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The Attitude of Relief

Fred Cuny was a self-made disaster-relief expert. From what I have read about him, he may not have liked that description. "Relief", at least as practiced in times of great disasters, disgusted him. He saw enormous problems in the idea of rushing in mountains of relief material and personnel. In his experience -- in Guatemala, Iraq, Turkey, Somalia and elsewhere -- relief often created further problems: ranging from utterly inappropriate material to logistical nightmares to a population that grows to depend on handouts.

In the wake of the worst natural disaster independent India has known -- the recent Orissa cyclone -- I find myself wishing I had known Cuny. More important, I wish he was in Orissa, offering his unique insights into the situation there. I think he would have been a fount of intriguing ideas, both for Orissa and for India. Some would work, some would not, but at least he would bring a deal of fresh thinking to bear on always knotty issues.

What a tragedy that he is gone, killed mysteriously in 1995 in the cauldron of Chechnya.

I know of Cuny in a sort of third-hand way: through reading articles about him. Most recently, a review of a new book about him (Scott Anderson, The Man Who Tried to Save the World: The Dangerous Life and Mysterious Disappearance of Fred Cuny). The reviewer, Lawrence Wechsler, knew Cuny well, and paints a picture of a strange, remarkable man. Reading it after visiting cyclone-devastated Orissa was a revelation. It got me wondering about the state, about how Cuny might have gone about rebuilding it.

First, a little bit about his thinking. In his 1983 book Disasters and Development, Cuny wrote: 'Disasters hurt people. They injure and kill. They cause emotional stress and trauma. They destroy homes and businesses, cause economic hardship and spell financial ruin for many. And the people hit worst are the poor.' Fairly mundane so far? But Cuny was just setting the stage for his real vision.

'For the survivors of a natural disaster,' he went on, 'a second disaster may also be looming.' He was referring to relief, to the way the outside world swings into action in response to disasters. In one case, a shipment of instant mashed potatoes utterly baffled the locals. The women began using it as detergent. In another, thousands of blankets began arriving in Guatemala after a 1976 earthquake. Nobody stopped to remember that this was a country where blanket-making was a significant part of the economy. Cuny was critical of what many of us might consider the most immediate imperative in a calamity: send in food. This worked to impoverish farmers in surrounding areas. You have to understand local conditions in a disaster-hit area before mounting large-scale relief operations. For such an understanding directs the way relief must proceed, and often, that is in surprising ways.

Cuny was also perturbed by the way relief operations suddenly grind to a halt after a few weeks or months. This often left victims in a worse state than if there had been no relief in the first place.

His most important insight was about the entire attitude relief represents: that of responding to a tragedy. He thought that a disaster is best considered not as a tragedy, but as an opportunity. After all, the tragedy is done with when the cyclone abates, or when the earth stops quaking. Mourning helps nobody; far better to get on with the job. The opportunity is right there: in the work to be done; in the shape rebuilding will take; in the chance that the most deprived people -- always the worst affected as well -- will find new voice and strength in themselves. The opportunity is, even more crucially, in what a broken society can do to mould itself anew.

What are the lessons in all this for Orissa? Trying hard to think as Cuny might have, I came up with a few. I don't have any idea how practical they are, but I will list them here for you to mull over.

1. The cyclone-hit area needs doctors, no doubt. From all over the country, they have come to Orissa to offer their services. Who I didn't see in similar numbers were water-quality experts to test wells, engineers to repair them and quickly restore clean water supplies. Perhaps as a result, there were nagging reports of outbreaks of cholera and diarrhoea, meaning even more doctors are needed. In future disasters, should such engineers and experts reach the area first, even before doctors and volunteers?

2. Enormous numbers of domestic animals -- cattle, sheep, goats, dogs -- were killed by the cyclone. How will they be replaced? How will suddenly destitute villagers in the area pay for new animals? Might this be a time to consider introducing new breeds -- cows that yield more milk, perhaps, or goats that produce more than one kid at a time? After all, there are people throughout the country conducting research on just such breeds. Here's a perfect chance to turn that research into reality.

3. Trees were uprooted by the million. Already there are groups talking about huge replanting programmes. Can such programmes be run as employment schemes as well, in which local people plant trees and get paid for it? Is there some way to ensure a balanced mix of trees, so that even if we cannot restore a primeval Orissa, we do not end up with vast stands of swaying eucalyptus either?

Besides, there's evidence that the Bhitarkanika sanctuary, also hit by the cyclone, was relatively unscathed because it was protected by extensive mangrove forests. Other coastal areas, where development has ravaged mangroves, were devastated. Can replanting efforts extend to restoring the mangroves along the coast of Orissa?

4. People throughout the area are already rebuilding their homes with whatever material they can find. Can the government and NGOs leave them to do it as they best they can? There are a few good reasons for this.

One, victims will be back in homes far sooner than if they wait for some massive government house-building programme to stumble into action.

Two, they will construct their homes as they want them. From earthquake-hit Latur to the resettlement of dam-displaced villagers, a lesson bitterly learned is that governments produce housing that nobody wants to, or can, live in.

Three, building nearly two million brick and concrete houses needs money on a scale far vaster than is available. (One estimate I've heard: Rs 30,000 for each such house. Times two million is 60 billion rupees. Compare to the supposed central government assistance to Orissa of Rs 5 billion).

All things considered, it's much better to let Orissa's suddenly homeless build homes themselves, perhaps offering them small loans where necessary.

5. Which raises the question: what happens in the next cyclone? Won't these houses be flattened all over again, killing people by the thousand all over again? Not necessarily. If outside agencies concentrate, not on houses, but on building secure cyclone shelters, those will save lives. (Dr Ravi Chopra, of the Peoples' Science Institute in Dehra Dun, made just this point in a recent meeting I attended).

The Red Cross has built 23 such shelters along the Orissa coast. Each can shelter a few hundred. More are needed. There is again the question of money, for such shelters are not cheap (one estimate: Rs 900,000 for a shelter for 200 people). But as Dr Chopra pointed out, schools need to be rebuilt as well. If they can double as secure shelters during cyclones, that's a more efficient way to spend money.

6. For those of us outside Orissa, there is a great need to pressure its government, as well as the central government, to simply perform. We saw the sickening wrangling between the state and New Delhi over declaring the cyclone a "national calamity." As if it wasn't one; as if it needed to be labeled as such; as if it mattered anyway to the millions whose lives were turned inside out. As they wrangled, relief operations foundered in the absence of whole ranks of officials who had deserted their posts, blankets and polythene sheets were stolen by human vultures in Bhubaneswar. Besides, I saw no sign of that famous central government assistance being actually spent.

All this, when Orissa was crying out for efficient, responsive administration.

Accountability is, more than ever, vital. If you have contributed to relief appeals -- especially of a prime minister's or chief minister's variety but others as well -- ask that your money be accounted for. Take an interest in how your money is spent. Make your suggestions, whether along the lines I've touched on above or otherwise. Write to the press to goad them into covering the rebuilding of Orissa. (Rejecting a contribution on Orissa, one editor wrote to me last week: "We are off this topic now." It was a cyclone, but apparently it was also a "topic.").

It seems to me these are the ways to truly rebuild Orissa: because they will promote a longer, deeper interest in the state among us all. If Orissa is to be anything better than miserably poor -- which better situation this cyclone offers the opportunity to achieve -- it deserves that longer, deeper interest.

For money and clothes are one thing, or two, and easily given. Whole attitudes are quite another, and not so easily given. That's where Cuny's innovative insights might make a difference: in pushing us to give some deeper thought to what we make out of this cyclone. There might even be some lessons there for an India sauntering into the 21st century.

Dilip D'Souza