In the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Wal-Mart responded with $20 million in cash donations, 1,500 truckloads of free merchandise, food for 100,000 meals and the promise of a job for every one of its displaced workers (Barbaro & Gillis 2005). As the Japanese government struggles to recover from the recent earthquake, care for its citizens and avoid a nuclear disaster, I was wondering what, if anything, corporations were doing to help in the effort.
A recent report by Reuters outlined the “Japan quake’s impact on U.S. companies.” With so many US companies affected and operating in Japan I hoped that the same were responding with aid to the devastated region. I was concerned when a simple google search resulted in only two pertinent stories about aid coming from Sun Life Financial and Microsoft.
Then I stumbled upon a site by the US Chamber of Commerce’s Business Civic Leadership Center (BCLC) entitled, “Corporate Aid Tracker – Japanese Earthquake and Tsunami, March 2011.” Here I learned that global corporate assistance for this crisis has reached approximately $45 million by over 40 companies, many responded with size-able donations to the American Red Cross.
Hopefully with continued assistance from governments, corporations and individuals, Japan can recover more quickly from this recent disaster. We all have a responsibility when a natural disaster of this magnitude occurs.
Image Credit: Official US Navy Imagery via Flickr under CC license.
emily — there are lots of releases going up on CSRwire trumpeting corporate relief to Japan in case you want to do a an analysis.