e-newsletter
Message from the President
It is now a month since the earthquake and tsunami disaster hit north-east Honshu. The scale of the damage and loss, though still far from clear, has ever since dominated our thinking and actions concerning Japan.
As one would expect, in Australia horror and astonishment were very quickly joined by a desire to help. The question was (and is) “What can I do?”
The need for help will remain for a long time. This is a realistic view, and by no means conflicts with our confidence in the resilience of the Japanese people in the face of calamity, and their expertise in reconstruction. As AJS Queensland President Ross McConachie said to me, we must show our support now, but it is even more important to find ways to be helpful over the long haul.
Given the logistics mess created by the earthquake and the tsunami, it soon became clear that the best short-term help would be money, given to someone with feet on the ground in the affected area, experience in humanitarian relief, and an international reputation for integrity. It is a matter of record now that Japanese Red Cross became the recipient of choice for most of the early donors.
Australia-Japan Societies around the country have been at the forefront of fund raising for this disaster relief. I am very proud of what has been done, and of what is still in the pipeline. I was also very happy to see how the Federation’s network was used as a platform for exchanging ideas and experience early in the piece, when things were still very confused. In this latter regard I would like to thank and congratulate two of our members from Western Australia. AJSWA President Patrick Whight gave us all valuable advice on the legal restrictions on public collecting. Jenny Byatt, from Bunbury, took it upon herself to create and maintain a very useful resource document, assembling all the relevant disaster-related information she could find.
I have collected a long list of donations and fund-raising activities by our Member Societies. There are too many to list them all here (and in any case there are bound to be others that I have missed, so it would be foolish to try to be comprehensive). But I do want to share a sampling of them with you, because they add up to an impressive effort – something that should be an inspiration for further efforts.
Several Societies turned already-scheduled functions into fund-raisers. Others – notably JAFA (Kodomo no Hi, on 1 May in Adelaide), AJANT (a film night on 9 June in Darwin) and AJSFNQ (Day of Hope on 17 April, in Cairns) – are organising major events deliberately targeting fund raising. Some Societies have made donations in their own right; I know AJS(ACT) gave a remarkably generous gift of $5,000, and AJSNSW $2,500. The ACT backed that up with another $900 raised at a softball game. Well done!
AJSV in Melbourne, AJASA in Adelaide and AJAWA in Perth were all involved in street collections. I do not know the results of those efforts, but I did hear that in Melbourne $23,500 was raised on the first of a scheduled two days. Members have signed official condolence books, and several leaders of our Member Societies in smaller cities have been important contacts for local media following the story in Japan. Societies everywhere have been active in publicising the many fund-raising performances donated by all sorts of entertainers.
What next? What is implied by Ross McConachie’s insight, which I cited at the beginning of this message?
I do not know the answer(s) to that. But to be useful after the first flush of public generosity cools down, we will have to help bring resources other than money to the problem. There will be some solutions that cannot simply be bought with money. Can we marshal our non-monetary resources – our networks – relevantly? I have been having a lot of discussion with a gentleman from Tasmania who has a very interesting temporary accommodation system. It just might suit the current need in Japan. Getting an open-minded evaluation of its suitability will not be easy. But perhaps it can be done, with our help.
Leigh McClintock
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National Federation of Australia-Japan Societies
PO Box R937,
ROYAL EXCHANGE NSW 1225
info@austjapanfed.org.au