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World Vision thanks Monash

17 August 2005

International aid agency World Vision last week presented vice-chancellor Professor Richard Larkins with a plaque, thanking the university for its generous support of tsunami victims.

From left: Professor Richard Larkins, Ms Michelle Gale and Professor Gary Bouma.

The university community raised nearly $12,000 for World Vision through regular staff contributions made by salary sacrificing. A further $25,000 was passed on to other aid agencies nominated by the donors.

World Vision's corporate and donor relations manager, Ms Michelle Gale, said the agency was grateful for the overwhelming response from Australians to the tsunami appeal.

She said World Vision would remain in tsunami-struck regions in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, Thailand and Myanmar for up to 15 years, helping locals rebuild their communities.

Ms Gale, who presented the plaque on behalf of Monash alumnus and World Vision chief executive Mr Tim Costello, said there was still much work to be done.

"We're still at the disaster stage, where we are providing temporary shelter and preventing disease outbreak," Ms Gale said. "We are also establishing 'child-safe areas' to protect vulnerable children from child prostitute traffickers."

The chairman of the Monash University Tsunami Support Group, Professor Gary Bouma, who attended the presentation, said Monash would continue to help, often in association with universities in Australia and Indonesia.

The tsunami was the result of an earthquake that struck the western coast of Sumatra, Indonesia on the morning of 26 December last year. It triggered tidal waves that swept into coastal villages and seaside resorts. More than 220,000 people died, with half a million injured and a million others left homeless.