Global Automotive Company shows its heart

Continental AG, Hanover, is contributing 500,000dollars for the tsunami victims in Asia. The international automotive supplier isworking together with aid organizations to determine whether a portion of this amount should be donated in the form of material resources, the corporation announced on Monday.

Screenshot of Press Release January 03, 2005
Read the press release here

For all you savvy Fund Managers

It is one thing to exploit human feelings to amass funds for disaster relief and quite another when it comes to efficiently appropriating the money collected. The operative word here is "efficiently".

For example, when funds are pouring in from all quarters of society (remember the kid that donated his entire savings of Rs. 1350), is anybody thinking (are capitalistic corporates even advising the relief organisations) of putting the unutilised funds into some kind of interest-earning deposits.

My second question here is whether it is a plausible contention to believe that the huge sums of money collected will service only the immediate relief operations. I should think that if planned wisely, agencies should now have "start-up" capital that is adequate for reconstruction efforts as well as for reintegration of the affected, back into society. Any takers?