This week, as families around the world remember the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004, HelpAge International and its partners Help the Aged, HelpAge Sri Lanka and HelpAge India highlight the positive role older people have played in the reconstruction of their countries.

More than 10,000 older people have received small business loans or benefited from credit schemes during the three-year programme of tsunami work funded by the Disasters Emergencies Committee (DEC).

Managed and distributed through older people's associations, many of the loans have already been repaid and the money reinvested in communities, showing that when older people are given money they use it wisely.

60-year-old Thilakased Mallika lives in a fishing village close to Matara in Sri Lanka. Before the tsunami she ran a thriving batik business from her home.

When she heard that the giant waves were coming, Mallika, her husband and her daughter left everything behind and fled their home. The looms they used to produce batik cloth were completely destroyed, leaving them without an income.

Help the Aged and HelpAge International, working with local partner the Visura Development Foundation, gave the family a small loan which they used to replace equipment and buy new stock. "The loan helped us rebuild our business and now we sell locally, but also take our cloth to other nearby markets," says Mallika, who repaid the loan in one year.

Richard Blewitt, Chief Executive Officer of HelpAge International, said: "The tsunami relief effort has allowed us to focus on not only on meeting older people's immediate needs after the disaster, but on building their capacity so that they can generate income, participate in decision-making, and play an important part in lifting their families and communities out of poverty." Help the Aged and HelpAge International have helped to establish hundreds of older people's groups in India, Sri Lanka and Indonesia, many of which will continue beyond the three-year post-tsunami programme. Not only have they been administering loans, but in India for example they have also been lobbying banks and governments to give older people access to credit.

As the tsunami relief-funded projects draw to a close, HelpAge International and its partners are currently working with 16 local organisations to ensure sustainability of some of these programmes. They are also responding to the needs of older people in the wake of the Bangladesh cyclone.

Help the Aged and HelpAge International have also launched a disaster risk reduction programme to ensure that older people's capacity and skills are utilised and their needs met so that they are better equipped to respond to the increasing number of global disasters and conflicts.

Help the Aged and HelpAge International received £8 million from the UK public as part of the DEC Appeal and have invested the money in programmes in Sri Lanka, India and Indonesia.