March 2015 FEW Meeting Recap: Women Need Women to Talk About Their Needs

Event recap of the FEW March Meeting: “Unequal Impact- Gender in Disasters and Action You Can Take” with Nonprofit NGO Consultant Sarajean Rossitto

“Women need women to talk about their needs”

By Katharina von Tschurtschenthaler

A disaster strikes – what do victims of such a catastrophe need most urgently? Water? Food? Shelter? Yes, without any doubt. All these basic needs have to be covered. But have you ever considered that every person has different requirements? That a mother needs privacy while breastfeeding her newborn? That violence is a big issue especially for single women when staying with men in an evacuation center? That child pornography was a huge problem in the aftermath of the earthquake of 2011? Maybe you have not thought about that. Which is no big surprise: Those news never made it into prime time TV, explains Sarajean Rossitto, a long-term Tokyo resident, nonprofit NGO consultant and FEW member. Why? “Because it was considered being bad publicity for the region.”

With her presentation at the FEW monthly meeting on Thursday, March 12, Sarajean wanted to create awareness, that the “every person for him or herself” mentality is not in light of real life. Every person is impacted differently. She told the story of a couple of women who died in their cars in Miyagi Prefecture just after the Tsunami hit. They did not make it to the evacuation road in time. Because before trying to save their own lives they took care of their closed ones – their children, husbands and mothers.

In several brainstorming sets we discussed possible gender gaps and what has to be done to reduce them. The first step is to admit that there is a gap – that a mother has different needs than a child, an elderly person might need more physical support than a 30 year old man. Representatives from both genders have to be in charge – a woman will feel more comfortable to talk to another woman. In addition a system needs to be implemented on how to deal with violence.

Sarajean also helped us brainstorm actions we can take to be more involved and connected in disaster prevention and response, such as:

• Learn more about the local situation
• Prepare a kit, your home, your family, a plan
• Share information, concerns
• Look for routes, wells, organizations doing good work (and yes, there are a bunch of NGOs focusing on women’s needs, for example “risetogether”: their members set up a text message service to report violence)
• Support groups, funds, other women
• Contact local government
• Create a network for emergencies, phone tree, contact list, an emergency plan
• Join and volunteer

Japan has to catch up regarding gender inclusion – while many NGOs are fulfilling gender standards overseas they don’t do so here. Why? Sarajean never got an answer to this eligible question – which shows again that especially in Japan there is a long way towards gender equality and sensibility in disaster management.

Tokyo-based Sarajean Rossitto facilitates workshops, seminars and projects aimed at developing skills, organisational capacity understanding of global issues and effective partnerships. She has more than 10 years experience as a nonprofit NGO consultant in Japan and has more than 20 years experience working with organisations in the US, Japan and East Asia.