New Zealand Christchurch Earthquake Appeal

The Christchurch Earthquake Appeal Trust has now funded 13 initiatives, with more to be announced shortly. Funded projects include support to quake-hit businesses, video conferencing facilities for students, sports fields and playgrounds for children, and more. You can see a full list of the projects funded on our website (http://christchurchappealtrust.org.nz/Projects-funded).

The Trust’s focus is on large scale, multi-beneficiary projects that will have the widest possible benefit in Canterbury. There are many funders in New Zealand helping community groups, businesses and individuals to recover. Our role is to fill the gap and to fund projects that would not otherwise be possible

The Trustees have adopted a portfolio approach to the fund. The portfolio allocation has been made across the Trust’s seven funding categories. It provides a framework the Trustees will use to ensure there is a balance between the wishes of donors and the needs of the city.

The Christchurch Earthquake Appeal would like to thank everyone who has donated through GlobalGiving. Your generosity will make a difference to the recovery effort in Canterbury.

To date, the Appeal has raised almost NZ$98 million. Funds have been allocated to repairing sports fields and parks, and to sport and recreation programmes for young people whose schools have been affected by the earthquakes. The Trust is also funding a feasibility study for a temporary cathedral to become a focus for community activity while Christchurch’s iconic cathedral is rebuilt. The Trust will shortly be announcing a number of allocations. Keep up to date with the Appeal on our website: www.quakeappeal.com.

It has now been three months since the 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck Christchurch, New Zealand, on February 22, 2011, causing widespread damage and tragic loss of life.  Since then, more than $73 million has been raised for recovery and reconstruction in the Christchurch area.  Rather than try to condense the massive amounts of media coverage the reconstruction efforts have received, I thought I'd list a few concrete numbers and examples of projects undertaken with the funds raised:

• $3.5 million will be used to help restore the city's playing fields, in time for winter sports for school-aged children.
• The Appeal Trust has donated $554,000 to help deliver sport and recreation programs for young people in Christchurch. Some schools are sharing sites due to damage, so students are attending morning or evening classes and have lost opportunities for sports and recreation. The hubs will run sport, recreation, leadership, dance, and music activities.
• Orion, Christchurch's electricity distribution lines company, assisted by other lines companies for New Zealand, worked constantly to restore power in the initial aftermath of the earthquake. They erected a new 66 kV overhead line to get power to Christchurch's eastern suburbs, a project that would have normally taken six or seven weeks to achieve, in 2.5 days.  Power was restored to 82% of households within 5 days and to 95% within two weeks (source: Wikipedia.org).

If you want to follow updates from the Christchurch Earthquake appeal more regularly than these project updates, the Appeal has its own Facebook page you can visit: http://www.facebook.com/ChristchurchEarthquakeAppeal.  They admittedly discuss more about fundraising than rebuilding expenditures, but I found it a helpful source for some of the information above.