Brussels, 26/05/2016 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 26 May, the European Commission announced that the EU has just released €4 million in further humanitarian aid for the victims of the earthquake which devastated Ecuador on 16 April.
The funding is taken from the ECHO budget (the European Commission's humanitarian and civil protection department) and will enable the immediate needs to be financed of the thousands of inhabitants whose homes have been destroyed, especially in the suburbs and rural areas.
This emergency aid is expected to help restore the livelihoods of the many who lost their means of subsistence. It will also ensure protection, access to health care and psychological support, as well as clean water and sanitation kits to prevent the risk of water-borne diseases. This risk is high in the coastal provinces during the upcoming rainy season, the Commission states in a press release.
The aid will be channelled through the humanitarian organisations which are ECHO's partners on the ground.
Initial emergency aid of €1 million had already been mobilised by the European Commission just a few hours after the earthquake took place. The earthquake measured 7.8 on the Richter scale and was the most powerful Ecuador has experienced since 1979 (see EUROPE 11534). (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)