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BURMA- ONE YEAR AFTER NARGIS Labutta, as with many of the delta’s small towns, is still trying to recover a year after the storm. A main concern is finding clean drinking water. The Aung Min Ga Lar reservoir is the towns main source of clean drinking water but has needed to be drained seven times to try to make the reservoir’s water safe again. Water is not the only concern in the delta. Last year, after the storm, most of Burma’s crops failed because the soil was saturated with salt from the cyclone. As a result of the failed crops, farmers were not able to afford new roofing for their houses and the bamboo and banana palms previously used in the construction of houses were long washed away with the storm. Thus an estimated 500,000 people in the delta are still living in houses only roofed with tarps that will not be able to survive Burma’s rainy season.
However, there are glimmers of hope and healing in Burma. Many schools are being built with the help of the international aid agencies. These schools will not only help educate the children who survived but will also serve as safe shelters if another cyclone like Nargis hits Burma in the future. Also, of the more than 1,700 children orphaned by Nargis, aid groups have successfully reunited 196 children with their extended families and a further 1,500 children have found long-term families to support them. But even with these slight successes, Burma is still in desperate need of international aid. It is estimated that at least 250,000 people will require food handouts until the end of 2009 at the earliest and a half a million people still remain without adequate homes. The UN estimates an additional $10.2million is urgently needed to build permanent shelters before the monsoon season begins. Although aid is still needed in Burma, the amount of aid coming into the country has not been adequate. Part of the problem is that most international journalist are not allowed to report from inside Burma, therefore there is little public awareness of the work being done by the roughly 60 international aid agencies working there. Significant aid is still needed to get Burma back to what life was like pre-Nargis. GRI Work in Burma Please donate today to make a lasting impact in the lives of those who are still struggling to live day to day a year after cyclone Nargis. published by GRI: May 09 archived by GRI: Aug 09
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The town of Labutta, in Burma’s Irrawaddy delta, used to be a bustling town of about 5,000 to 6,000 locals. Now its whole population is 300. One year ago, cyclone Nargis destroyed most of Burma’s Irrawaddy delta, leaving approximately 138,000 dead and 2.5 million homeless. International aid flooded into the country in the aftermath, however it is still unknown how much of that aid actually reached the delta. 
“Seeds and fertilizer had been donated to the village, but that salt water from the storm had reduced crop yields over the past year. Although some of us survived we lost all our property. We are still trying to get back to normalcy.”