USA , Australia , Germany , Canada lay back promise. (shake the Tsunami hits)

[wellard]

Originally posted by a_decent_1: Well, The worlds biggest donors really shook the Asian "Tsunami" hit countries. Here is the report HOW. The USA "pledged" $857 billion to the Tsunami hit but "allocated" just $366 billion. Australia "pledged" $739billion but "allocated" just $136 billion (Source:- "The Hindustan Times" India's Daily. ) No Offence Intended. Here are TWO LINKS (plz copy and paste them) Link 1 :- Link 1 Link 2 :- Link 2

What utter bullshit

Australia "pledged" $739billion but "allocated" just $136 billion LOL

thanks for the biggest laugh I have had today .... Australia is a country of 20 million people how the *hale* are we going to have 739 billion $ of anybodys money to give away.

quote from the link
Yet when I read the article .... "Australia, Germany and the Netherlands have all allocated less than 20 percent of their respective pledges of $739 million, $643 million and $309 million.

Australia's pledge includes up to $389 million in interest- free loans to Indonesia with the government saying that none of the loans had yet been granted. " .. end quote


So when has billion been close to million? .....

[ 05-22-2005, 12:45 PM: Message edited by: Memnoch ]

[wellard]

So taking into account that your whole post is a disgraceful misinterpretation of the facts (even the ones you linked too). That the dollar value quoted by your aljazeera link is not clear if it is Australian or New Zealand or some other countries dollar, and slags off countries heart given charity aid I hope to see some rectification or clarity on your view on the money donated so far and why it should be donated all at once or trickled slowly over time at appropriate targets.

Myself, I think a country the size of Australia to commit to giving a Billion dollars of government money to Indonesia on top of hundreds of millions of charity donations was stunning in the extreme

[Stratos]

I think a_decent_1 have mixed up "millions" with "billions". No single country have pledged even a single billion dollar of any dollar kind.

[wellard]

Originally posted by Stratos: I think a_decent_1 have mixed up "millions" with "billions". No single country have pledged even a single billion dollar of any dollar kind.

Australia did. Our government has pledged a billion dollars Aus$ (750 million US$) to Indonesia. A stunning amount, that is why I have the shits that our help has been called into question. Do people just expect us to hand over a cheque for a Billion dollars straight up? No way! Not with all the corruption that is rife in that country. The money is allocated over a couple of years and targeted where it will do the most good. A sensible decision IMO

[mad=dog]

The world is not constant. If it was we could whip out the calculator and say we need X engineers multiplied by Y salary plus Z overhead in administration divided by country factor W and materials cost factor V. However the world is NOT that simple. You make an initial plegde based on a very loose survey. However as more information is gathered and as the situation change this plegde may naturally change as well. That is a fact of life. Plain and simple.
The tsunami was horrible. I cannot fathom the extend of this disaster. It must not happen again and we must do anything in our power to see to that.
Also these pledges are NOT regular third world aid. It is NOT just money simply given away. I'll gladly pay and have personally donated a sizeable amount of money, but *beeep* it must ONLY go to assist the crisis and (most importantly) make sure there are counter-measures if it should happen again. And it WILL happen again. Tsunamis don't just stop happening.
The problem is phased
- Short term problems. Assist the victims.
- Medium term problems. Setup warning systems. Train personel. Reconstruction.
- Long term problems. Research and development. Structure models.
The problems must be sorted in that order. And we will do that.

You cannot just pile money on on a problem and make it go away.

[Azred]

The Pacific Tsunami center recorded the earthquake and suspected a large tsunami; they tried to contact various governmental representatives from the countries afflicted, but they couldn't get anyone to answer the phone.

[a_decent_1]

Hey Man cummon,

Don't Lay that Against "me"

We gotta talk ABOUT THE TOPIC. not the Topic starter.

Just found this piece of News interesting so Let u all know to discuss.

[ 05-22-2005, 02:53 AM: Message edited by: a_decent_1 ]

[shamrock_uk]

Well, my views:

1) It's morally wrong to pledge an amount to improve world standing but not to donate it. The amounts given increased directly in line with what 'rival' countries said they were giving - it almost looked like a process of 'outbidding', to be the 'best' donating country.

2) The gaps are too large to be explained away by overestimation.

3) Private donations, whilst commendable, cannot absolve the governments involved. If they say they'll donate, they don't mean somebody else.

4) Many of the corrupt governments in the region have been forbidding 'hands-on' disaster relief by Western countries. In some ways they 'deserve' to have less money.

5) Over-pledging is a chronic international problem and happens at every humanitarian event. C.f. events from Afghanistan to the Iranian earthquake.

[ 05-22-2005, 05:05 AM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]

[a_decent_1]

Well said Shamrock,

I am sure The donations wld come in soon. And i really HOPE they do Bcoz Indonasia is in real Bad state. I've been there , Man ... It's hell. (which is one reason i am a lettle sensitive about the donations.)

[wellard]

I notice you have still not corrected the link length to prevent the screen scrolling horizontally from your first post.

Also you have not adrerssed a previous point raised.

"Do people just expect Australia to hand over a cheque for a Billion dollars straight up? No way! Not with all the corruption that is rife in that country. The money is allocated over a couple of years and targeted where it will do the most good. A sensible decision IMO."

So please answer, do you think that a targeted response over a couple of years of a Billion dollars (aus$) is measly? do you think that we should hand it over without control over how it should be spent?

I also notice that you have corrected your billions to millions *without apology* but is there a chance to posty a link to "The Hindustan Times" that you say the quote comes from. I understand they have an english version of the paper.