New Zealand announces recovery package to assist Samoa

Home » Articles » New Zealand announces recovery package to assist Samoa

New Zealand announces recovery package to assist Samoa

Tags: Tropical Cyclone Evan Posted date: December 20, 2012 | No comment

New Zealand’s Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully has today announced the provision of a further NZ$2 million for Samoa to assist in the next stage of recovery from Cyclone Evan. This is in addition to the NZ$ 600,000 already committed. The NZD 2 million funding will be provided to the Government of Samoa to support a costed recovery plan.

It is likely to focus on support to critical infrastructure, housing, education and tourism. The New Zealand Government has already committed $600,000 to meet immediate relief and early recovery needs in Samoa. This includes:

· An initial NZ$50,000 to support the Samoa Government with immediate relief efforts.

A further NZ$150,000 to respond to requests from the Government of Samoa for immediate response and early recovery (such as relief or recovery supplies and products and technical experts);

· NZ$150,000 to the Samoa Red Cross to assist disaster affected people (such as relief, evacuation centre supplies, water, sanitation, shelter); and

· NZ$250,000 to New Zealand NGOs to provide on-going relief and early recovery assistance (such as water and sanitation, shelter and agriculture recovery) to affected communities.

Technical experts already or shortly to be deployed by New Zealand include: an environmental health assessor from the New Zealand Defence Force, an advisor to Samoa Red Cross and technical advisors from the Ministry of Civil Defence and Emergency Management. New Zealand has also provided search and rescue and aerial surveillance via the New Zealand Defence Force.

About the author

Adolf