The Science of Donated Stuff and Other Important

Lessons From Haiti’s Earthquake

The Science of Donated Stuff and Other Important

Lessons From Haiti’s Earthquake

José Holguín-Veras, William H. Hart Professor,

Director of the Center for Infrastructure, Transportation, and the Environment

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institutejhv@rpi.edu

Describe research experience in PD-HL

�Diagnosis and characterization:�Field work:

�Causes of problems encountered

�Identification of lessons learned (positive and negative)

�Characterization:

�Produce quantitative estimates of cargo flows etc.�Produce quantitative estimates of cargo flows etc.

�How humanitarian logistics take place

�Katrina, Haiti, Chile, Japan, Alabama, Joplin, etc.

�Other contributors:�Miguel Jaller, Tricia Wachtendorf, Noel Pérez, etc.

�Supported by the National Science Foundation

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The Science of of

Donated Stuff

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The Science of Donated Stuff

�Helping others is one of the most noble things we could do�However, sometimes, in our desire to help we do harm

�This is the story of the Science of Donated Stuff

�JHV stumbled into this after 9/11

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Humanitarian Logistics / Material Convergence

�Fritz and Mathewson (1956) defined convergence as “the movement or inclination towards a point”

�They created a comprehensive:�personnel convergence, i.e., movements of individuals;

�informational convergence, i.e., “movement or transmission of symbols, imageries, and messages…”;

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transmission of symbols, imageries, and messages…”;

�material convergence, i.e., “…the actual movement of supplies and equipment…”

�Humanitarian Logistics intertwined with convergence

�Not much research in either field

Flow of goods to a disaster (PAHO)

�Pan-American Health Organization classifies goods in:�High priority: Items which are required for immediate

distribution and consumption.

�Low priority: Items which are not immediately required but might prove useful later on

�Non-priority:

Different estimates indicate that about 50-60% of the cargo belong to this group

�Non-priority:

�Inappropriate for the event/time/context/population

�Arrive unsorted or in a condition impossible to efficiently inventory and thus difficult to identify timely

�Have surpassed expiration dates, are perishable, or are in poor/damaged condition

�Arrive without appropriate/known site for efficient distribution

�Are unknown, useless, or of doubtful value.6

In Japan, this may not work

What is the problem?

�The efficiency of the flow of high-priority goods depend on the flow of low/non priority cargoes

�Equivalent to trying to move two different liquids through a pipe

High/low priority

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Logistic system

Non-priority

High/low priority

Is it really that bad?

�Let’s take a look at previous experiences�1953 Arkansas tornado

�1992 Hurricane Andrew

�2001 World Trade Center

�2005 Hurricane Katrina

�2010 Haiti�2010 Haiti

�2010 Floods in Colombia

�2011 Tohoku earthquake

�Indeed, we could list as examples ALL major disasters

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1953 Arkansas tornado

� “… (the day following the tornado) all this clothing and food and all this vast store of supplies started moving into Searcy for distribution to the tornado areas….There was no place to put it … No buildings to put it in ... That created a big problem ... So much was worthless rags. They had some pretty good ones. Somebody sent an old doggone big carton of falsies. We got a tuxedo, a nice one …”

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carton of falsies. We got a tuxedo, a nice one …”

� “…It was coming by Railway Express, by truck, by plane, by freight car… Enormous amount of floor space, but that was filled in two hours—filled ceiling high. One other big building…probably a hundred feet long and sixty feet wide, with 14 feet ceiling… filled in 12 hours.” … sixty percent of it was not good; it shouldn’t have come to the area at all…” (NORC report No. 52, pp. 281)

1992 Hurricane Andrew

�“Excessive donated clothing created major problems… some of the clothing was not appropriate for the tropical climate of Dade county (e.g., winter coats)….Often, truck drivers with loads of clothes drove straight to severely damaged areas…Upon arrival, they often did not know where to deliver the donated clothes, so they unloaded them on the side of

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donated clothes, so they unloaded them on the side of the road. The heat and usual afternoon summer rains quickly turned the piles into heaps of stinking, rotting cloth.” … “ Excessive food donations created further emergency management problems.” (Neal, 1994, pp. 24)

2001 World Trade Center

� “Chris Ward is snaking through a tunnel of cardboard crates, past boxes … past thousands of shampoo containers organized by size….The problem is, very little of it was needed… little of the cargo reached the intended recipients, as they simply had no use for it…The propensity of Americans to ship stuff to national disasters has become such an overpowering reflex that rescue workers now have to divert considerable resources to ensure the largess does not get in the way. Some even describe the torrent of

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not get in the way. Some even describe the torrent of sundries as a “second tier disaster.”” (Newsweek, 2002)

� “[There] were examples of much needed materials, but we also saw donations of unnecessary goods … the five tractor-trailer loads of pumpkins donated to Ground Zero around Halloween that needed to be redirected to public schools …. We heard of people driving machinery and equipment to the site, leaving it for use, and then becoming upset when it was not returned even though the items were never documented, processed, or requested.” (Wachtendorf and Kendra, 2004, pp. 5).

2005 Katrina / Gulf Coast

� “"Donation management is the most difficult part of every disaster," he said of the unsorted mountains of clothes. "We have a little bit of everything."”…. (Caller-Times, 2005).

� “Sometimes generosity can go awry.”….. In Katrina's immediate aftermath…. collection sites along the Mississippi Gulf Coast became “nothing more than dump sites”….” (Times-Piscayune, 2005).

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Piscayune, 2005).

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Dumpsites like this one, were a common sight after Katrina. Truckers, hired to transport clothing to disaster, dumped their cargo upon finding out that nobody want the clothing.

2010 Floods in Colombia

�The Colombian Red Cross reported receiving:�“A tiger costume” (for use in the carnival)

�“…used underwear…”

�“…three Spanish flags…”

�“…wigs…”

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2010 Haiti

�A plane loaded with toys from a Thai manufacturer landed in Port au Prince days after the disaster (with a TV crew), deposited several tons of toys in the tarmac and left after taking the TV shots…

�Several containers of Red Bull and potato chips …

�Dominican officials reported dozens of planes that �Dominican officials reported dozens of planes that landed in Santo Domingo without a consignee (60-70%), that have to be unloaded and their cargo sorted out and transported to Haiti at their expense

�Ten containers with refrigerators, of no use due to lack of power (they were being used as tables…)

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�“Nobody seemed to know exactly what was on the boat, or who actually sent it. One rumor was that it was from Costa Rica.”…” The boat, it turned out, had mostly packs of water bottles, which is nice and everything, but water isn't really what Haiti needed right after the quake. There was plenty of water. right after the quake. There was plenty of water. Sanitation equipment or rice would have definitely been more useful. This is one example of aid that just might have been hurting more than it was helping.” (National Public Radio, 2010).

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�“...people send things that they do not know if are needed or not…”; “…not suitable…”; “…expired…”; “…whatever could fit in a box, it is a dump policy…”; “...donations were hard to control…”; “a lot of inappropriate donations…”; “…about 80% of clothing donations were useless…”; “...big bottleneck and donations were useless…”; “...big bottleneck and create a big problem…”; “…shiploads of these from different organizations even countries…”; “…those donations can slow down the distribution of priority goods, useful goods…”; “…they need storage, handling, resources…”;“…donations need to be controlled and be subject to standards…”; “ …donors need to provide transportation )…”.

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The Mexican Navy offered to transport all donations made by Mexican resident. This produced a humongous flow of unnecessary goods, including food items not traditional in the Haitian diet (some of them produced diarrhea)

This is bottled water that came from Spain. Using the money spent on transportation to buy the water locally would have increased the total water available to survivors and responders by a factor of three to four

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This is CARITAS Dominican Republic: They were inundated with clothing donations for Haiti, which they had to store as there was no use for it

2011 Tohoku Earthquake

�Quotes from individuals interviewed :�“…50% no good…”

�“…70% was no priority…”

�“…too many blankets…”

�“…too much clothing…”

�“…a lot of broken bikes…”�“…a lot of broken bikes…”

�“…people got offended when we told them we did not need that kind of goods…”

�Visual inspection of one of the distribution centers indicated that 40-50% of the materials there were clothing of little used to the victims

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This is the Iwate Prefecture Convention Center Japan 2011, again clothing donations are a big problem in post-disaster response

The top floor is exclusively clothing that was donated and there is no use for. The ground floor shows low-priority donations (stuff that could be useful later on, but that is not needed at the moment)

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One third of the 60 staffers at the convention center were trying to sort the clothing to try to use it

How to to

Help

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How to help

�Rule #1: Do not send physical donations because:�In most cases produce more harm than good

�Waste of money: once you factor in transportation costs these donations deprive victims of the goods relief agencies could purchase locally with the transportation money

�Depress local markets, negatively impacting local producers�Depress local markets, negatively impacting local producers

�Rule #2: Donate money to reputable relief organizations with a local presence in the area�They know what is needed

�Could purchase locally providing a boost to local economies

�Reputable and local relief organization, try to help (almost always overlooked and tend to do great work)

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�Rule #3: To those thinking about volunteering�Do not make things worse by becoming a volunteer victim

�Join reputable relief groups a volunteer, they know how to best use your help

�Be self supported (a week+ of supplies, water, medicine)

�Arrange local support before going to the disaster site�Arrange local support before going to the disaster site

�Do not be a disaster tourist

� If not willing to commit at least a month of work, do not go

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Other Important Lessons from the from the

Port-au-Prince Earthquake

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Important Things to Remember

�Humanitarian Logistics is like the circulatory system:�Large arteries/veins move large volumes of blood

�Dozens of mid-size arteries/veins distribute blood

�Thousands of capillary vessels deliver tiny amounts of blood to cells thus providing (geographic) coverage

�The system works because there is a layered structure with �The system works because there is a layered structure with (a few) high capacity links at the top, that fulfill the need of (thousands of) tiny distribution links at the bottom

�Cannot connect the aorta to the capillary vessels

�The realities of modern supply chains:�Minimal or no inventory

�Not equipped to deal with sudden demand increases

�Ramping up production could take weeks29

Amount of Cargo/Person

�Normal conditions:�Cargo flowing to New York City (660 kg/person-day): 625 kg

of water (all urban uses); 20 kg of fuel for heating, transportation, electricity; 12 kg of raw/semi-manufactured consumer goods; 3 kg of food (all include container weight)

�Post-Disaster conditions:�Post-Disaster conditions:�U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (10 kg/person-day): Ice (5

kg), Water (4 kg), 2 MREs (1 kg)

�SPHERE project (7.5-14 kg/person-day): Water (7-14kg), food (½ kg)

�Tohoku, Japan: 20 kg per person-day

�The needs of the response itself may be two-three times these numbers

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Impacts of Disasters/Catastrophes on HL

Characteristic Disaster CatastropheLocal supplies (households, stores)

Only partially destroyedMostly destroyed (3/4 DCs in PaP; all in

disaster area, 6/69 & 3/43 DCs in Tohoku)

Private sector supply chains

Impacted though functionalSevered (Haiti, Japan: 2+ weeks to restart, Ishinomaki: 87/150 truck comp.destroyed)

Demand for supplies IncreasesHuge increases on account of number of

people and businesses impacted

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Convergence of non-priority supplies

Major problemHuge problem (50-70% of total cargo

entering the area)

Geographic area covered; entry points

Small to midsize; typically many entry points

Could be extremely large; typically few entry points

Complexity of the local distribution

Challenging though doableExtremely complex due to extent of infrastructure impacts, area impacted

Panic buying If any, it is localCould be significant (a food distributor in Japan reported doubling of base demand)

Net resultLocals are key in initial days, outside help

brings additional suppliesOutside help is the primary source of

supplies; complex distribution required

Major damage to critical infrastructure

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The Cause of the Problems Seen in TV…

� The earthquake severely disrupted the centers of power (Government, United Nations, Catholic Church) removing the natural interlocutors of foreign (outside) aid groups

Entry points

Aid from rest of Haiti / Dominican Republic

Aid flowing to Port au Prince faced huge

distribution bottlenecks

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Local physical / social distribution network

Physical and social links with local distribution networks were severely disrupted

The crisis could have been avoided if the local bus iness class would have helped the foreign aid groups

(the evidence suggest they did not help much)

Dominican Republic through small groups

flowed well,Why??

Emergent Humanitarian Logistic Structures

�Three structures emerged with vastly different network topologies: Agency Centric Efforts, Partially Integrated Efforts, and Collaborative Aid Networks

Impacted area

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a) Agency Centric Efforts(ACEs)

b) Partially Integrated Efforts

(PIEs)

c) Collaborative Aid Networks

(CANs)

ACEs in action

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ACEs in action

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CANs in action: Servicio Social de Iglesias

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Efforts of large foreign aid agencies were hampered by:�Lack of suitable interlocutors: the disaster im-pacted the centers of power and removed their natural partners���� They were forced to create a distribution network almost from scratch

�Difficulties in articulating efforts with locals� Could not find enough manpower and trucks (list

Created for another purpose, extended to humanitarian logistics:�Highly decentralized/redundant networks, with thousands of individuals ���� Only had to extend the mission of their existing networks to humanitarian logistics

�They are local, knew and trusted the others � Found the trucks, drivers, and helpers needed;

Agency Centric Efforts (ACEs) Collaborative Aid Networks (CANs)

Two Main Paradigms (PIEs are in the middle)

of truckers created two weeks after the disaster)� Lacked local knowledge needed for such effort� Faced numerous security problems� Lack of familiarity with local milieu may have

precipitated over cautious security measures

�Very few points of distribution (PODs) � Trying to deliver aid to tens of thousands

���� instability at some PODs, helicopter drops� Some had to walk miles to get aid� Structural inertia made it difficult to adjust� Earthquake survivors forced to choose between

maintaining social ties by staying near theirdestroyed homes or moving to camps to betterposition themselves to receive aid

had manpower for points of distribution (PODs)� Geographically distributed with local knowledge� No securityproblems (protected by locals)� Enjoyed the trust of the population

�Their massive coverage enabled them to:� Organizethe population at a very fine level� Engagetheir support in aid distribution� Deliver the aid to small groups of people in

coordination with local community leaders� The close coordination between community

leaders and helpers provide a better chance of maintaining social ties

The Lessons from Haiti

�The immense value of the human-social networks:�Pre-existing social networks did very well

�Newcomers struggled, could not deliver the supplies

�The disaster community must refocus efforts:�Too focused on transport of large flows to disaster areas

�Almost no focus on local distribution (assuming that �Almost no focus on local distribution (assuming that “somebody” could take care of it)

�ACEs are doomed to be ineffective for distribution:�They are not geared for that, their strength is long-haul

�Too many PODs are needed: cars are not an option, people cannot walk several miles to get supplies

�Not enough man-power to man all these PODs

�Not enough local know-how39

Take home message: It could happen here

�Reason #1: In catastrophic events, decapitation of the local leadership (ACEs’ interlocutors) is likely

�Reason #2: In large urban disasters, manpower needed at PODs will exceed what ACEs could timely deliver. 200-300 PODs in PaP require 16,000-24,000 staffers � About the average size division US Army staffers � About the average size division US Army (3-4 weeks to fully deploy)

�Reason #3: Good relief efforts require community buy-in/support, almost impossible for ACEs to achieve in because lack of time and resources

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* Think about: Tokyo (32 mil), Seoul (21mil), New Y ork City (20 mil) , Mexico City (20 mil), Jakarta (19 mil), Sao Paolo ( 19 mil), Beijing (15 mil), Los Angeles (14 mil) , and others…

Take home message: Redirection is needed

�More emphasis in local distribution is urgently needed�Transporting supplies to the site is not the real challenge

�The real challenge is how to distribute them efficiently

�The best way is to set up the local distribution networks before the disaster

�Humanitarian crises do not have to be deadly (Chile)�Humanitarian crises do not have to be deadly (Chile)

�CANs are resilient, reliable, robust, and efficient�No incident of theft or unsafe operations

�Very efficient logistics, distributed large volumes of goods without any problem

�They worked when the UN cluster had to suspend delivery operations, e.g., during the political crisis

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Take home message: Take advantage of CANs

�Integrate CANs in disaster preparation efforts

�Engage CANs as part of a holistic strategy of preparation and response:�Train them in risk reduction, first aid, humanitarian logistics,

disaster mitigation

�Designate their meeting places as Points of Distribution�Designate their meeting places as Points of Distribution

�In case of a disaster, activate the ones needed

�Remain open to involving new CANs if they could help

�Focus efforts on transport of large flows of supplies to the site

�Let CANs take care of local distribution

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