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International (2006-2014)
Tzu Chi in the USA
1989 – 2014

Continuing Care in

Central America

fter a week of heavy tropical storms along the
Pacific coast led to heavy flooding throughout
ACentral America in early October 2011, local Tzu
Chi volunteers in Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala
immediately sprang into action to assess damage, to
provide cash and material relief, and to arrange for further
support. At the end of the month, teams of volunteers
from the United States traveled south to meet and
support them.
During previous hurricane and earthquake relief
efforts in 1998 and 2001, respectively, Tzu Chi volunteers
from the United States had taken the lead in providing
relief to local disaster survivors. By the time U.S. volunteers
returned in 2011, they only needed to support the local
volunteers already active in the three affected countries.
When volunteer teams arrived from the United
States to the disaster zones, donated funds from Tzu
Chi USA Headquarters were used to purchase supplies
locally to both support survivors affected by heavy
flooding and loss of homes and crops, and help spur

Commencement at Morita Tzu Chi Elementary
in Tijuana, Mexico.

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