*EPF403 12/30/2004
U.S. Takes Humanitarian Aid Seriously, Official Says
($35 million is "initial funding" for South Asian tsunami victims) (310)

Washington -- The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has deployed multi-agency disaster assistance response teams to India, Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Thailand, and the Washington operations center is active 24 hours a day, according to USAID Administrator Andrew Natsios.

In a December 29 interview with Gwen Ifill of the Jim Lehrer NewsHour on the PBS network, Natsios said the teams includes experts in water and sanitation, food assistance, logistics, health and medicine and shelter who are working with international nongovernmental organizations, the Red Cross, U.N. agencies and others to determine needs and local resources.

Such an assessment, Natsios said, is necessary "so we don't send the wrong commodities and the wrong assistance to the wrong countries." He said the United States has put $35 million aside, which the Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) will use to purchase supplies from the field.

He said this initial funding would likely increase after the first assessments were complete.

The United States traditionally takes the lead in such humanitarian aid, he added. Statistics for 2003 show that "the United States gave 40 percent of the $2.4 billion given by all government assistance for international humanitarian aid for all countries in the world," Natsios said. He added that the U.S. budget for official development assistance has increased 140 percent, from $10.6 billion in 1993 to $24 billion in 2003.

"I know peoples' lives around the world are at risk in these emergencies," Natsios said. "And if the United States does not lead and does not act, if we don't, a lot of people die. So we take it very seriously," he said.

The transcript of Administrator Natsios's interview is available at:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/asia/july-dec04/aid_12-29.html

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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