Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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45. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade the total assistance provided by Irish Aid to date to assist the relief efforts following Typhoon Haiyan; if there are proposals to provide further assistance; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [52418/13]

Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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46. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade if he proposes to raise at the next EU Foreign Affairs meeting the urgent need for the European Union and indeed the international community in general to provide much needed further humanitarian assistance for the Philippines; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [52419/13]

Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 45 and 46 together.

Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest storms ever recorded, hit the Philippines on 8 November with devastating effect. It is estimated at present that the typhoon affected 14.4 million people, with over 3.6 million remaining displaced, including approximately 1.5 million children. The full human toll of this disaster remains unclear but over 5,600 deaths have been confirmed to date.

Ireland was among the first to respond to this disaster, providing immediate, life-saving assistance. To date, the Government has provided over €3.6 million in humanitarian assistance, making Ireland one of the most generous contributors to the relief effort on a per capita basis. Of this assistance, over €2.6million in funding has been provided through our key NGO partners for the provision of emergency food and non-food items; water, sanitation and hygiene; emergency health care and protection of vulnerable women and children. Ireland’s support will benefit up to 50,000 households.

To date, Irish Aid has authorised four airlifts of essential relief items, the most recent of which arrived in the Philippines on Monday, 2 December. This brings the total amount of essential relief items provided by Ireland to 166 tonnes, valued at €967,000 in total. According to the latest figures, Ireland is the second largest contributor of emergency stocks through the UN World Food Programme Humanitarian Response Depot system, second only to the World Food Programme itself. We have also deployed five members of the Rapid Response Corps to the Philippines to assist UN relief.

An Irish Government's technical mission arrived in the Philippines on 28 November and travelled to the worst affected area, Tacloban City. The purpose of this mission is to prepare a detailed analysis of the longer-term needs of the worst affected regions and to explore ways in which Ireland can most effectively contribute to the recovery process. The team will return to Dublin later this week and report to the Tánaiste and me, with recommendations on how Ireland can assist the Philippines in the medium to long term.

The international community has so far contributed a total of US $394 million in response to this disaster. Of this, $167 million has been provided to the UN appeal which is at present 48% funded. This includes $25 million from the UN’s Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF), to which Ireland is an important contributor.

While the situation in the Philippines was not on the formal agenda for November’s EU Foreign Affairs Council, the Tánaiste took the opportunity to discuss with his EU colleagues the wider EU response to the crisis. Department officials are in regular contact with the European Commission’s Directorate for Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection (ECHO) and, in particular, the EU Emergency Response Centre. As of the end of November, the EU and its Member States had provided over €130 million in support to the relief effort. Just last week, in Brussels, I also discussed the EU response with the European Commissioner for Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection, Ms. Kristalina Georgieva, who recently returned from the region.

While the agenda has not yet been finalised, I would expect that I will have the opportunity to discuss the evolving situation in the Philippines and the role the EU should play in the recovery process at the Development segment of the Foreign Affairs Council, which I will attend, in Brussels, on 12 December.