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Five years ago I was privileged to start and build up an humanitarian and social organisation called Caritas Sibolga . It has become a strong local NGO with international network (long term MoU with some international partners). In the first five years of its existence Caritas Sibolga implemented programmes with the value of 6 million Euro. Although it didn't hired the best professionals and consultants, Caritas Sibolga demonstrated the ability to design and implement big scale programmes with local staff, which could compete in quality with that of big INGOs. What was the key to this success? Let find out in an article  Kunci Kesuksesan Caritas Sibolga  I published on my Indonesian blog. * The author was Programme Manager and Deputy Director of Caritas Sibolga from 2005 to 2009. During his professional work in Caritas Sibolga he has developed implemented 22 projects with the support of donors from different countries (among them Caritas Italy , Secours catholiq...

One of the houses built as part of the rehabilitation and reconstruction projects in Nias, after the 2005 Nias earthquake (Photo: Private archive) Although emergency response after a big disaster is a challenging work, according to my experience the reconstruction and rehabilitation is the more challenging one. Basically to do emergency response is not more than distributing basic needs of the beneficiaries. The only challenge is to set up an prestigious distribution method, so that more beneficiaries can be reached in a rapid way. Reconstruction and rehabilitation presents itself more complicated than it seems in the first sight. Especially in the NGO way of work, i.e. to put a high value on participation and empowerment of the beneficiaries, this challenge will appear to be real. Working together with the beneficiaries to build a resilient community seems to be easy but in reality could be difficult and complicated. No wonder that many NGOs, even the big ones, t...

One of many coordination meetings with different groups and partners during my time as Programme Manager of Padang earthquake emergency response Can you spot me in that photo? (Photo: Private archive) I have been lucky to be part of emergency response in two (or three) emergencies: Aceh-Nias tsunami Dec 26th, 2004, Nias earthquake Mar 28th, 2005, and now Padang earthquake Sep 30th, 2009. In Nias tsunami relief I took only a very limited role. But after Nias earthquake I had to play a key role for 4 years in all aspects. February this year I started a totally new "life" in the sense without dealing with project management and all related matters. Half a year later Padang earthquake took me back. Although in Padang emergency response I don't play the key role, but I could be a witness of some critical issues need to be learnt. I want to write some lesson learnt from my experience in that three emergencies. For now I want to concentrate on scale of disaster. B...

When Dec 2004 the tsunami and then Mar 2005 the earthquake hit Nias Island, the Diocese of Sibolga decided to institute the Diocesan Caritas of Sibolga. Since the March 2005 earthquake Caritas Sibolga has provided emergency and reconstruction relief in communities throughout Nias, with the accompaniment of Caritas Italy and the support of Caritas Austria and CRS.