Donations to Turkey and Syria

[LindorDoubleChoc]

Sorry if there has already been a thread on this today but I've been out and about.

However, well meaning people on my street in London are collecting donations of warm clothing, toiletries, nappies, blankets, everything you might need in a crisis which will be driven on landrovers/vans to the earthquake zone.

Aibu for understanding that this is less helpful than donating money to the Red Cross and other charities on the ground who can buy these much needed items much closer to the emergency area and get them to people in need quicker?

What is the point in transporting all these things from so far away? Turkey and Syria are surrounded by countries with all the resources necessary if someone else can just pay for them?

Or am I misunderstanding?

Wow.
your choice obviously but no one in this country has had their entire house, family and livelihood wiped out by a natural disaster.

By the way, Amazon is a quoted stock and many pensioners across the world will have some exposure in their pension fund. Now is not the time to be vacating shares in SpaceX, Microsoft, Tesla etc for all the good they do in the real world.

I don't have spare money but I do have a perfectly useable icandy apple2pear that may be of some use.....

But after reading this I should probably just flog it....

Please don’t donate things. I’m an humanitarian aid worker, I’m here. Coordinated Ukraine response as well and it was a nightmare having so much unusable stuff. Unfortunately a lot of donations sent from uk and further away places was just dumped on the side of highways and roads.

Also there’s only 1 access road to NW Syria currently, that only just opened back up today so only trucks from UN agencies are going through and very very slowly!

I understand peoples reluctance to sometimes donate money to larger orgs. DEC is fantastic as the money gets split among all member organisations! Here are some smaller local ones who are crying out for financial donations:
AKUT non-government volunteer search and rescue
AHBAP non-governmental rescue and relief Turkey
Molham team - ngo in Jordan mainly for Syrian refugees but on the ground providing aid
White Helmets - supporting in Syria

Wait....WHAT?!! No stop it this is a pitch for some sort of black comedy sitcom....a vicar wants to drive a van of sheep to an earthquake zone?! That's it Internet, I'm done.

Obviously donate to DEC or the Red Cross. I just....sheep?!

He has form for it too!

Another aid worker here (although I do slow, grubby, wars these days, my rapid deployment days are over).

Don't donate stuff. Money only. Have a jumble sale and donate the money. Frankly if you want to donate a load of coats because it makes you feel better you are missing the point.

No one wants to sort out your crap. The standard reading I share is: ideas.ted.com/after-a-disaster-dont-send-toys-or-clothing-send-money-heres-why/

The other point is that buying things on the local market helps support recovery. If you made your living selling t shirts and thousands of free t shirts are dumped on the local market? There goes your business and everyone it employed.

DEC are great - and because the short term absorption of funds has a natural limit, they're pretty flexible at organizations using money for recovery as well as the immediate response. I've also worked with the White Helmets in the past and they're tremendous.

Turkey is a massive country and a lot of it is unaffected with shops, factories etc so better to send cash and let things be bought there

Well thank you for that insight. Pointless post.

Local Mosques are collecting essential items to drive over in trucks but of course money donations are best, as long as they do get to the right place.

This post is perfect.

My brother lives in Turkey and he listed these organisations when I asked him today. He also pointed out that because the Turkish lira has been on the floor for so long, our donations in GBP are worth such a lot (I think it's something like £1 is 20lira) so it will go even further.

First of all, just need to declare here that I do work for a large global humanitarian organisation (and have been working in this field for around ten years), so make what you will….

I would always send donations to a large international organisation, simply because they have the expertise and experience to know what is needed and can get it through quickly to where it needs to go. Large aid organisations will generally have warehouses around the world with tents, medical supplies, land rovers etc… that can be mobilised extremely quickly in the event of a sudden and urgent humanitarian need. Moreover, the equipment that they hold is rigorously quality checked and built to standard specifications which will not be the case for stuff left outside your local charity shop, however much love and concern was in the heart of whoever donated it.

Many people will comment on things like CEO salaries in large charities and I completely understand and agree that that is a legitimate area to question. But in my view, the significance of this is often over stated. The amount of most charities budgets that represents is, in percentage terms, minuscule (although the outright numbers are on the face of it, high salaries). And for the avoidance of doubt, I am NOT a CEO.

For myself, I have donated to the DEC. I don’t work for DEC, but I know and respect a number of their member agencies well. They are, in my view, one of the most effective means of making sure that the right resources get to the right places as quickly and effectively as possible.