The winning fundraisers of our Get On Board campaign set off for an epic surf trip to the Mentawai islands in early March.  

Matt Belden and Will Hutchinson arrived in Padang to meet up with the SurfAid, Quiksilver and SDSU Center for Surf Research representatives and Quiksilver pros Balaram Stack and Ry Craike.  

The crew hopped aboard the Melaleuca charter boat, only to be met with a fierce storm that forced them to remain in Padang for the evening. The next morning the skies had cleared and they were ready to set sail for the Mentawai.

Matt, Will and the gang enjoyed some great surf days but all agreed that the highlight of their trip was time spent on the islands.  Will described it as “eye-opening”.  The aftermath of the 2010 tsunami was still very evident and Matt said it was “as if the jungle had been wiped out by a giant lawnmower”.



While on the islands, Matt and Will were able to witness SurfAid’s programs in action, and toured Quiksilver’s Katiet Center and radio tower projects.   ...read more

Thursday 12 April 2012

Two major earthquakes struck in the ocean off Sumatra yesterday setting off tsunami alerts and causing widespread panic.

The first quake, at 3.38pm, was of magnitude 8.6 in a depth of 23km, 434km south-west of Banda Aceh. It forced the evacuation of staff from SurfAid’s offices in Medan (North Sumatra), Padang (West Sumatra), Gunung Sitoli (Nias) and Tua Pejat (Mentawai Islands).

SurfAid’s Chief Financial Officer, Andrew Spagnardi, who is based in Medan, said the quake was very strong.  “It went on and on for more than four minutes.  We all ran outside and stood in the street with the rest of the local community away from anything that could fall on us,” he said.

Meanwhile residents of coastal cities and villages in the islands started fleeing towards higher ground in case of a tsunami.



Two hours later a strong aftershock of 8.2M hit, causing more panic.

“We had to evacuate our office again as we were concerned the building might collapse; it was a very eerie feeling,” Spagnardi said.

SurfAid staff rang all our offices to check that staff were OK and ascertain any injuries or damage in the villages.  Electricity was cut in many areas.

Three small tsunamis were recorded, the highest at 0.8m. The tsunami alert, which had been issued for the entire western coast of Sumatra by the Indonesian Meterology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG), was lifted at 8pm.  Twenty-eight other countries had also issued alerts. ...read more

Indonesia is an archipelago consisting of more than 17,000 islands. The Indonesian population is the fourth largest in the world, with a total of 240 million inhabitants. About 19 million people try to survive on less than US$1 a day, while a staggering 120 million people live on less than US$2 a day.

The poorest areas of Indonesia are the remote islands where sometimes as many as 95 per cent of people in rural communities are poor. In isolated areas people can’t access the public basic services (education, health, work, etc.) that are usually concentrated in the bigger towns on the mainland. 

In the isolated Mentawai Islands this has resulted directly in unnecessary deaths, especially among pregnant women and children under five. It also contributes to the unacceptably high levels of malnutrition, diarrhoea and acute respiratory infections in children under five. The accessibility and quality of maternal health are still the major causes of high maternal deaths in Indonesia. Providing health care facilities for pregnant women and children under five in remote areas of Indonesia has been dauntingly challenging.

But SurfAid is up for that challenge!




Fighting poverty and improving living conditions is tougher than it seems. There are many different and interlinked factors that contribute to the situation. Any solution needs to take into account these different factors and find creative ways of tackling them.

So, SurfAid will provide very practical support such as materials to build water tanks, water taps and toilets for clean water and sanitation, mosquito nets to avoid malaria, and vegetable seeds to help establish nutrition gardens to eradicate malnutrition. ...read more

You can help support SurfAid by participating in Billabong’s Life’s Better in Boardshorts initiative that is designed to capture the moments that enrich our individual summer experiences.

The interactive project calls on people to use the Instagram app to take a photo of whatever it is that makes their life better and then upload the image to a communal gallery at billabong.com/lifesbetter

The payoff for sharing the photo is twofold. Each entry is eligible for prize packs that include everything from clothes to a surf trip but — more importantly — Billabong will make a $1 donation for each photo received to make life better for some less fortunate members of our global community. ...read more

On February 10, 2012 the top fundraiser of SurfAid’s first ever ‘Get On Board’ fundraising contest was announced.  Matt Belden of Surfbreak Rentals and a friend will be joining an all-star lineup for a once-in-a-lifetime Mentawai surf trip.

On March 7th, Matt and his friend will leave for the Mentawai Islands, alongside Quiksilver pros Balaram Stack and Ry Craike, and representatives of the Quiksilver Foundation, Quiksilver Travel, SDSU Center for Surf Research, and SurfAid.

Matt’s fundraising efforts not only won for him two spots on the Mentawai surf trip, but also raised an amazing $4,300 for SurfAid. ...read more

The Mentawai and Nias islands, off Indonesia’s Sumatran coast, are home to some of the most perfect surf breaks in the world. A dream destination for surfers. But look past the azure blue waters, and near perfect waves, and you’ll see a people challenged by regularly occurring natural disasters and disease.

Since 2000, SurfAid has been working to improve the health, wellbeing and self-reliance of the Mentawai and Nias people through education programs involving nutrition, hygiene and disease prevention. SurfAid has also taught Emergency Preparedness programs and provided disaster response to help prepare for and recover from devastating earthquakes and tsunamis.

These islands also represent a perfect case study to more deeply explore the challenges and opportunities related to broader issues of sustainability and the surfing industry’s connection to it … social, environmental, and economic.

All of this adds up to a driving need for more awareness within the surf industry in the United States … surfers, surf travelers, board shapers, glassers, apparel and accessories manufacturers … all of us.

So you’re probably thinking ... ...read more

After an intense year of work, SurfAid has completed the major projects of our Tsunami Recovery Program in the Mentawai Islands since the 25 October 2010 disaster.

After our initial Emergency Response, seven recovery projects ran simultaneously across three islands, three of which were implemented by SurfAid partners YRSM (Yayasan Reimar Schefold Mentawai), arche noVa and IBU Foundation.  

The projects were Post-disaster Disease Prevention and Treatment, Clean Water, Hygiene Promotion, Psychosocial Support, Mother and Child Health, Emergency Preparedness and Temporary Shelter.



Prior to the tsunami, we were implementing two separate projects, Community-based Health and Clean Water. As soon as we realised the scale of destruction caused by the tsunami, we realised we needed to step up and provide a much greater level of assistance to as many of the affected areas as possible. Luckily we received substantial support, almost immediately, from AusAID and the New Zealand Aid Programme, as well as donations from corporates, individuals and foundations. This allowed us to set our sights high with regard to the amount of assistance we were able to provide. ...read more

During the Mentawai Tsunami Recovery Program, SurfAid worked with partner arche noVa to implement clean water facilities. Besides hardware, arche noVa also tried to increase awareness about hygiene practice. Although some public latrines were built by different international NGOs (non-governmental organisations), most of the community members were defecating in the open, in the forest or river.

CLTS (Community-led Total Sanitation) is an approach where communities are “triggered” about their hygiene practices. At the end of the activity, community members sign a contract that they will build a simple private latrine.

Sabiret, a hamlet in South Pagai which was hit directly by the tsunami and where all community members were displaced to the 27km area, was one of the hamlets triggered by arche Nova staff. ...read more

SurfAid would like to sincerely thank brothers Santiago and Fernando Aguerre for their eight years of passionate, tireless and dedicated contribution to our organization.

Santiago has resigned from SurfAid’s International Board and Fernando has announced his resignation as President of the Surf Industry Manufacturers Association (SIMA) Humanitarian Fund and Chairman of the Liquid Nation Ball. Fernando remains on the SIMA Humanitarian Fund Board as a director.

In 2002, SurfAid founder Dr Dave Jenkins was invited by the Aguerre Bros to speak at the Surf Summit in Cabo San Lucas and he inspired the surf and action sports industry to get involved with SurfAid’s mission. The following year, the SurfAid USA office was opened and through US funding helped the organization expand its educational health programs and services.  ...read more

Pictured:   David Pyott, Chairman of the Board, President and CEO of Allergan, Inc. (on the right) and Randal Schober, Executive Director of SurfAid USA.

SurfAid is proud to announce that it has been awarded a $2,500 grant from Allergan, Inc. through the Allergan Foundation. Funds will help SurfAid address the community needs of the Mentawai and surrounding islands through our health programs and services.

Allergan, Inc is a multi-specialty health care company based in Irvine CA that is focused on discovering, developing and commercializing innovative pharmaceuticals, biologics, medical devices and over-the-counter consumer products that enable people to live life to its greatest potential. ...read more