Humanitarian Teamwork from Logistics Giants

A partnership launched at Davos brings together relief organizations and transport companies, united in a can-do approach to disaster response

by Alyson Warhurst

Addressing companies at the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in the aftermath of the December, 2004 Southeast Asia tsunami that claimed almost a quarter of a million lives, Peter Bakker, chief executive of Dutch logistics and transport company TNT (TNT.AS), laid out a bold manifesto.

"We should not compete when it comes to saving lives," Bakker said. "We have a social duty to lend our expertise to help solve what has been too often referred to as a 'logistics nightmare'—that is, the prioritization, transportation, storage, and onward distribution of appropriate goods in the immediate aftermath of humanitarian disasters."

Thus, at the Davos Forum in January, 2005, the Logistics and Transportation Industry Humanitarian Workstream was born—an alliance of some of the world's major logistics and transportation companies, including United Parcel Service (UPS), TNT, Agility Logistics (AGLT.KW), and Deutsche Post World Net (DPWGN.F), the parent of DHL.

Putting People First

The first challenge for the member companies was to prove to the humanitarian community that they could put humanitarian goals above business objectives, particularly following disasters where transportation and warehousing services are at a premium.

"Our motivation has always been to use our logistics expertise to help make a difference to people on the ground, when and where we can," says Tarek Sultan, chairman and managing director of Agility. "We recognized from the beginning we would have to take a collaborative approach with the humanitarian community. Our companies took the road of dialogue, transparency, and relationship-building, saying quite openly we are in this for the long haul, sometimes there are going to be bumps, but we will learn from each other and act in good faith."

The journey has not been easy. Indeed, it has been too slow for some, especially since each company had been working as an individual contributor to humanitarian groups. TNT, for example, had a long-established successful partnership with the World Food Program. At its CEO's insistence, the company was prepared to share its tried-and-tested approaches with other firms.

During the Lebanon crisis in 2006, during which 800,000 people were displaced, Agility worked with local Red Cross and Red Crescent operations to move food, blankets, and mobile hospitals into affected areas during the bombing and immediately after the cease-fire. The company's recent projects also include helping transport enough food to feed 43,000 people in Indonesia for the World Food Program after flooding in Jakarta. The firm similarly worked with the local government in Bangladesh to procure and transport food and bottled water after a cyclone, as well as delivering life-support materials to displaced families in Iraq with the International Medical Corps.

DHL had already tested the concept of airport emergency support in the aftermath of the 2004 tsunami and Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The concept was developed further into DHL Disaster Response Teams, which are the core element of the company's partnership with the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.