WHY DOES SHELTER TAKE SO LONG?

WHY DOES SHELTER TAKE SO LONG?


Keen to see progress, the public and major donors are likely to latch on to reconstruction as visible proof of money spent.


Yet progress is often slow.


Wrangling within the aid community about the kind of shelter that should be built (temporary? semi-permanent? permanent?); determining land ownership when documents may have been lost and owners killed; finessing design (hopefully in consultation with survivors) and spatial planning; making sure the contracting and tendering process is carried out transparently - all take time, which means big spending is put on hold for a while.


Critics question whether aid agencies should do reconstruction, saying they do not have a particularly good track record.


"If any area needs reform, it is that one," said James Darcy, of the Humanitarian Policy Group at the Overseas Development Institute (ODI). "The fact is these are essentially relief organisations and the job that needs doing is essentially not relief - that's the problem."


This was highlighted after the tsunami when generous funding was found by the Tsunami Evaluation Coalition to have not only "exceeded the absorption capacity of an overstretched humanitarian industry" but also encouraged established actors to work outside their area of expertise and inexperienced actors to proliferate.


However, there is less money for Haiti than the tsunami, Burnett said, adding that the Red Cross would return to its "traditional role" - focusing on areas such as water, shelter, sanitation and income-generating activities - with the private sector expected to take the lead on reconstruction in Haiti.


"What we did after the tsunami was unusual - permanent housing, big infrastructure projects and so on," Burnett said. "There's going to be a gap of three or four years before people start moving back in significant numbers into permanent settlements and ... the role of the Red Cross is to help fill that gap."



Click here for a selection of experts' views on other Haiti response issues

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