• Culture of hospitality pushed to its limits as communities provide refuge for hundreds of thousands fleeing violence
• Hosts selling assets and sharing everything they have, risking extreme poverty and their own displacement
• A host villager agonizes, “It will be easier to die than to ask the displaced to leave.”

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (May 28, 2009)—Poor communities in Pakistan’s northwest are hosting up to two million people uprooted by recent violence in the region. World Vision warns these communities—already among the poorest in the world—may join those displaced in the coming days as their assets are sold to help those in need.

“Families have provided refuge for up to 90 per cent of those escaping the fighting,” said Canadian Graham Strong, World Vision’s Country Director in Pakistan. “They are sharing their homes, food, clothes and water. They are poor already and are making themselves poorer in the process.”

Many assets are being sold to meet the growing need. “As the disaster continues,” explained Strong, “hosts are having to sell their land, cattle and other assets at far less than the market value in order to keep providing for their guests.”

As the only international relief, development and advocacy organization providing assistance in Buner District, World Vision talked to villagers whose limited resources are almost depleted by those displaced.

They expressed a major concern that their cultural code of hospitality and compassion is being stretched to its limit and could be masking the scale of the need caused by the crisis. 

“Without urgent assistance there is a real fear that impoverished host communities could contribute to another wave of internal displacement,” said Strong.  

“The cultural ethic of generosity and hospitality means hosts are now facing the agonizing choice between asking guests to leave or becoming destitute and displaced themselves,” he continued.

World Vision found hosts often have little or no connection with those taking refuge in their homes.

A 59-year-old man in Buner has taken 37 people into his home.  “Many host families have exhausted their wealth and will have to leave themselves or ask their guests to leave. It will be easier to die than to ask families to leave,” he said.

Basic services such as health, education, water and sanitation are being stretched to breaking point, World Vision learned from its rapid assessment in Buner. It found pregnant and lactating women and children under five are extremely vulnerable, with access to healthcare and medical supplies in one of Pakistan’s poorest communities already depleted.  

To alleviate the situation, aid agencies are urging donors to fully fund appeals to allow them to address the needs of both the host communities as well as those fleeing violence.

Canadians wishing to donate to the emergency in Pakistan can do so by visiting WorldVision.ca or calling 1-800-268-5528.

“We urge the international community to follow the example of Pakistan’s communities who have demonstrated extreme generosity in the hardest of circumstances,” said Strong.

World Vision is distributing health kits, mattresses and essential household items in Buner and hopes to raise $13 million to address the urgent needs of more than 200,000 people in Buner, Swabi and Mardan in northwest Pakistan.

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Notes to Editors

• World Vision has operated in Pakistan since 1992. World Vision does not have child sponsorship programs in the country. Communities in five districts of Pakistan benefit from our intervention targeting health, water and sanitation, education, and psychosocial support. World Vision Canada funds more than $780,000 in projects that focus on community farming for families, child rights which ensures that children have access to quality services, and improvement in the standard of living after the earthquake that hit Pakistan in October 2005.
• World Vision is a Christian relief, development and advocacy organization dedicated to working with children, families and communities to overcome poverty and injustice. World Vision serves all people regardless of religion, race, ethnicity or gender.

To interview World Vision staff, please contact:

Yoko Kobayashi
905-565-6200 ext. 2151
416-671-0086 (cell)
yoko_kobayashi@WorldVision.ca

Alex Sancton
905-565-6200 ext. 3949
416-419-1321 (cell)
alex_sancton@WorldVision.ca