North Hollanders set up massive fundraising campaigns for refugees from Ukraine. The stuff will come and drivers will also register. The destination is more complicated: it remains unclear until the day of departure and control over the issuance is taken out of your hands.
Dick Nijssen, chairman of the Holland-Ukraine Foundation, has been transporting goods to Ukraine for thirty years. Normally, his organization takes it away himself and he sees with his own eyes where the stuff ends up. Because of the war, he now leaves the transport to Ukrainian drivers with Ukrainian cars, who want to return to their families in their home country.
Exactly how and where the drivers drive into the country cannot be said until Saturday, on the day of departure. Nijssen is in contact with the Ukrainian embassy in The Hague, which talks about a special ‘corridor’, corridor, for aid organizations. “On such a ‘corridor’, only cars with a special sign, such as the Red Cross, are allowed. But I don’t know exactly how that works and where it will be.”
No control
The most difficult thing for him is that he has no control over the stuff. “Normally we walk in the hospitals and children’s homes where our things end up. Now you have to leave it to other aid organizations.”
That does not mean that Nijssen has a bad image of the Ukrainian organizations. He assumes that the items will now also end up in the right places: he knows the organizations that do this well and trusts them ‘one thousand percent’.
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Stuff to refugees in Poland
The Polish Natalia Rokosz collects things in Amsterdam for Ukrainian refugees in Poland. Today she has arranged a place at LOADS.amsterdam where things can be brought. The first transport will start on Friday.
“I have a large network in Poland and therefore felt that I had to set up such a campaign. I called major European transport companies, with locations in the Netherlands and Poland. Already an hour after my call I had four drivers who wanted to bring the stuff from the Netherlands to Poland.”
Free drivers
The drivers drive voluntarily. What is not free is the fuel. “That’s the main obstacle, finding money for fuel. Some large companies will pay for it themselves, but the smaller companies cannot. I arrange that money through funds.”
The items are driven from the Netherlands to the southeast of Poland. A Polish aid organization keeps track of where the refugees are, so that the items are sent to the right place. Once there, the Polish organization takes over. Because the situation changes so often and the refugees move around a lot, it is only clear on the day of transport where the drivers can take the items.
Rokosz calls on everyone to bring everything they can spare to the location in Amsterdam-North this afternoon. Five wooden pallets are urgently needed, but warm clothing, sleeping gear, medicines and food are also desired.
Without foreign connections
But you can also set up a collection campaign without connections in Poland or Ukraine. Marjolijn Sleven from De Goorn sympathizes very much with the refugees and also wanted to set up something. “I have the space to collect things and I know many people who can help through my work at the municipality and childcare.”
For her, the transport does not go further than Limburg. She hopes to find someone else with a truck, but otherwise she will drive to Limburg with friends to deliver the stuff there. The Netherlands-Ukraine Cooperation Platform Foundation takes over the items there to take with you. “They have the connections there, so they can do that better. But I can do something locally.”