IRIN
PAKISTAN: Focus on shelter in mountain earthquake communities
11 January 2006


[This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United
Nations]

MUZAFFARABAD, 11 January (IRIN) - Muhammad Hyatt, 60, and his brother
Muhammad Ashraf, 65, carefully place the last bricks to finish their
small two-room shelter in the mountain village of Kot, around 50 km
southwest of Muzaffarabad, capital of Pakistani-administered Kashmir.

"We've built this shelter on our own and we are going to spend the
winter under this roof," Muhammaad Hyatt said in Kot, home to over 400
families in the remote area above the snowline, over two hours' drive up
the steep zigzag road from Muzaffarabad.

Both brothers lost their wives in the South Asia earthquake that ripped
through Pakistan's North West Frontier Province (NWFP) and
Pakistani-administered Kashmir on 8 October, claiming the lives of more
than 80,000 and rendering more than 3.5 million people homeless.

PUTTING UP TEMPORARY SHELTER

It took Muhammad Hyatt and his brother, with the help of other family
members, less than a couple of days to erect a temporary shelter using
wooden beams and rocks salvaged from what remains of their former house.

The walls are made of gravel-cement bricks and the roof is covered with
corrugated iron sheets provided by the International Organization for
Migration (IOM), the lead agency for shelter in quake-affected areas.

The structure, around 8 M long and 3 m wide, will provide a warm and dry
refuge for the two families of seven people.

The total cost of the shelter with some insulation material to make it
warmer is around US $400, or almost the sum provided by the Pakistani
government as initial compensation for collapsed houses and distributed
by the Pakistani army to help quake survivors build some shelter against
the bitter Himalayan winter. "It will be warm in this shelter when there
is over 1.2 m snow outside as there will be special wood sheet cover to
protect us from the cold," Muhammad Hyatt explained.

Sanaullah Marwat, an IOM staff member working in the area, said that the
extended family would also get waterproof tarpaulins, with mattresses
and one quilt per family member as part of a winterisation kit.

SOME STILL WITHOUT SHELTER AT HIGH ALTITUDE

Although the majority of the estimated 400,000 quake survivors at higher
elevations in quake-hit areas have temporary shelter, according to
relief workers, there are still some survivors yet to receive help and
build shelters for the harsh winter.

Since 31 December, heavy snow and rains have battered survivors, many of
whom live in tents that have not been properly winterised.

"In general, a lot of high altitude villages and union councils have
been covered [with hard shelter materials] already. There must be more
than 50,000 shelters that have been distributed all over high altitude
areas in Muzaffarabad district alone," Rex Alamban, head of the IOM
sub-office in Muzaffarabad, said.

"That's combining military and humanitarian community figures. The
challenge now is to find the gaps and we are still finding lots of gaps
that have not been covered by the shelter distribution," Alamban
explained.

"A few hundred families are left. They were not included in the
assessments and they were never found [before] in the assessments, but
we are finding them now," he added.

Immediately following the earthquake a lot of shelters, especially
[non-winterised} tents, were distributed in high altitude areas as
nothing else was available.

"At that time, it was deemed providing anything was better than nothing.
So they were given these tents," the IOM official said, adding: "But
conditions are changing now because of the winter and we really have to
speed up winterising and distribute hard shelter [materials, including
corrugated iron sheets, and tools to build them] for the high altitude
areas because the tents will not stand heavy snowfall."

The IOM has provided shelter for some 10,000 families in and around
Muzaffarabad alone and is to cover some 4,000 more in the area.

Maj Farooq Nasir, a spokesman for the Pakistani army in Muzaffarabad,
said they had constructed over 65,000 shelters at altitudes of 1,500 m
and above. "That is 72 percent of the population living at 1,500 m and
above," he said.

"If you add the shelter activities of international organisations and
NGOs, that rate will be between 85 and 90 percent," Farooq added.

Some residents of villages above the snowline had said that the problem
was a lack of corrugated iron (CGI) sheets. "The main issue we have in
our village is CGI sheets. They are not easily available and [are]
costly now, prices for them have gone up by over 50 percent since the
quake," Abdul Walid, a resident of Chattian village in Machiara union
council, said.

LOGISTICAL CHALLENGE

The logistical challenge of moving relief items to some villages is
huge, relief workers say. For example, big Chinook helicopters can carry
up to 5 mt of relief items, but they cannot land in some high altitude
areas, as there is not enough flat terrain available for them. "So we
have to rely on MI-8 smaller helicopters and even the smaller ones that
are provided by the Pakistani military," Alamban noted.

Other relief groups are working on the issue as well. Medecins Sans
Frontieres (MSF) has distributed shelters to up to 6,500 households,
while the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has covered
some 40,000 families already with winterisation kits.

Meanwhile, Maj Gen Shaukat Sultan, a spokesman for the Pakistani army,
said earlier that more than 229,000 temporary shelters had been
constructed for people living above the snowline in quake-hit areas.


IRIN photos and articles of the Asia earthquake impact are available to
media and members of the humanitarian community free-of-charge. Articles
can be accessed at www.IRINnews.org. Full-sized images suitable for
publications can be downloaded directly from the public photo
library:www.irinnews.org/photogallery/iringallery .  To search for
appropriate photos select 'Pakistan' under the Country search dropdown
box.

New photos and articles are added daily.


IRIN-Asia
Tel: +90 312 454 1177
Fax: +90 312 495 4166
Email: IrinAsia@IRINnews.org


- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Appropriate Donations for International Disaster/Humanitarian Needs
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Center for International             web: www.cidi.org
    Disaster Information         listserv: www.cidi.org/listsub.htm
                               guidelines: www.cidi.org/donate.htm
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
South Asia Earthquake               www.cidi.org/incident/sasia-05j