Tsunami relief effort

The Indian Ocean tsunami of 26 December 2004 was one of the world’s most devastaing natural disasters. Within days of the disaster, Sam DiPiazza, CEO of PricewaterhouseCoopers International Limited, committed the global network of PricewaterhouseCoopers firms to the provision of tsunami aid and relief. He recalls: “This commitment reflected our collective philosophy of helping the communities in which we work. Alongside the immediate flow of donations and aid from individual PricewaterhouseCoopers member firms around the world, we wanted to leverage our global network of expertise in the most effective way. So we offered our time and capabilities free of charge in support of the UN’s relief efforts across the affected region.”

In March 2005 UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland announced an agreement under which PricewaterhouseCoopers would donate 8,000 hours of advisory services to the UN Tsunami Flash Appeal. The assistance focused on two areas: improving the transparency of the financial tracking system for donations; and enhancing accountability to ensure donations were reaching the right destination and used appropriately. Mr Egeland observed that this“very important agreement will mean unprecedented transparency and investigations capacity”—and provide a model for future collaboration between the UN and the private sector. PricewaterhouseCoopers people in countries across the region affected by the tsunami are now working under the direction of the UN management team to help ensure that donations reach the point of need. “The enthusiasm of PricewaterhouseCoopers people around the world has been incredible,” says PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Peter Spratt, who is co-leading the initiative. “We are all working outside our comfort zone, which makes this all the more challenging and rewarding.”
Dubravka Kulisic, PricewaterhouseCoopers’ project manager and coordinator for the tsunami effort, brings to bear her experience of working with the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, in the US. She notes that the UN’s commitment to greater transparency and accountability to donors has been underlined by the creation—with the help of the PricewaterhouseCoopers team—of a real-time system for tracking donations.