HANOI, Vietnam (AFP) – Flooded rice fields, dead cattle and smashed fishing boats will mean economic hardship for Vietnam's typhoon survivors long after they clean the mud from their houses, aid workers say.
Typhoon Ketsana, one of the worst disasters to strike Vietnam in years, claimed the lives of 162 people and has also taken away the livelihoods of many more.
"The harvest for this season is probably lost," said Ugo Blanco, who is coordinating disaster response for the United Nations.
Less than one week after the typhoon affected 14 provinces last Tuesday, aid agencies are still in the emergency phase where the priority is distributing fresh water, food, and basic household supplies including blankets and mosquito nets. Related article: Asian armies to the rescue
But Blanco says there is also a need to start thinking about the medium and longer-term impact of the disaster and how to help people in this largely rural country get back to work.
Ketsana caused devastation across Southeast Asia, killing at least 293 people in the Philippines before striking Vietnam. It also claimed 17 lives in Cambodia and 24 in Laos.
Vietnam is the world's second-largest rice exporter but initial government estimates say more than 30,000 hectares (74,000 acres) of paddy have been flooded or damaged. About half of that loss came in one province, Binh Dinh.
Almost 60,000 hectares of other crops were also damaged.
Quang Tri and Thua Thien-Hue provinces suffered the heaviest livestock losses, of almost 150,000 poultry, about 1,600 cows and buffalo, and 2,800 pigs, the government report said.
The storm also damaged more than 500 boats and ships, mostly in the fishing province of Quang Ngai, it said.
About 2,300 hectares of aquaculture areas were inundated, but for Pham Chau and other seafood producers the extent of the losses is still unclear.
"We will only know really how much we lost in terms of fish and shrimp in the next few days," said Chau, 47, of Tong Chanh village in Thua Thien-Hue.
For the moment, he knows that big waves during the storm damaged about half the enclosure where he raises the sea creatures.
Chau was busy trying to fix a damaged net. Others had been swept away and he expects "considerable" losses.
His wife usually sells the fish he produces at the market but since the storm damaged his enclosure they have not sold anything, forcing them to live off their savings, he said.
"I don't have much in my savings now," said Chau, who invested 50 million dong (2,800 dollars) in his business, partly through a bank loan that is not paid off and prevents his getting more help from the bank.
He said he might have to turn to loan sharks to rebuild his business.
For the most vulnerable, the Red Cross aims to help 21,000 obtain a viable source of income by early next year.
That initiative is among the aims of an international appeal for 4.75 million dollars launched by the Red Cross on Friday.
It could include the supply of fertiliser to two or three provinces, said Doan Van Thai, secretary general of the Vietnam Red Cross Society.
State-run Vietnam News on Saturday said the government planned to give 460 billion dong -- about 25.6 million dollars -- to affected areas, partly to buy seedlings to restart production but also for rebuilding, disease control and other measures.
Local governments in the typhoon-hit central region have asked Hanoi for far more. They want close to 40 million dollars as well as 600 tonnes of rice seed, 20 tonnes of vegetable seed and 30 tonnes of maize seed.
Blanco said the UN had sent people to the disaster zone to try to assess the need for livelihood recovery assistance.
"Probably this will be one of the main sectors which the international community will try to support," he said.
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Showing posts with label ketsana. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ketsana. Show all posts
Sunday, October 4, 2009
Friday, October 2, 2009
Tourists in Vietnam Venture Out Again -
Tourists in Vietnam Venture Out Again
Julian Abram Wainwright/European Pressphoto Agency
Floodwater remained in the town of Hoi An in the aftermath of Typhoon Ketsana on Thursday. More Photos >
Published: October 1, 2009
HOI AN, Vietnam — The chest-high waters in this carefully preserved little town are receding, and as the roads dry they are filling up again with tourists who had been trapped in their hotels.
Multimedia
Typhoon Ketsana Batters VietnamSlide Show
Typhoon Ketsana Batters Vietnam
Related
Typhoon Kills at Least 41 in Vietnam (October 1, 2009)
Enlarge This Image
Julian Abram Wainwright/European Pressphoto Agency
A woman walked onto a flooded road in Hoi An on Thursday. More Photos »
“We were in our room for three days,” said Sandra Hudspith, 62, a sociologist from Australia. “All we had to eat was noodles, and if I never see another noodle again, I’ll be happy.”
Tony Boyle, also from Australia, peered into shops where people were using brooms and mops to sweep out the muck the flood left behind. “You feel ghoulish, like you shouldn’t be here,” he said. “But they need the money. They’re lovely, lovely people.”
This old trading town, which is now one of the country’s premier tourist attractions, was one of the hardest hit areas in the typhoon that battered central Vietnam two days ago, killing 92 people by the latest count.
The storm, Typhoon Ketsana, also killed 277 people in the Philippines and 14 in Cambodia, and more storms were forecast for the Philippines. Typhoon Parma, with winds gusting up to 130 miles per hour, was expected to make landfall on Saturday north of Manila, and heavy rains had already begun in some parts of the country on Thursday evening. The authorities warned of mudslides and heavy flooding, and said the strength of the storm could surpass that of Ketsana, which last week caused Manila’s worst flooding in four decades.
Low-lying parts of Hoi An’s old town, with its mustard yellow walls and curved tile roofs, remained flooded Thursday, and some people were still trapped on upper floors.
Small wood skiffs piled high with produce delivered food and water to them. Some boatmen engaged in what the people of Hoi An have learned to excel at — tourism — ferrying visitors up and down the flooded streets for a look.
“Come visit our gallery!” called Hoang Thi Thao from the flooded Thanh Lich Gallery to a passing skiff as she washed down her muddied walls. “Maybe tomorrow.”
In the To To Boutique, on slightly higher ground, the bottom shelves were empty where bolts of cloth had been removed up to the flood’s high-water mark. A male mannequin stood at the front of the shop, naked from the chest down. Its trousers had been removed and its shirt had been tied at the chest, where the rising water stopped. Le Thi Ngoc Anh, 35, the shop owner, said she would probably put its pants back on tomorrow.
Around the corner in another clothing shop, the owner, Do Thi Nga, 47, argued with a tour guide who had come to pick up clothing ordered by her clients. The flood had stopped the work of the tailors, and the tourists were leaving now after making a two-thirds down payment. “I don’t know what I’m going to do,” said the tour guide, Nguyen Thi Ngoc Phuong, as she climbed back onto her bicycle.
Another shop nearby was a shambles, with broken crockery and soaked piles of clothing lying around. “We’ve lost everything, a hundred percent,” cried the owner, Ha Thi De, 55, her lips quivering, as she collected muddy bits of broken crockery and dumped them into a bucket. Her husband sat on a plastic stool at the open shop front, staring into the street. “He’s helping me to clean up,” Ms. De said.
Bit by bit, Hoi An was returning to life as it has come to know it. The sun was shining, and groups of tourists ambled down the streets with cameras and shopping bags.
A former trading town that was one of the country’s main ports in precolonial times, and then a ruin during and after the Vietnam War, Hoi An has been turned into a tourism showpiece. It was designated a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 1999, and local officials project that 1.2 million tourists will visit it this year and that the number will more than double over the next six years. Provincial officials have begun to worry that it is all happening too fast. The Quang Nam Provincial Peoples Committee issued a report recently saying development was threatening to overwhelm the character of the town.
In the Milan fabric shop, which also sells the richly filled moon cakes of the harvest festival, Vuong Huu Khoi, 55, said his family had retreated with its merchandise to the second floor, eating some of the cakes to get through the flood.
The slow pace of business gave him a chance to light a cigarette and consider what his town had become. “They used to call it the forgotten town,” said Mr. Khoi, who was born here and left only to fight in the 1970s as a soldier for South Vietnam.
Now, this is the place visitors come to see the real unspoiled Vietnam.
Julian Abram Wainwright/European Pressphoto Agency
Floodwater remained in the town of Hoi An in the aftermath of Typhoon Ketsana on Thursday. More Photos >
Published: October 1, 2009
HOI AN, Vietnam — The chest-high waters in this carefully preserved little town are receding, and as the roads dry they are filling up again with tourists who had been trapped in their hotels.
Multimedia
Typhoon Ketsana Batters VietnamSlide Show
Typhoon Ketsana Batters Vietnam
Related
Typhoon Kills at Least 41 in Vietnam (October 1, 2009)
Enlarge This Image
Julian Abram Wainwright/European Pressphoto Agency
A woman walked onto a flooded road in Hoi An on Thursday. More Photos »
“We were in our room for three days,” said Sandra Hudspith, 62, a sociologist from Australia. “All we had to eat was noodles, and if I never see another noodle again, I’ll be happy.”
Tony Boyle, also from Australia, peered into shops where people were using brooms and mops to sweep out the muck the flood left behind. “You feel ghoulish, like you shouldn’t be here,” he said. “But they need the money. They’re lovely, lovely people.”
This old trading town, which is now one of the country’s premier tourist attractions, was one of the hardest hit areas in the typhoon that battered central Vietnam two days ago, killing 92 people by the latest count.
The storm, Typhoon Ketsana, also killed 277 people in the Philippines and 14 in Cambodia, and more storms were forecast for the Philippines. Typhoon Parma, with winds gusting up to 130 miles per hour, was expected to make landfall on Saturday north of Manila, and heavy rains had already begun in some parts of the country on Thursday evening. The authorities warned of mudslides and heavy flooding, and said the strength of the storm could surpass that of Ketsana, which last week caused Manila’s worst flooding in four decades.
Low-lying parts of Hoi An’s old town, with its mustard yellow walls and curved tile roofs, remained flooded Thursday, and some people were still trapped on upper floors.
Small wood skiffs piled high with produce delivered food and water to them. Some boatmen engaged in what the people of Hoi An have learned to excel at — tourism — ferrying visitors up and down the flooded streets for a look.
“Come visit our gallery!” called Hoang Thi Thao from the flooded Thanh Lich Gallery to a passing skiff as she washed down her muddied walls. “Maybe tomorrow.”
In the To To Boutique, on slightly higher ground, the bottom shelves were empty where bolts of cloth had been removed up to the flood’s high-water mark. A male mannequin stood at the front of the shop, naked from the chest down. Its trousers had been removed and its shirt had been tied at the chest, where the rising water stopped. Le Thi Ngoc Anh, 35, the shop owner, said she would probably put its pants back on tomorrow.
Around the corner in another clothing shop, the owner, Do Thi Nga, 47, argued with a tour guide who had come to pick up clothing ordered by her clients. The flood had stopped the work of the tailors, and the tourists were leaving now after making a two-thirds down payment. “I don’t know what I’m going to do,” said the tour guide, Nguyen Thi Ngoc Phuong, as she climbed back onto her bicycle.
Another shop nearby was a shambles, with broken crockery and soaked piles of clothing lying around. “We’ve lost everything, a hundred percent,” cried the owner, Ha Thi De, 55, her lips quivering, as she collected muddy bits of broken crockery and dumped them into a bucket. Her husband sat on a plastic stool at the open shop front, staring into the street. “He’s helping me to clean up,” Ms. De said.
Bit by bit, Hoi An was returning to life as it has come to know it. The sun was shining, and groups of tourists ambled down the streets with cameras and shopping bags.
A former trading town that was one of the country’s main ports in precolonial times, and then a ruin during and after the Vietnam War, Hoi An has been turned into a tourism showpiece. It was designated a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 1999, and local officials project that 1.2 million tourists will visit it this year and that the number will more than double over the next six years. Provincial officials have begun to worry that it is all happening too fast. The Quang Nam Provincial Peoples Committee issued a report recently saying development was threatening to overwhelm the character of the town.
In the Milan fabric shop, which also sells the richly filled moon cakes of the harvest festival, Vuong Huu Khoi, 55, said his family had retreated with its merchandise to the second floor, eating some of the cakes to get through the flood.
The slow pace of business gave him a chance to light a cigarette and consider what his town had become. “They used to call it the forgotten town,” said Mr. Khoi, who was born here and left only to fight in the 1970s as a soldier for South Vietnam.
Now, this is the place visitors come to see the real unspoiled Vietnam.
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