After a decade of independence following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the southern Caucasus region — Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan — continues to face economic difficulties and the risk of renewed conflict and internal strife. Specifically, conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed area of Nagorno-Karabakh, and secessionist movements in the Georgian regions of Abkhazia and south Ossetia have created more than 900,000 refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the Caucasus.

In response to this growing humanitarian crisis and rapid decline in living standards, IRD began operations in this country in 1999. Some highlights of our work include:

• Rural Enterprise Support — Assistance to farmers and other rural entrepreneurs to improve the quality of their lives by increasing their incomes;
• Health Care — Emergency distribution of pharmaceutical and medical supplies, training for medical professionals and construction of medical facilities;
• Emergency Survival Aid — Distributing food parcels, hygiene kits, school kits, blankets, tools and seeds to refugees, IDPs and local vulnerable populations;
• Repatriation and Reintegration — Providing direct assistance to IDPs and refugees through direct food and clothing distributions and income generation opportunities; and
• NGO Capacity Building — Providing small grants and management assistance to local NGOs to help them improve and expand community services.

Retrieved from http://www.ird.org/our-work/by-region/europe/georgia on 1 November 2014 by the Internet Archive WayBackMachine.

International Relief & Development (IRD) website.

Partner: International Relief and Development (IRD)

Articles

Pedals for Progress partners with a wide variety of organizations to promote and aid sustainable economic development throughout the world. One of our partnerships this year was with International Relief & Development (IRD), a NGO with truly global reach that provides $500 million in development assistance in nearly 40 countries annually. Our collaboration with IRD involved a joint program of theirs with the United Nations to aid more than 800 refugee families in Georgia displaced during that country’s 2008 conflict with Russia.

P4P was pleased to be able to help that effort by providing 82 donated sewing machines. The shipment cleared customs in early September and the machines have by now been fully distributed. Our hope is that the sewing machines will in some measure encourage entrepreneurship and return self-sufficiency to families who had been forced from their homes during the fighting and returned to find their belongings stolen or destroyed. Most of the aid was distributed in the Shida Kartli region of central Georgia (just south of contested South Ossetia).

Below is a thank you note forwarded to us by IRD:

“I am Iamze Chutkerashvili, a solitary mother and I am looking after my two sons alone. I am a teacher and my salary is not enough for keeping the family. Without the assistance from non-governmental humanitarian organizations as IRD our life would have been much more difficult.

“I have already received a solid assistance from IRD and I was amazed and very excited when I saw your representative once again in my family with quilts, sewing machine, and sewing kits.

“As you know our village is one of the villages from the former buffer zone and during the war in August 2008 almost every family were damaged and looted, so you can easily understand how important such kind of assistance for me is.

“I want to say once again that all beneficiaries in my village are very thankful to IRD for the assistance.”

As much as we wish it were otherwise, Pedals for Progress simply can’t get the items our domestic supporters donate to all the places in the world where people desperately need a leg up. Partners like IRD help us help those whom it would normally be prohibitively difficult for us to reach alone.

Fall 2010 InGear

P4P is pleased to announce a partnership with International Relief and Development (IRD), one of the world’s largest non-profit investors in international development and providers of humanitarian assistance. IRD has relief programs in over forty nations. One of these is Georgia.

Nestled in the Caucasus Mountains, Georgia is a former Soviet republic which has been attempting to remove itself from the shadow of Russia for nearly two decades. Despite large amounts of Western political and economic aid, Georgia’s economy remains inextricably tied to its powerful northern neighbor. Its domestic market is miniscule and the vast majority of its imports and exports come from or are destined for Russia. This is problematic in light of intermittent, politically-motivated bans on Georgian products by the Russian government and the fact that, since its independence, its outdated Soviet industries have struggled to compete internationally. In addition, Georgia’s notoriously corrupt government seemingly has little power to aid the plight of its people. Over a quarter of Georgia’s population lives below the official poverty line.

The 2008 conflict with Russia over South Ossetia hurt many Georgian families who had been forced from their homes and returned to find many of their tools and supplies stolen or lost during the Russian occupation. IRD is working with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees to provide assistance to more than eight hundred of these families. As part of the IRD effort, P4P-supplied 82 sewing machines, which are being made available to encourage local entrepreneurship. These machines are expected to arrive on the Georgia by mid-July.