A year after Typhoon Haiyan hit the Eastern Visayas region in the Philippines, life seems to have returned to its normal pace.
In Tacloban, one of the hardest-hit areas, traffic jams are back, small grocery stores and stalls have reopened next to fast food chains, major infrastructure, buildings and roads are being rehabilitated. However, at nights you still get this eerie feeling walking on the dark streets where stray dogs sleep next to piles of cartons and rotten vegetables. Electricity has only been restored to about 40 percent in the city.
The road to recovery is not an easy one and the scars of the disaster are still vivid.
Printing articles to share with others is a breach of our terms and conditions and copyright policy. Please use the sharing options on the left side of the article. Devex Pro members may share up to 10 articles per month using the Pro share tool ( ).
About the author
Kasper Engborg
Kasper Engborg is currently the head of OCHA in Tacloban, Philippines, which has been the regional hub for coordinating support in response Typhoon Haiyan. He has more than 18 years of international humanitarian and development experience in interagency coordination and programming in chronic and complex emergencies, natural disasters and post-conflict settings. Engborg has also worked with UNHCR, UNICEF and the Danish Red Cross, and in several countries including Eritrea, Georgia, Laos, Kosovo, Palestinian territories, Malawi, Iraq, Jordan, Uganda, North Korea and the Philippines.