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12/8/2015
RSD provides help following severe earthquake in Nepal
Over 8,500 fatalities: that’s the sad balance of the devastating earthquake in Nepal in April 2015. Some 8.6 million people have been directly affected, including some 1.2 million children. They have been torn from their everyday lives, no longer have a roof over their heads, and many have lost family members, too. The constant fear of new quakes combined with the high level of poverty means that reconstruction work is progressing very slowly.
Over 8,500 fatalities: that’s the sad balance of the devastating earthquake in Nepal in April 2015. Some 8.6 million people have been directly affected, including some 1.2 million children. They have been torn from their everyday lives, no longer have a roof over their heads, and many have lost family members, too. The constant fear of new quakes combined with the high level of poverty means that reconstruction work is progressing very slowly.
RSD has taken on the task of helping the poorest of the poor. Thanks to generous donations by the companies and employees of the business group it has been possible to support many aid projects, including one that has a special place in everyone’s heart:
In 2005, the ASHA Friends and Patrons Organisation, founded by Uta and Josef Erdrich from the German town of Ortenau, opened the ASHA Primary School in Lalitpur, 10 km to the south of Kathmandu. Thus primary school was built to give the poorest of poor children the chance to attend school, and currently provides education to 186 children. Moreover, in 2008 a hostel was opened which accommodates 32 school pupils from extremely difficult family circumstances. Since the natural disaster the helpers of the ASHA Friends and Patrons Organisation have also been working to rebuild basic structures and to distribute relief supplies in order to ensure survival of the poorest inhabitants.
Foodstuffs such as rice, potatoes, vegetables, domestic items such as pots, crockery, gas for cooking and even tarpaulins to provide protection from the monsoon are urgently required in order to ensure basic survival. Great suffering is being experienced and the local population continue to require assistance in their slow return to normality.
RSD will continue to help with relief work on location and is in close contact with the Erdrich family and the responsible parties in Nepal.