Movement on the Ground Morocco Earthquake Relief

Dear Donors, 

The harrowing earthquake that struck Morocco 4 months ago meant help was urgently needed. All of you responded to this call for aid, and because of donations like yours, many people in need have received help from Movement on the Ground. Now, with the start of the New Year, Movement is looking back on all the impact that we made and considering our plans for the future. 

Right after the disaster, our focus was on Search and Rescue (SAR). Thanks to the donations that came in quickly after the earthquake, we were able to fund a mission that not only searched for survivors but provided many other SAR teams with critical equipment. Especially in the first days after an earthquake of this magnitude, this is the priority, and it's your quick support that allowed us to move so fast. We specifically focused on the remote mountain regions of Marocco, where there are many isolated villages. These areas are hard to reach for any aid program, and as a result had often received little to no help. Our primary efforts were concentrated here, but our team also dedicated time to the Marrakech region, where we provided temporary homes to families who were sleeping out in the open. 

Following the initial SAR efforts, our team responded to the next big emergency: A lack of shelter, with winter fast approaching. With many families left homeless after the initial earthquake it was crucial to provide emergency shelters. Thanks to the funds provided by donors like you, hundreds of people received emergency tests. With our team working together with the local community, we built a temporary community close to several isolated villages, where basic needs would be provided. With local help we also set up sanitation facilities, which responded to a clearly urgent need.

Because of the need for more facilities, our team decided to construct emergency sanitation facilities in many isolated villages, to provide help where it was most needed. Helping the most amount of people in a short amount of time required an innovative strategy of cooperation, where the villages were provided with material and instructions, and given time to work on the toilets. In this way, Movement could act as a supplier and by giving advice, while the construction was done by the villagers themselves. Thanks to this method, a relatively smaller budget could be stretched a long way. Movement assisted seven villages and impacted more than 1600 people. 

Throughout our assistance efforts we have worked closely with local partners. Now that the time has come to phase out our mission in Morocco, our team has handed over the facilities and any remaining resources to local partners, to ensure all the donations are spend on aiding in the long-term reconstruction of the region. We hope that you will consider donating to support our other missions, for example our Campaign to help refugees on Lesvos get through the winter. Thank you once again for your support!

Sincerely, 

Movement on the Ground.