ShelterBox now unveils its most ambitious appeal

ShelterBox  now unveils its most ambitious appeal

Last week Hastings fire officer, Mike Peachey was sent to Iraq to deliver humanitarian aid to Syrian refugees living at the Krwigorsk camp as a volunteer response team member with international disaster relief organisation, ShelterBox.

ShelterBox has been responding to the Syrian refugee crisis since last year, having committed over $1 million of aid to refugee families living in Lebanon, Jordan and Iraq, as well as those who remain internally displaced within Syria’s borders.

New Zealanders can ShelterBox help Syrian refugess help by donating:  http://www.givealittle.co.nz/org/shelterbox

The United Nations has confirmed that over two million Syrians have now fled their homeland.  Already hard at work in and around Syria, disaster relief charity ShelterBox is raising its game. It is gearing up to help as many refugees as possible, and setting it’s boldest-ever appeal target.

'£2 million to help the 2 million. ‘Let’s show these families that the world has not abandoned them.’
 

The refugees and the rhetoric keep on coming. While the world talks of atrocities and interventions, diplomacy and warfare, the lines of families fleeing conflict are still growing. It took two years for the exodus from Syria to reach one million - it took only the last six months to pass the two million threshold. And three quarters of these war-weary are women and children.

Antonio Guterres, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, this week branded it ‘the biggest refugee crisis of all time’. In addition to the two million who have fled, an estimated four million people remain dispersed or homeless within Syria, separated from their livelihoods and possessions.

So, international aid charity ShelterBox is planning one of the biggest disaster responses in its history. The call is going out that, if supporters worldwide will back it with an extra £2 million, it will aim to reach a further 5,000 families over the coming months.

Throughout 2012 and 2013 ShelterBox has already been providing aid in Iraqi Kurdistan and Jordan, it was the first aid charity sanctioned by the Lebanese Government to distribute shelter in Lebanon, and it has created effective partnerships to deliver truckloads of aid into Syria itself. So far ShelterBox has been able to help over 4,500 families and response teams and partner organisations are now poised to deploy more aid on several fronts.  

ShelterBox’s Operations Director John Leach says, ‘We have already helped thousands of refugee families, but with an extra push we can help thousands more. The target of £2 million is immensely challenging, but so too is the extent of this refugee crisis.’ 

‘ShelterBox aid - and our methods of delivering it – is proving effective time and again. Now, more than ever before, we need the compassion and generosity of ShelterBox supporters to back our work in the field. Let’s show these families that the world has not abandoned them, and offer them shelter and hope.’

With colder weather just around the corner, conditions for refugees are only going to worsen as temperatures in the region fall below freezing. ShelterBox offers a winterised shelter solution, and wants to bring as many refugee families as possible in from the cold this winter.

ShelterBox’s Syria Refugee Appeal will be co-ordinated from its Helston, Cornwall HQ, but will use its worldwide network of affiliates. Posters and other specially-designed resources will be available via a distinctive website area, and ShelterBox’s army of volunteers and supporters of all ages will be mobilised to help reach the £2 million goal.

About Shelterbox
 
ShelterBox is an international disaster relief charity that provides emergency shelter and life-saving supplies to families around the world who are affected by disasters. The ShelterBox solution is to provide the essentials a family needs to survive and begin rebuilding their lives at the time when they need it the most.

ShelterBox aims to help the areas where the need is greatest by providing shelter, warmth, comfort and dignity to families in the immediate aftermath of a disaster. Each big, green ShelterBox is tailored to every disaster but typically contains a disaster relief tent for an extended family, blankets, water purification and storage equipment, cooking utensils, a stove, a basic tool kit, a children's activity pack and other vital items.

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