HOW TO HELP PAKISTAN FLOOD SURVIVORS: UNITED NATIONS ISSUES GUIDE TO DONORS

(Cairo, 24 August 2010) - The United Nations has published a How to Help - Guide to Humanitarian Giving to assist governments, organizations, businesses and individuals who want to support the humanitarian response to the immense flood disaster in Pakistan.

The Guide provides a concise overview of the main multi-lateral funding mechanisms managed by the UN in this disaster with contact details and useful website links. The purpose of the guide is to encourage and facilitate funding to meet the most urgent, lifesaving needs of millions of people with food, drinking water, emergency shelter, medical care and basic non-food items.

While the United Nations and other humanitarian relief organizations welcome all forms of assistance, they urge potential donors to make cash contributions rather than in-kind donations such as food, clothes and other goods which have to be shipped or flown to Pakistan. A cash contribution is fast and flexible and allows priority needs to be covered throughout the different stages of the emergency response.

Cash contributions also ensure that the donation can feed into the humanitarian community's existing strategic plan which has been established in coordination with the Government of Pakistan, the Pakistan Initial Floods Emergency Response Plan (PIFERP). This plan requests US$460 million and is 59 percent funded as of 24 August. Critical, under-covered sectors of the PIFERP can be funded through the Emergency Response Fund for Pakistan (ERF) and potential donors are invited to support this fund.

Other channels for donations are directly to humanitarian organizations on the ground through a shared website or through the Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF) which has already provided $27 million in response to the emergency in Pakistan

The How to Help - Guide to Humanitarian Giving in Arabic and English is available on http://unocha.romenaca.org/

Note to the Editor: The disaster in Pakistan is still unfolding and parts of Sindh province in the south are experiencing fresh flooding. So far, 16.8 million people have been directly affected and over 1,500 people have lost their lives. Over one million houses have either been damaged or destroyed and at least 3.2 million hectares of standing crops have been damaged or lost.

For further information contact: Jens Laerke, OCHA-Cairo +20 19 555 8662, laerke@un.org