This gift in action
In July 2010 Pakistan was hit by severe flooding which left over a million people without homes, food or any means to earn a living. Whole communities were forced to flee to find refuge in camps, sometimes hundreds of miles away from home. Towards the end of the year some families began to return to their abandoned villages only to find homes, roads and fields all devastated.
Oxfam started work in 92 villages most in need of assistance, helping over 6,000 families. It included initiating ‘cash-for-work’ schemes across Sindh province to help people to rebuild and provide them with money to buy food, medicines and other essentials. Both men and women were able to take part in the scheme and both were paid the same amount, roughly around 300 rupees per day (£2.15), paid in monthly instalments.
Work included clearing rubble and water from streets and homes, cleaning irrigation channels, rebuilding roads, making bricks for reconstruction and, like Halimar from Breghoo Broohi village in Shikapur, making quilts.
"We are thankful to Oxfam as they gave us quilt-making work and gave our men work cleaning the village. The money given to us for the work, we used to buy items like pots, clothes and medicines. Oxfam's money was helpful to buy basic necessities."