(Reuters) - Isolated communities in the
Philippines including hill tribes are facing hunger a week after a typhoon
struck, and with roads blocked, supplies will have to be dropped by air,
authorities said on Tuesday.
Typhoon Bopha has killed a presently confirmed
total of 714 people and caused crop damage worth 10.3 billion pesos ($250
million) when it hit on Tuesday last week. Over 900 people are unaccounted for
and about 2,000 were injured, the national disaster agency said.
The most intense storm to hit the
disaster-prone Philippines this year wiped out communities near the coast in
the southern provinces of Davao Oriental and Compostela Valley. But villages
inland were also hard hit by floods and landslides and many are cut off. The
Philippines has asked for help from allies and the private sector to get help
in by air.
"Their food is fast dwindling, their
roads are blocked by fallen trees and boulders and it will not be long before
everyone in these upland villages will go hungry," Manggob Masinaring, a
member of a mountain tribe and a volunteer relief worker, told reporters. [Those areas are home to numerous brethren
who have obeyed the gospel as a result of work done by brethren in Digos and
Davao – HRO]
Compounding the problem was that the source
of water for many villages had been blocked or polluted by mud and debris. "The
streams, which are their only source of water, are too murky for
drinking," Masinaring said.
International agencies including the Red
Cross and World Food Programme have appealed for nearly $100 million for food
and shelter for 5.4 million people affected by the typhoon. Nearly 400,000
people lost their homes and farms.
Major-General Ariel Bernardo, the army
division commander in the south, said food and other supplies would have to be
dropped by helicopter to the most isolated communities, including hill tribes,
who had yet to be reached.
Stephen Anderson, country director for the
World Food Programme in the Philippines, said help had to be delivered fast to
communities that had lost everything -- homes, crops and all "productive
assets".
"These people are extremely vulnerable
... it's a race against time," Anderson told Reuters.
The Philippines had asked the United States
if it could de help with its ships, planes and helicopters, said Benito Ramos,
executive director of the national disaster agency. Britain had offered to send
two heavy-lift helicopters, he said. Private companies and individuals were
also being asked to help with their helicopters.
About 20 typhoons hit the Philippines every
year, often causing death and destruction. Almost exactly a year ago, typhoon
Washi killed nearly 1,500 people in Mindanao, but most storms make landfall further
north.
