I would like to start by thanking you for coming and I have been deeply moved by the things I have seen and heard here in Sukkur and in the heart of Sindh along the banks of the Indus River about the impact that these floods have had on the people of Pakistan.

The waters of the Indus River have nurtured civilization for 5000 years of recorded history. Today, I have also seen and met with the families who suffered the terrible damage that these waters have recently done. This has caused not just a humanitarian crisis, but as you drive along the roadside and see the destruction of agriculture and death of livestock, one recognizes this also is a tremendous economic and social catastrophe.

We know that twenty million Pakistanis have been affected by these tragic floods and we know that more than 20 percent of all cropland in this country is underwater. Farmers are without crop, livestock have been wiped out, the winter planting season, rapidly coming upon us, is in serious jeopardy. We met today with children who are hungry and who are not currently in schools and we know that mothers are currently lacking access to necessary urgent maternal healthcare. Waters are polluted, and water-borne illness is a tremendous threat to the entire population.

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to meet with the United Nations organizations cluster leads that are providing urgent support to Pakistan and urgent leadership sector by sector. Over 1.8 million people have received initial 30 day rations of food from the World Food Program, more than half of that has been provided through partnership with the United States. The sectors are working aggressively to meet the needs and are clearly scaling up their response efforts as quickly as they possibly can.

I also met with General Nadeem and the National Disaster Management Authority staff. This is the first natural disaster in Pakistan where NDMA led by General Nadeem has been in clear charge of the entire response effort. USAID is proud to be working with General Nadeem and his team who are doing an outstanding job in very difficult circumstances. In fact, USAID has helped provide resources to set up and support the National Disaster Management Authority. We continue to provide support to allow General Nadeem to have the capacity, staff and capability to save as many lives as possible, evacuate communities, and provide support to communities that have been affected by the floods.

We had the chance yesterday to travel with General Nadeem by helicopter over the flooded Swat Valley, and we saw bridge after bridge that had been washed out by the floods, stranding more than 600,000 people in the region. So many of these people were displaced only a year ago by terrorism and had recently returned home - only to suffer from this natural disaster.

Today, touring devastation in this region, I am both saddened by the extent of the catastrophe and also deeply impressed by the commitment and valor of the dedicated international and local relief workers who are doing their best to meet human needs. But let me be clear: This disaster presents a major logistical challenge. Simply getting food, water, non-food items such as hygiene kits, and a range of other items to the needy populations will be a significant challenge in the days and weeks to come. We are committed to supporting as significant a relief effort as is possible and our focus on a day to day basis is to ensure that the relief effort is larger, exists at greater scale, is more efficient and is able to meet greater needs every single day.

We are carrying a message with us for the people of Pakistan: As you begin to recover from this disaster, America, including the United States Agency for International Development and all of the other parts of our government stand with you. The American people are committed to humanitarian response. We believe in the moral calling of saving lives when it is possible to do so and we are fully committed to this effort. That is why just last week Secretary Clinton and I joined the United Nations General Assembly and announced a $150 million support package just for the immediate relief effort that has taken place and it is why we continue to try to expand our efforts every single day.

Today, in southern Pakistan, I am pleased to announce that the United States will redirect an additional $50 million of assistance from our Kerry Lugar Berman Assistance portfolio to aid Pakistanis in early recovery efforts such as the things we started to see here in the camps.

We will continue to closely monitor and assess the situation, and will look for ways that we can most immediately and effectively benefit the people of Pakistan. There's no question that as this effort transitions from meeting basic needs in the immediate relief period to an early recovery period that is focused on supporting the resiliency of local markets -- helping people get back on their feet, supporting local cash for work programs so that they can support themselves and build viable local economies -- that we will need to take steps that fulfill our commitment to the people of Pakistan and do what is ever most appropriate and most effective to really help people recover.

We will consult closely with Pakistan's leadership. We have been engaged in an important and significant strategic dialogue since the beginning of this Administration. Secretary Clinton and President Obama remain committed to that dialogue as a vehicle for us to have the type of consultation and partnership that cuts across a broad range of issues and allows us to work in real partnership on behalf of the people of Pakistan. As hard as it is to image a future in the face of the devastation that we see today and we see all around Pakistan as a result of the floods, we believe that this also presents an opportunity to build back a stronger and better and more resilient Pakistani economy.

After the tragic earthquake in 2005 that killed almost 80,000 Pakistanis, USAID committed itself to rebuilding schools on behalf of those affected communities. We rebuilt 56 schools that serve more than 20,000 students and we built them to a high earthquake standard that we, in fact, had the chance to see as we flew over some of them yesterday. That's just one example of how we can work together to build back a stronger and more capable Pakistan that provides better services to its people and takes seriously the risk reduction that we need to put in place, so that future natural disasters simply don't cause the kind of tragedy that we have seen today and that we have seen in the recent floods.

So I thank you for being here. I thank you for joining us in the visits to the camps, ultimately those visits for me were a unique opportunity to speak with, listen to and learn from the people we are trying to serve. I take back with me a real sense of commitment because what they've been through has been horrendous and we want to do everything we possibly can to help them rebuild their lives. Thank you.