The tsunami of December 2004 had its greatest impacts on rural coastal communities,
many of which were already poor, vulnerable and with few livelihood options. With a high dependency on a severely depleted and over-fished natural resource base and on badly degraded coastal ecosystems, few coastal communities could, prior to the tsunami, see a path out of poverty. This is not a situation to which communities should be returned as a result of post-tsunami rehabilitation efforts. Rehabilitation should look beyond returning to the status quo and seek to address the root causes of vulnerability — issues of resource access, marginalization, market access, power imbalances, lack of information, and unsustainable resource use — and build resilience to cope with future threats and opportunities.