This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Neighbor News

Local Tucson Student is this year PSAid Contest 3rd Place Winner

How Best to Help During International Disasters

Natural disasters and crisis throughout the world have become all too frequent. Americans are generous and immediately step up to help, often gathering food and supplies for those in need. However, when it comes to helping surrounding disasters overseas, Cash is the Best way to help, otherwise new problems can be created trying to manage unneeded materials.

We’d like your help in reaching your readers so they can help effectively rather than adding new problems. To help convey this message the USAID Center for International Disaster Information (USAID CIDI) conducted a national public service announcement contest called PSAid. College students developed public service announcements to spread the Cash is Best message. We’re asking you to dedicate some of your space to utilizing one or more of the winning PSAs.

Tucson local Lisa Trahin won 3rd place in the video category in addition to her People's Choice win.

Find out what's happening in Tucsonfor free with the latest updates from Patch.

After decades of experience with donors, donations and disaster relief, USAID CIDI knows that monetary contributions to reliable relief agencies give the best support to people affected by natural disasters. CIDI relies on the generosity of publications such as yours to donate space for the PSAs to share this important message. When people donate materials, such as clothes, food and supplies, they require storage space, workers to sort through and organize and are often not what is actually needed, creating a second mini-crisis. When on-the-ground relief organizations are able to purchase needed supplies from the area that helps stimulate the local economy, serving as another way to help.

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?

More from Tucson