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AUSTRALIA SPENDS BIG
Various contributions to the tsunami aid effort. All figures in Australian dollars:
Australia: $35 million
New South Wales: $2 million
Western Australia: $2 million
Queensland: $1.5 million
Victoria: $1.5 million
Australian Capital Territory: $500,000
South Australia: $500,000
France: $177,000
UPDATE. That French figure seems impossibly low, but it checks out here and here (100,000 euros = $A177,000 = $US135,400). France is also sending rescue workers to Thailand and humanitarian aid to Sri Lanka, but please ... $177,000? Andrew Sullivan probably makes more during his Pledge Week.
In other charity news, the Australian cricket team has donated its prize money from the Second Test and is promising further fund-raising; and Stephen Frost reports from Hong Kong on Indonesian maids who’ve raised $10,000 so far for victims back home:
There are around 85,000 Indonesian domestic helpers in Hong Kong (the second largest group after Filipinas). Despite their low pay (they are often paid well under the minimum wage) and being denied a day off on Monday (Boxing Day Holiday in Hong Kong), the community has started to raise money for relief efforts back home. This has been difficult because usually they only meet on Sundays, so the drive to raise funds has been conducted by SMS and other means. However, as of this morning they have raised $HK10,000 and organisers expect that on Sunday they will add to this amount considerably. All cash is being collected by a well known human rights activist from Aceh living in Hong Kong, and will be deposited with an international agency. Many of these women will have lost entire networks of families and friends and can do nothing but sit and wait for news to filter through or donate whatever they can from their small wages.
UPDATE II. Tasmania only has the population of Melbourne’s western suburbs, but you beat them, France! They’ve donated just $150,000!
UPDATE III. Jeff Jarvis writes:
The NY Times headline this morning says: “Irate Over ‘Stingy’ Remark, U.S. Adds $20 Million to Disaster Aid.”
Now that makes a direct cause-and-effect relationship; the headline says we added $20 million because of the U.N. “stingy” crack.
The story does not back that up. I don’t believe the facts back that up.
Hey, it could be true; maybe ‘stingy’ is the magic word that unlocks US government money! Yo, US government! You are STINGY because you haven’t given me any PayPal money! Stingy stingy stingy!
That ought to do it.
UPDATE IV. The Sydney Morning Herald repeats that $170,000 figure. I’ve driven more expensive cars.
UPDATE V. Australian charities have raised nearly $3 million. Says Red Cross volunteer Jenny Patterson: “It’s been really hectic. You put down the phone and it rings again ... people are being very generous.”
UPDATE VI. US readers can donate at Amazon (current total: $1,587,261.99) or by calling the WorldVision.org number: 888-562-4453 (via Hugh Hewitt).
UPDATE VII. I thought that French total sounded impossibly low. Reader Heiko points to these two articles, and writes:
100,000 Euros is what cities and departements (somewhat comparable to US counties) in France are quoted as giving in the above links. Dijon for example is giving 150,000 Euros.
France is giving 15 million Euros, Germany 20 million Euros.
As with the US, these are sums given for immediate disaster relief. More is to be expected later.
Good.
UPDATE VIII. More from Heiko, in comments:
It’s kind of funny to read the comment section of this article: A French reader being happy at finally hearing that other nations are also providing help.
I suppose a lot of this is due to delays in reporting donations in other countries, without your listing I wouldn’t be aware of all the details with regards to Australia and would only know the total pledged by the Australian government.
According to this German source, more than 100 million euros have been pledged in total so far, with the European Union and Japan giving the most (30 million euros each), followed by the US (25 million euros) and Australia (20 million euros).
The total seems to be rising quickly, and it’s clearly very difficult to provide an up-to-date and accurate listing with so many people and organisations giving.
UPDATE IX. Reuters earlier:
FRANCE: Foreign Minister Michel Barnier in Sri Lanka, then Thailand. Has earmarked 100,000 euros for relief, sent 16 rescuers to Thailand, 10 tonnes aid to Sri Lanka.
Reuters now:
FRANCE: 15 million euros pledged to affected states in Southeast Asia. French authorities and aid groups decide to send 110 tonnes of aid
Notice that the US and Oz are, ahem, and the rest are “capital deprived”
By almost an order of magntitude?
And the US and OZ are the only two who have not signed Kyoto, and we are the only ones who can really, really afford to give aid.
As for France, going to war with France is like deer hunting without an accordion.
France doesn’t need to demonstrate its clear moral superiority to the English-speaking world by anything so crass as donating money for disaster relief—unless, of course, there’s something in it for them, like oil contracts.
U.N. Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland demonstrated his moral superiority by calling for increased taxes in Europe and the U.S. as a response to the disaster.
Former President Bill Clinton demonstrated his clear moral superiority by immediately heading for the television cameras to call for a coordinated international response. No one asked about his own inaction in the face of the Rwandan genocide in which far more people died, and which, unlike the tsunami, could have been largely prevented.
The true test will be how much reconstruction aid is forthcoming in the months following the initial relief effort, when the costs will be great and the television cameras turned off.
Posted by Bruce Rheinstein on 2004 12 30 at 02:01 AM • permalinkAl Jazeera list aid from arab countries incl;
KUWAIT: Supplies worth $2 million pledged and $100,000 sent.QATAR: $10 million
SAUDI ARABIA: $10 million package pledged, half to be distributed via the Saudi Red Crescent, and half for international aid groups.
UNITED ARAB EMIRATES: $2 million.
They are running the Israel story saying Sri Lanka asked Israel to scale down a proposed 150-strong medical team, saying it had enough doctors and rescue personnel, but welcoming urgent Israeli supplies.
However the Australian aid of five air force transport planes with supplies and medical teams as well as team of police was aceptable…
Raise taxes? What a ridiculous notion. Thats not the way to deal with it at all, I agree with you there, Bruce.
However Clinton acknowledges he made a great mistake in Rwanda. He is doing the right thing by calling for such a response, it is what is needed. You cant belittle his call just because of one mistake which he now regrets.
Nous si l’atome-bombe les Grenouilles jusqu’à ce qu’ils rougeoient. De cette façon, nous pouvons les tirer la nuit.
Posted by Cybrludite on 2004 12 30 at 02:49 AM • permalinkClinton has never acknowledged what documents released this year revealed—that his administration was aware of what was happening in Rwanda, that administration officials were privately referring to it as genocide early on, and that they kept things quiet because then-President Clinton decided not to intervene. As a result, close to a million people died.
Clinton’s doing what he does best—self-aggrandizing.
Posted by Bruce Rheinstein on 2004 12 30 at 02:51 AM • permalink$A177,000 from France is rather low, but I’m willing to give them the benifit of the doubt for now. It could just be a legal hold up, like having to get legislative approval or something.
I’m kind of pissed about UN Emergency Aid Coordinator Jan Egeland saying the wealthy nations were stingy, though. He based the comment on the fact that the U.S. government gives something like .13 of it’s GNP in humanitarian aid and the UN wants wealthy nations to give something like .7 percent like Scandinavian governments are doing. Guess where Mr. Egeland is from? Norway.
It’s the biggest piece of BS I’ve heard in a while considering that the US has been the largest contributer to disaster and humanitarian aid for as long as I can remember. For example, we give something like 64% of all the world’s food aid compared to the 13% of the Europe Union which has a higher GNP and bigger population. Fox was saying this morning that the US aid for the tsunami victims is going to over $100,000,000,000 and I’d be willing to bet that figure will go up. That’s not counting private and business donations which will also end up being pretty significant. Besides Amazon, I’ve seen requests for donations and links to relief agencies all over American companies’ websites. Apple Computers is a typical example. http://www.apple.com In addition the U.S. Navy is sending a Marine amphibious group and aircraft carrier group to help with the rescue and relief efforts and has been flying P-3 patrol aircraft on search & rescue and damage assesment missions since the first day of the disaster. Committing those kind of resources is not cheap. And the contributions of other wealthy nations like Australia and Great Britian is going to be pretty impressive as well.
Sure the Scandinavian governments give .07%, but, if I’m not mistaken, their taxes tend to be a good bit higher than what Americans and most Europeans pay and their economies tend to follow socialist models so more of their economies are tied up in the government.
I’m not trying to knock the amount of aid the Scandinavians do give, as I have a good friend who is Norwegian, and I know they are very generous when it comes to charity and foreign aid. I just think the numbers the UN is basing their opinion on don’t represent reality well.
Heck, Amazon has given more than France…...
Look now, its soon to be ten times more.
Posted by Mike SC USA on 2004 12 30 at 04:25 AM • permalinkQ: When will the U.N. call France “stingy” (as they did with the U.S.) for their paltry donations?
A: Never.
Posted by Jinx McHue on 2004 12 30 at 05:00 AM • permalinkhttp://actu.voila.fr/Article/article_une_041229160016.shdxy8c9.html
http://actu.voila.fr/Depeche/depeche_villes_regions_041229165209.r62zut86.html
Not a single commenter seems to have done any fact checking on French giving.
100,000 Euros is what cities and departements (somewhat comparable to US counties) in France are quoted as giving in the above link. Dijon for example is giving 150,000 Euros.
France is giving 15 million Euros, Germany 20 million Euros.
As with the US, these are sums given for immediate disaster relief. More is to be expected later.
I happen to be in favour of US policy in Iraq. Many people in France and Germany are not.
But they are still democractic friends and allies of the United States, willing to do their part to help, be it with disaster relief, or in advancing peace and democracy in places like Afghanistan or Ukraine.
Or indeed, Iraq itself, be it through debt relief, training of police or humanitarian assistance.
http://news.tf1.fr/news/monde/0,,3193954,00.html
It’s kind of funny to read the comment section of this article: A French reader being happy at finally hearing that other nations are also providing help.
I suppose a lot of this is due to delays in reporting donations in other countries, without your listing I wouldn’t be aware of all the details with regards to Australia and would only know the total pledged by the Austrlian government.
(there is a great amount of detail on French giving in the French media, unsurprisingly really)
http://www.spiegel.de/panorama/0,1518,334786,00.html
According to this German source, more than 100 million euros have been pledged in total so far, with the European Union and Japan giving the most (30 million euros each), followed by the US (25 million euros) and Australia (20 million euros).
The total seems to be rising quickly, and it’s clearly very difficult to provide an up-to-date and accurate listing with so many people and organisations giving.
Oh good France pledges 15 million euros setting a goal for Amazon to shoot for!
Posted by Mike SC USA on 2004 12 30 at 10:23 AM • permalinkOh please. Disaster assistance surely doesn’t deserve to be swept under the “foreign affairs” rug. I realize there’s a philosophical argument to be made about whether government should be in the philantropy business at all, but since government spending on that kinda thing is a reality, kudos to the AUS state governments for dipping into their own budgets to help the tsunami victims.
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AUD 177000?! That’s disgraceful. Amazon.com alone is beating them.