Independent Evaluation of CARE International's Earthquake Response in Northern Pakistan

Author(s)
Kirkby, J., Saeed, A., Zogopoulos, A.
Publication language
English
Pages
74pp
Date published
01 Aug 2006
Type
Evaluation reports
Keywords
Disaster preparedness, resilience and risk reduction, Disaster preparedness, Disasters, Earthquakes, Food and nutrition, Gender, Health, Livelihoods
Countries
Pakistan
Organisations
CARE International

This is an evaluation of CARE’s response to the 2005 Pakistan earthquake. CARE had opened its office only 4 months earlier with a small team. All agencies responding to the earthquake had problems relating to the difficult physical environment; CARE had additional problems caused by its small presence with limited surge capacity and the challenging physical and socio-cultural environment of the Allai Valley in which it worked. These problems related to the extent of damage, winter weather, transport, insecurity, institutions, and the lack of development in a virtually feudal society in which women lived extremely restricted lives. CARE succeeded in quickly developing a sound reputation with the government, other agencies, and beneficiaries, but the rapid growth of CARE-P and the difficulty of recruiting and training national staff created a number of problems in human resources and management systems. The reconstruction programmes were technically successful, but connections to beneficiaries have been less effective, partly because programmes have been implemented separately.