Our friends at KEEN Footwear took quick action after the devastating earthquake in Nepal by setting up a fundraising partnership with Mercy Corps. For the past three years, KEEN has made an annual commitment of $50,000 to Mercy Corps’ global disaster response efforts. In response to the crisis in Nepal, KEEN is also encouraging people to contribute to Mercy Corps, and will match $10,000 in online contributions (in addition to their own $50,000 contribution). Click here to go directly to KEEN’s fundraising page at Mercy Corps.
Here’s a note from Jennifer Schmidt at Mercy Corps:
I wanted to reach out as Mercy Corps is responding to the massive 7.8 magnitude earthquake that shook Nepal late Saturday morning, killing thousands of people and causing wide-spread destruction in the capital city of Kathmandu and in hard-to-reach rural areas. As tremors continue to shake the region, the toll of casualties and full scale of devastation is still not clear. Officials estimate at least 8 million people have been affected in some way.
Mercy Corps has a large and experienced team on the ground in Nepal – over 90 team members – mostly locals who deeply understand regional needs and context. Our immediate priorities include clean water, food, hygiene and temporary shelter. We’re already at work and distributions of emergency relief supplies began today. Seasoned Mercy Corps responders from around the world are on their way to join our Nepal team to address immediate needs, which include bringing aid to hard-to-reach areas, and starting to focus on longer-term recovery plans. One of the things that sets us apart is not only our immediate response work and ability to reach even the hardest to reach people, but also our commitment to systemic change following a disaster – to helping communities build back better. So even in the early days where we’re focused on water, food, shelter and hygiene, we meet needs in a way that makes communities stronger.
More about our response at http://www.mercycorps.org/
