Being quick off the mark….

By Lauren.

It’s Wednesday morning and our Head of Creative interrupts my peaceful start with a “Have you seen the news?” I haven’t. Its 8.30am and my mind is caught up in meeting minutes and a bit of an admin backlog. “Earthquake in Haiti,” he informs me, and there it is, the rest of my working week goes into a spin.

Before I know it, it’s Friday night and we’ve produced 27 press ads for the week and weekend broadsheets. We’re not the only ones. In fact, all of the major, and some not so major, international aid charities are in the papers from Thursday onwards. Everyone has been incredibly quick off the mark.

Not since the tsunami has such a large-scale fundraising effort been put into practice. The difference is this time everyone is prepared. The Disasters Emergency Committee – the umbrella organisation which coordinates responses to overseas disasters – received £10 million in just 24 hours. The other notable difference is that this time we have more media at our fingertips. According to The Independent  Twitter, YouTube and Facebook have collectively produced $9 million in donations whilst text messages have produced a further $11 million.

As I flick through the papers, I ask myself whether they are saturated with requests for help. Perhaps. Is that a problem? According to the above figures and my experience at TW CAT no. The UK public continues to give generously.

Inevitably the usual NGO backlash will begin over when the money will get there, what it is used for and how it will affect the development of the country. What is clear is that Haiti will need all the help that it can get and as infrastructure delays aid reaching areas most affected, being quick off the mark in raising funds is critical.