Past Tzu-Chi International Relief Activities
Outer Mongolia As a result of the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Outer Mongolia has fallen into difficult times. Since 1992, Tzu Chi has prepared and sent over 10,000 cotton shirts, shorts, hats, socks, jackets, long pants, and boxes of powdered milk. A total of 39 tons of food and clothing were carried in 9 different planes and transported to Outer Mongolia along with a share of caring.
Papua New Guinea In Papua New Guinea, western Africa, there is an average of one doctor for every 8000 people. The people living there are constantly plagued by disease. The child mortality rate is as high as 14%, and the average life span of its citizens is only forty-seven years old. The country lacks medical facilities and the production abilities are low. Therefore they turned to Tzu Chi for help. Since 1995, Tzu Chi has provided medication worth over $100,000 (US dollars), which can be used by the patients of all five hospitals of the country.
Ivory Coast Due to economic problems, children from villages and neighboring countries have poured into Abidjan, the country’s capital, creating a serious social problem. Tzu Chi worked with M.D.M for the fourth time in a 3-year project to assist the kids wandering on the streets. They set up a Children’s Home that shelters homeless children aged six to fifteen. The goal is to develop their living and reading skills. An estimated 14000 homeless children can benefit from this program.
Buddhist Tzu Chi Kidney Dialysis Center in
Malaysia. Read more ... Free clinics in Mexico. Read more ... Yellow Earth Relief Mission. Read more ... Nineth free clinic. Read more ...
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Famine, rampant starvation, and civil war have long
ravaged Ethiopia. Since 1993, Tzu Chi, in conjunction with Medical du Monde (M.D.M.), has
begun a three-year plan to assist and improve Ethiopia’s medical facilities. Tzu Chi
has rebuilt two medical centers and set up 13 medical stations in North Shoa region, Menz
and Gishe. They also developed sources of fresh water for the locals. So far, an estimated
340,000 people have benefited from these efforts. 
In the summer of 1993, the destitute country of Nepal was battered
by torrential rain and floods. In order to help the most severely affected refugees to
have a place to stay, Tzu Chi built 1800 houses at Sarlahi, Rauthat, and Makwanpur.
The descendants of the 65,000 soldiers left behind from
the Chinese Civil War in Northern Thailand are without any citizenship, and rightly called
the "Orphans of Asia". Because the Taiwanese government’s plan to send
relief to Northern Thailand has ceased, Tzu Chi has started a three-year plan of assisting
Northern Thailand. Tzu Chi has started to build houses, give education, medicine, and
agricultural assistance. In the near future Tzu Chi hopes to help guide the villagers to
become independent. 
Due to the genocide, Rwanda became a horrific battleground in June,
1994. Tzu Chi and M.D.M worked together once again to transport medical supplies and
medical personnel deep into Rwanda on missions of mercy. Dr. Wang Ing-wei from the Tzu Chi
hospital also went to Rwanda in person to assist with medical aid.
After emerging from a long-term civil war, Cambodia was
successively hit by drought and other natural disasters. Since 1994, Tzu Chi has sent
urgent aids in the form of water pumps, grains, rice, oils, etc., to prevent Cambodia from
complete loss of sustenance. The beneficiaries numbered more than 300,000 people, and a
deep affinity was established with native Cambodians.
This was the third time Tzu Chi worked with M.D.M. They provided
$430,000 (US dollars) to begin emergency medical assistance in Chechenya. This assistance
provided medical treatments to mentally-ill patients recovering from war trauma, and
improved the health and hygiene of the general population. This project ended in February
of 1996.
Since June of 1997 Tzu Chi has provided the refugee camps in the
four major cities of Azerbaijan with 1500 tents, 100 wheelchairs, and then ten shipping
crates full of winter clothes and covers. Two crates of summer clothes were also sent to
Gambia in South Africa. One crate of both winter and summer clothes and covers were
shipped to Liberia.