Natural and man-made disasters swept through various parts of the world and received much attention over the past decade. Many parts of the world also suffer from the lack of basic necessities, including shelter, water, food, education, access to basic health care, and safety, identified in "humanity's top 10 problems over the next 50 years. The Conference on Humanitarian Logistics will focus on various topics relevant to planning, preparing, and responding to disasters, as well as recovery and mitigation, long term development, and health efforts. Given the complexity of the problems faced and the lives at stake, the main objectives of the conference are to articulate the opportunities and challenges in preparing and responding to disasters or addressing long term problems, both from a humanitarian and a corporate/economic perspective, to identify important research issues, to create academic awareness for the research opportunities and to establish priorities for non-government organizations (NGOs), corporations, and the government in terms of their strategies, policies, and investments.

The Conference is supported in part by the Georgia Tech Nash Endowment, the Georgia Tech Focused Research Program and the National Science Foundation.