries, a Red Cross report warns today.
”Since the fall of the Taliban, the arrival of over 350 international aid agencies in Afghanistan has driven up local rents, inflated salaries and sucked away skilled Afghans from the government and vital services,” says the Red Cross World Disasters Report.
The report also warns that aid agencies are shifting their priorities to respond to high profile, politically strategic conflicts such as Iraq and Afghanistan, rather than assessing where the need for aid is most pressing.
”Chronic emergencies in countries such as Angola, Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo receive little attention,” the report notes.
”In April 2003, $1,7-billion of relief and reconstruction aid was raised by the US department of defence for Iraq. This figure stands in stark contrast to the $1-billion shortfall in funds faced by the UN’s World Food Programme to avert starvation among 40-million Africans across 22 countries.”
A Red Cross appeal for humanitarian assistance to the people of Angola last year raised only 4%of its target in four months. – Guardian Unlimited Â