PeaceTrees Vietnam staff, officials from the Quang Tri Women’s Union, Department of Foreign Affairs, and the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi commemorating the 25th anniversary of U.S.-Vietnam normalized diplomatic relations in July, 2020 (photo credit: PeaceTrees Vietnam)
July 11th, 2022 marks the 27th anniversary of normalized diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Vietnam. Nearly half of a century after the end of the Second Indochina War, Vietnam is a middle income country with a fast-growing economy and is one of America’s strongest international partners. Continue Reading
As our work with the SE Asia Foundation continues to mature, I’m often asked about how one can know if their charitable donations are doing all the good they expect. Usually, I just answer such inquiries with a top-of-the-head response. But recently a friend wanted to delve more deeply into that question so I decided I’d better put my thoughts together more concisely. So, here you go: Ten serious mistakes to avoid when giving, followed by one positive suggestion. Continue Reading
The term “natural capital” is not well known, but is a significant concept for global development and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It is best defined as the earth’s natural resources that can be used for economic gain. This could be economic gain for large companies, but it also provides livelihoods for small-holder farmers and small-scale fishers. Without sustainable use of natural resources, those closest to the land and sea would lose their income and often community cohesion.
However, the best solutions for sustainable development of land and sea are often those indigenous communities who have the local knowledge. Several Global Washington members are working in partnership with communities on sustainable use of natural resources as a good source of income. This includes securing land rights for small-holder farmers, scaling sustainable farming and fishing practices, and advocating for equitable supply chains. Furthermore, SDG 12 lays out targets for Responsible Consumption and Production. Learn more about the topic and the work of Global Washington members in the following article.
We are also excited to gradually get back to in-person events about global development. I hope you can join us in the coming months to network, learn, and contribute to our global development community. Stay tuned for event announcements.
How GlobalWA Members Teach Responsible Use of Natural Wealth
An abundance of natural resources on this planet has led to the unabashed expansion of civilization at an unprecedented rate, but we have reached a precipice of consumption that cannot be ignored. Sustainable Development Goal 12 outlines how a society can produce and consume resources responsibly, without causing harm. The goal is critical, for the world’s largest and most necessary industries are inexorably tied to the earth’s natural wealth.
Fishermen, Vietnam. Photo: Quangpraha, Pixabay.
Resource protection, equitable distribution, and responsible consumption are cornerstones of the Monterey Framework, a precedent of environmental and social consciousness that underlines the far-reaching detrimental impact of the fishing industry. Human rights transgressions, unethical business practices, and the loss of access to critical resources are some of the rampant crises that initiatives like the Monterey Framework aim to address. In that mission, the world’s seafood sector is an exemplar of a movement to respect indigenous fishers and increased demand for sustainability standards for natural capital.
The crisis of finite systems
Natural resources are under the strain of depletion, exacerbated by rampant climate change, accelerated by unsustainable practices. The concept of natural capital explores how these environmental resources are crucial for socioeconomic systems that sustain global industries, commerce, and agriculture. Fertile soil, diverse marine ecosystems, and teeming forests are the groundwork for some of the world’s largest industries, both within and beyond borders.
The cumulative goods and services traded in the marine sector, for instance, was valued at 2.5 trillion USD per year – roughly 3% of the global GDP – in 2020.
Unsustainable practices highlight the finite nature of these assets: research shows that natural resources tend to be overused for short-term economic prosperity, rather than be preserved and consumed sustainably. With the example of the agriculture sector alone, a simulation by the UN WCMC revealed several impact drivers that generate heavy footprints on some of the world’s most vital resources: habitat modification of freshwater systems to produce cropland, the expansion of existing arable land through further modifications like deforestation, and unregulated water usage for irrigation leading to significant depletion of water resources.
Without frameworks to implement sustainable practice standards, these ecosystems are poised to crumble under the weight of rapidly developing sectors.
A grassroots approach
Smaller-scale rural farming enterprises, still suffer from the fallout of unsustainable practices, lack of access to resources and knowledge, and increasingly limited financial relief. The solution, as GlobalWA members demonstrate in their work, may be formalization: to encourage rural communities to organize and legitimize themselves as recognizable associations, so they may receive training in sustainable practices, be properly licensed, have access to financial resources, and mitigate risk for potential investors. To that end, NGOs across multiple sectors have employed innovative systems to rehabilitate unsustainable resource production, starting from assisting individual farmers to facilitating multi-sector coordination of capital and goods.
Farmers in India. Photo: Rajesh Ram, Unsplash.
Modernizing practices for long-term growth
Sustainable practices being as pivotal on land as they are at sea, a tenuous bond between silt and civilization encapsulates the resource crisis in agriculture, one of the world’s vital sectors heavily impacted by natural capital depletion.
Legitimization presents again to be a strong solution in efforts undertaken by Landesa, a non-profit organization working to secure legitimate right to land ownership for rural communities in the world’s richest agricultural belts. Estimates show that up to 1.5 billion people are affected by erosion and degradation of land; 1.8 billion are expected to suffer crippling water scarcity by 2025, and rising temperatures are projected to enable the proliferation of crop pests and pathogens. Furthermore, degraded land leading to lower and less reliable crop yields is expected to perpetuate starvation and malnourishment on a global scale.
Landsea’s mission links the practicality of land autonomy in the hands of farmers with the most drastic impacts of unregulated agriculture: legitimate land rights will allow farmers to invest in long-term preservation methods for more sustainable and reliable farming, staving off starvation, mitigating the impact of droughts, and increasing crop yields. Implementing proper irrigation systems alongside farming methods like agroforestry and terracing are made more viable through the legitimization of land ownership, and can mitigate soil erosion, dependence on rain cycles and pest invasions.
Efforts to return land rights to their rightful owners is also a matter of consideration for FSC Investments and Partnerships and their work to assist Indigenous populations. The 2018 FSC Indigenous Foundation paved the way to sustainable practices in managing and operating Indigenous territories with independence and autonomy granted to landowners. In 2020, the Foundation’s landmark initiative, the Indigenous Peoples Alliance for Rights and Development (IPARD), generated a $13 million partnership between the FSC and USAID over 5 years; this program aims to develop the operational capacities of Indigenous Peoples such that they retain proper land rights, employ sustainable practices and have access to sufficient technologies to become independent in managing resource-rich land.
Advocating for land rights to combat environmental consequences on agriculture is a theory proven in practice. A 2015 infographic illustrates how Ethiopian farmers with legitimate ownership on their land were reportedly 60% more likely to invest in erosion prevention measures, and Ghanaian farmers, 39% more likely to plant more trees. Overall, deforestation rates were lower in nations where legitimate land ownership was made possible.
Formalization of small-scale farming sectors is more than a signal for investors; the process also works to ease operations for smaller groups, allow greater access to natural capital and provide better infrastructure to manage these resources. Under the guidance of Heifer International, for instance, agricultural cooperatives of farmers have proliferated across the world, encouraging the growth of communal cooperation through registered entities. The legitimization of agricultural sectors enables farmers to more easily access natural and financial resources, cooperation with other groups and entities to incorporate the help of products and services across multiple sectors, and provide business development and financial literacy training for farmers.
These cooperatives are an exemplary result of the Rural Entrepreneurs for Agricultural Cooperation in Haiti (or REACH), Heifer’s landmark initiative to provide infrastructure, facilities, access to resources and training in financial literacy, business management and sustainable farming practices. The push for organized, registered and licensed operations enables farmers to not only access resources in a reliable and sustainable manner, but provides them with the skills to grow their enterprise beyond simply making ends meet.
Heifer’s Leveraging Success program in Honduras also aims for collective legitimization, training and collaboration. By connecting farmer associations with training enterprises, local dairy farmers were able to increase their product output by 69%, and beekeepers were able to grow their hives from 20 to 360 through the program’s duration, a 94% jump in production capacity. The Dairy Network achieves similar results in Ecuador by providing farmers with technical expertise, proper infrastructure, and well-coordinated access to financial services.
Beyond assisting the farmers themselves, NGOs have worked to implement frameworks that coordinate sustainable commerce between sectors.
Grander systems for a prosperous future
An apparent preference of investors to provide capital to larger companies rather than smaller, localized, indigenous fisheries is no mere observational bias, according to Future of Fish, a versatile non-profit focused on advancing the world’s fishing industries towards a sustainable future. In an article on the state of the fishing industry in Peru, sustainable business analyst Cristina Rocca underlines the core problem with lack of funding for smaller groups: investors are reluctant because of “high levels of perceived risk and low levels of fisher formalization”, and investors tend to be more comfortable with regulated, formalized entities that have established risk contingencies.
Unregulated fisheries are either unable or unwilling to formalize, operate with permits, licenses, sanitation standards, fishing capacity limits, and risk management strategies. Instead, they are primarily funded through informal private sources. Rocca explains why this is detrimental to local fisheries despite the possibility of larger sums paid out to cover the costs of risk: unreliability and volatility. These agreements are often made without formal contracts, through verbal agreements, paid in cash, and with no regulatory terms set. Fisheries are prone to becoming trapped into unregulated financial obligations, or left without receiving the agreed-upon amount. Such volatility proves to be an unreasonable investment for many.
The solution to volatility proposed by Future of Fish is rigorous capital coordination. A system where multiple channels of investment, types of funding, and subsets of investor priorities are organized in a transparent and comprehensive manner not only incentivizes funding sources through risk reduction, but enables the opportunity for cross-sector collaboration between multiple investors to fully fund programs with specialized branches and various operational goals. This collaboration would not be possible without an expansive multi-sector coordination system that allows investors to easily access every branch of the respective development program, and stands as a viable solution to industries prone to uncertainty and risk.
A systems approach is also evident in efforts to regulate global supply chains. Among other projects, the Earthworm Foundation has worked to ensure that Canada’s $33.2 billion forest product exports industry does not infringe on the priorities of the Tsay Keh Dene Nation (TKDN), Indigenous residents of British Columbia whose land yields some of the province’s largest supplies of timber. Through their commitment to High Conservation Values (HCV), Earthworm’s 2019 MOU with the TKDN enabled plans for long-term management of land, ensuring that forestry companies comply with the concerns of the Nation. Earthworm also held HCV training for the TKDN and their environmental consulting firm, Chu Cho Environmental, teaching them how to conduct their own assessments. HCV evaluations reveal the commitment of any enterprise to sustainable practices, a significant factor for the TKDN and their cooperation with forestry companies.
Argos International employs a framework that addresses multiple concerns in rehabilitating agricultural industries from the ground up. An exemplar of their work is the Creating Paths to Prosperity model, currently operational in Guatemala and Nicaragua. The Village Within a Village initiative grants locals with unused Argos-owned land, along with the technologies, practices and resources required to farm sustainably, leading to greater yields with smaller land spaces. Argos’ Climate Smart Agriculture program focuses on technological innovation to modernize farming practices to be more environmentally friendly, leading to lower emissions, higher produce yields per harvest and greater income for farmers. Argos’ partnership with the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) has pioneered networks that provide financial resources and relief for women, tools for entrepreneurship, credit management and encourage market-specific enterprises led by women. The versatile Harvest of Hope Centers (HHCs) provide developmental solutions for a variety of specific issues, ranging from agricultural development to malnourishment. Argos HCCs provide significant ease of access to resources for a multitude of concerns.
The sectors with the most severe impacts on natural wealth are paradoxically reliant on the very resources they exploit. The degradation of ecosystems paves a road to the collapse of the sensitive global enterprises that society depends on. That being said, true sustainability might be best taught from the ground up, from the individual farmer or fisher to the global enterprises that work with them. Training, organizing, legitimizing and providing access to vital resources for workers in these industries eliminates risk, maximizes yield, teaches sustainable practices, and enables widespread collaboration between investors, associations, facilitating institutions and governments. Effective systems that can coordinate funding, resource access and supply chain regulation are also instrumental in achieving SDG targets. Transparency in operations and literacy in practice may prove to be effective in turning the tide, building towards a sustainable future.
In addition to the above-mentioned GlobalWA members, the following members are working to improve natural capital sustainable practices in the international communities where they work.
FSC Investments and Partnerships
FSC is committed to supporting community and family foresters, including small private forest owners and Indigenous Peoples, who manage many of the world’s forests that are at risk of disruption or destruction due to competition over land use. For many of these people, the forest is not just about food, fuel, and shelter. Forests also act as safety nets when drought, crop failure, or diseases strike. Unfortunately, the drive for profits often takes precedence over the rights of forest-dependent communities and overwrites the voices of marginalized groups. In turn, these activities entrench poverty, while also destroying forests, their ecosystems, and their communities.
Seattle Aquarium
The Seattle Aquarium honors our location in the traditional and contemporary territories of the Coast Salish people, who have stewarded these lands and waters since time immemorial.
Guided by our mission and values, the Aquarium is committed to developing a strong foundation for long-lasting and mutually beneficial partnerships with Coast Salish and Urban Native peoples as well as other Indigenous communities so we can conserve our one world ocean.
For too long, the people most impacted by environmental harm have been marginalized when crafting solutions, unable to lend their expertise and ensure their needs are met.
The Seattle Aquarium is aiming to change this with a new fellowship program specifically for people from marginalized communities. Fellows will be paid a living wage as they develop new programming to engage groups and organizations who have historically not been well-served by the Aquarium.
This fellowship program will further our mission of Inspiring Conservation of our Marine Environment while building cohorts of future leaders from diverse communities who can support one another, first at Seattle Aquarium and ultimately at aquariums and conservation organizations across the globe.
Agros International Inspired by the teachings of Jesus, Agros International’s mission is to break the cycle of poverty and create paths to prosperity for farming families in rural Latin America. Founded in 1984, Agros advances a holistic model of economic and social development through four key opportunity areas: land ownership, market-led agriculture, financial empowerment, and health & well-being. To date, Agros has partnered with 45 rural communities in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, and Nicaragua, impacting the lives of over 12,000 people.
Agros’ vision is that rural poor families own agricultural land, attain economic self-sufficiency, realize their God-given potential, and pass on to future generations the values and resources that enable them to flourish.
Earthworm Foundation
We work with people from farm to boardroom to build value chains that work for people and nature.
Earthworm works to make supply chains resilient and regenerative. Supply chains deliver consumer goods that impact the health of billions of people and ecosystems.
Regenerating supply chains is about restoring soils and forests. We work alongside companies at the roots of their supply chains with farmers, local communities, governments, and partners to create regenerative agricultural practices, economic prosperity, and protect and conserve forests, thus creating replicable cases of change in sourcing regions.
EverVillage
EverVillage focuses their work on vulnerable ecosystems and populations facing climate change, humanitarian crises, natural disasters, pandemics, and poverty. They achieve this through services such as Green Infrastructure, Water for Climate, Water for Food, Community Engage!, Learn & Lead, and Impact Investing.
Nia Tero
Indigenous peoples sustain 80% of the world’s remaining biodiversity, including ecosystems essential to our global climate, fresh water, and food security.
Nia Tero exists to ensure that Indigenous peoples have the economic power and cultural independence to steward, support, and protect their livelihoods and territories they call home. These places are vital to us all.
Pangea Giving
We are a giving circle that gives our members and supporters direct, thoughtful, and effective ways to help grassroots organizations in the Global South to improve the quality of life in their communities.
Central to our mission is the commitment that our grants fund the self-defined needs of communities. We work with grassroots organizations that are embedded in communities and engaged in work that addresses these self-defined needs. Through nearly two decades of working with and learning from our grant partners, we have gained fluency in some of the critical issues facing rural communities in Latin America, East Africa and Southeast Asia.
For example:
One of our partners in Myanmar documents and spreads awareness on environmental impacts of industrial projects among ethnic minorities in Myanmar. Their projects advocate for environmental justice in areas affected by coal mining and power production.
Taa’Pit works with indigenous families in the Lake Atitlán region of Guatemala to reintroduce traditional foods, cooking techniques and agricultural practices to repair an ecosystem harmed by a history of environmentally damaging agriculture practices.
UNOSJO has defended indigenous rights in the villages of Mexico’s Sierra Juarez mountains for nearly 30 years, doing everything from educating youth on violence against women, to advocating to protect indigenous corn varieties, to maintaining the mountain roads with their own fleet of construction vehicles.
Remote Energy Remote Energy (RE) is a 501 (c)(3) for-impact organization that trains women and men worldwide to harness the power of the sun and develop the technical PV design and installation skills required to bring clean power and positive change to their communities. Technician training programs provide the growing workforce with the practical skills needed to be competent and competitive. Solar educator training programs empower local trainers with curriculum, mentorship opportunities, and the skills needed to meet current, regional training requirements.
Mercy Corps
We act as a connector, a collaborator, a catalyst, and an advocate for change. For 40 years and in more than 40 countries, we help communities forge new paths to prosperity in the face of disaster, poverty, and the impacts of climate change.
In every community where we work, we connect people to the resources and opportunities they need to build strong, stable livelihoods that can withstand future challenges.
Addressing the underlying challenges of climate change, water security, natural resource management, and access to energy is critical to supporting people in fragile places to adapt their lives to new risks, while transforming communities and economies over time. That’s why we focus on climate solutions that deliver practical, meaningful change at the local level, then mobilize our global team to identify opportunities for scaling and replication worldwide.
By Earthworm Foundation, reprinted with permission
3M, Mars, Nestlé and Earthworm Foundation are partnering with the Tsay Keh Dene First Nation in British Columbia, Canada to help respect their rights to decide how their territory is managed. This includes protecting key areas in their territory from unwanted harvesting for pulp and paper or other industrial activities. Continue Reading
Millions in Horn of Africa are in dire need of innovative water solutions
By Cathy Herholdt, World Concern Senior Communications Director
Dead livestock in Somalia. Photo: World Concern.
Here in Western Washington, we have a tendency – a compulsion, maybe even – to complain about the weather. Understandable this year especially, as we’ve had an unusually cool, damp spring.
Just last evening, I went for a walk in my neighborhood, as I do most evenings. It was sprinkling when I left the house just before dinner, but by the time I got a half mile from home, the sky opened up and unleashed a torrent of rain on me. At first, I sighed in frustration and headed back home, but as the water ran off the hood of my rain jacket, I paused and looked up, letting the water run down my face. Continue Reading
We are proud to announce that in 2022 Pangea Giving is funding 13 organizations. This investment represents a total of $114,000. The Board approved the grant allocations after receiving recommendations from our three regional pods.
My kids are similar to many kids in the U.S. in that they are on athletic teams, go to school, and live in a house with running water. They get clean water at school, and when they remember their water bottle, they have access to good water while playing sports. However, it’s estimated that 450 million children around the world do not have access to clean water, which is detrimental to their health, education, household income, and overall community well-being. Climate change and the rise of global conflicts exacerbate the limited resources we have, and children bear the greatest burden.
Sustainable Development Goal 6 outlines specific targets to not only increase access to clean water, but also preserve and improve water-related ecosystems and freshwater supplies. Several Global Washington members are working on SDG 6, and in particular, bringing clean water to children. The ripple effect of these solutions can advance goals for education, hunger, climate action, and reducing poverty. Join me in learning more about these Goalmakers and proven organizations.
In the coming months, Global Washington is planning a few in-person events to bring our global development community together. One event will be a workshop on effective usage of social media for global development organizations. Find out more here. Also, save the date for our Goalmakers Annual Conference on December 7 and 8. The first day will be online and the second day will be in-person in Seattle. I hope you can join us!
For children, clean water means everything. It means staying healthy from diseases. It means having enough food to eat. It means the opportunity to go to school and improve their futures. Water, for children, means life.
However, according to a 2021 analysis by UNICEF, more than 1.42 billion people around the world, including 450 million children, live in areas of high or extremely high water vulnerability. These are areas where physical water scarcity overlaps with poor water service levels, leaving the communities there to depend on surface water, unimproved sources or water that takes more than 30 minutes to collect. In other words, 1 in 5 children doesn’t have enough water for their daily needs, including drinking and practicing basic hygiene.
“When wells dry-up, children are the ones missing school to fetch water. When droughts diminish food supplies, children suffer from malnutrition and stunting. When floods hit, children fall ill from waterborne illnesses. And when water resources decline, children cannot wash their hands to fight off diseases,” UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore said in a press release.
By some estimates, every 90 seconds a child dies from a water-related disease.
The world’s water crisis, Fore says, is here. Unfortunately, climate change is only making it worse. Dry seasons are lasting longer. Rainy seasons are becoming shorter and more intense, often resulting in destructive floods and other weather disasters that wipe out crops and water systems. Half of the global population could be living in areas facing water scarcity within three years, according to UN estimates. By 2040, a quarter of the world’s children will be living in areas of extremely high water stress.
African children in line for water. Photo: Jeff Ackley, Unsplash.
This intensifying crisis is why many water organizations like Friendly Water for the World are moving away from digging wells and adopting more sustainable options. As aquifers are being drained, people are digging deeper and deeper wells, in some places tapping into dangerous levels of arsenic and fluoride and poisoning entire communities, especially children. Often, wells are abandoned only 2-3 years after they are built because they have broken down or require too much maintenance that the communities cannot afford.
Instead, Friendly Water for the World is building eco-friendly rainwater catchment systems that store as much as five times as much water as average plastic tanks, last 2-3 times as long, and cost 60% less. These tanks are primarily built at schools – as well as some administrative buildings and markets – eliminating the need for students to collect water. One principal says that before the rainwater catchment system was installed at his school, half of the students had to leave during the day to fetch water, interrupting their lessons.
But those children are the lucky ones, who even have the opportunity to attend school. In most countries, the household duty of collecting water falls on women and girls, which deprives them of the time and opportunity to attend school or build livelihoods.
To eliminate that burden, Water1st focuses its efforts on piping water directly to every home, as well as schools, health clinics, and community centers. Not only does it save time, relieve a physical burden, and create opportunities for women to earn income and children to go to school, but it also allows for better hygiene from high-quality toilets, showers, and faucets.
Sustainable Development Goal 6, Water1st notes, seriously raised the bar in terms of defining access to clean water. Basic water services – defined as an improved water source not more than 30 minutes away (round-trip) – fall far short of “safely managed” drinking water services, which are “located on premises, available when needed and free from contamination.”
Child collecting water, Sindh, Pakistan. Photo: Department for International Development (CC BY 2.0)
Save the Children is also focused on bringing change directly into homes. Instead of broad community-centered programs, their flagship Clean Household Approach works at the household level to prevent childhood infections and improve child nutrition, especially in children under age 2. It especially helps caregivers reduce the amount of environmental contaminants that children ingest through better water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) products and practices, including safe disposal of human feces, safe storage and treatment of drinking water, hygienic handling and safe storage of food, preventing infants and young children from consuming soil and animal feces, and handwashing with soap.
The latter, of course, became a primary concern during the pandemic, which had a profound impact on child welfare. Many of those aspects were discussed during Global Washington’s Annual Goalmakers Conference in December 2021, including both the negative and positive impacts on school WASH programs and water supply. School closures and gathering restrictions, for example, interrupted Splash’s hygiene behavior-change trainings, leading to the improper use of hygiene and sanitation facilities. Once schools re-opened, Splash was able to partner with local governments to make sure schools had soap and uninterrupted water supply for hand-washing stations – services that can and should continue long after COVID-19 no longer dominates public discourse.
Child washing hands at school, India. Photo: soumen82hazra, Pixabay.
WASH services and programs are also essential for preventing the spread of other deadly diseases. In conflict-affected areas, like Yemen, the breakdown of WASH services have led to the deterioration of population health, especially among women and children. There have been several outbreaks of cholera, for example, as well as other infectious diseases, and the country is at risk of a polio resurgence.
In light of these needs, the Yemen Relief and Reconstruction Fund has prioritized water projects, including solar-powered water purification and desalination systems for three hospitals in Hodeidah, the area that has been most-affected by infectious diseases and malnutrition. They are also providing communities with water filters, water tanks, and water-trucking services.
Child, India. Photo: soumen82hazra, Pixabay.
Amid a global rise in protracted conflicts, climate change and depleted water sources, children are most vulnerable to the risks posed by water scarcity and a breakdown in WASH services. However, with innovations in sustainable WASH products and programming, the world still stands a chance to not only curb the crisis, but improve clean water access for children and their families.
The following GlobalWA members are providing clean water and WASH programs in the communities they help in low- and middle-income countries.
Friendly Water for the World doesn’t make the rain fall, cure diseases, build schools, or plant trees. What we do is share ideas and simple technologies for capture and store rainwater, protect families from preventable diseases, make building schools easier, more inexpensively, and more environmentally sound. Perhaps just as critically, we make it possible for communities themselves to choose the technologies and approaches that best fit their needs. In one community of 10 villages, the area leader said that in the 17 years he was there, Friendly Water for the World was the first group that had ever come and asked them what they wanted before starting work, governed by the communities themselves.
We have launched a program in western Kenya to build 60 new rainwater catchment tanks, each holding 25,000 liters. Most tanks are attached to schools formerly without any access to water at all. Currently, many students have to leave their classrooms to gather water for the school, and also for their families. Some end up dropping out altogether to become part of the constant “long walk to water.”
Made of interlocking stabilized-soil bricks, tanks are fabricated onsite with locally available materials. They are not fired using increasingly scarce wood resources, and require no mortar. We’ve trained masons and brickmakers, also making it possible for them to support their families.
Each school and each project has to have a sustainability and maintenance plan written and approved by the community itself.
Rotary District 5030 Clubs have long been active in providing Clean Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Training solutions in developing countries, in both Urban and Rural areas. We currently have 15 projects being implemented in Africa, South and Central America and the Caribbean, with an additional three water projects in draft stage, and four more being authorized. These projects range in size from $30,000 up to $800,000.
One Urban project provided Clean Water, Hygiene Training and improved Sanitation in 31 Government schools in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia supporting over 31,000 students at a cost of over $485,000. This project will eventually be expanded by our partners to over 400,000 students.
Our projects in rural areas include providing Clean Water and/or Sanitation facilities to 14 rural schools in Ethiopia; Clean Water, toilets and hand washing stations at 4 schools serving over 625 students and teachers in rural towns in Guatemala, and a solar powered well for a fistula hospital in Uganda. We are also providing wells and solar powered pumping stations in a Senegal village; handwashing stations for 22 schools in eSwatini; a Water storage and delivery system for a regional hospital in Cameroon ; repairs and improvement to a septic system at a home for children in Mexico; Plumbing and fixtures for an orphanage in Tanzania; and a Reverse Osmosis system for a clinic and families in Haiti .
Save the Children works for a world in which every child affected by an emergency has access to a safe water supply and adequate sanitation facilities. We work towards this vision by: 1) Reducing morbidity and mortality of children exposed to poor WASH conditions; 2) Enhancing hygiene practices in schools; and 3) Designing WASH programming in a way where children are protected against dangerous situations and physical environments.
One of Save the Children’s signature clean water programs is distributing water purification materials and water containers to increase access to safe water in Kenya, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Somalia, and South Sudan. With the support of Procter & Gamble, we’re integrating the distributions into our existing health and nutrition, gender equality, livelihoods, education and humanitarian response work . To learn more about our WASH programming, visit our website.
Water is piped directly to every home, school, health clinic, and community center, assuring each household receives the maximum health benefits of clean water, a toilet, and a shower. Piped water to the home ends the walk for water for women and girls. With the constant burden of water fetching and illness lifted, women can earn an income, families begin to save money, and girls can go to schoo l.
All Water1st projects integrate piped water, toilets, and hygiene education. Studies have consistently shown that together — water, toilets, and hygiene — stop the spread of disease and save lives . When water is piped directly to the home and school, it allows for high-quality toilets and showers. Water faucets are placed in bathroom stalls for flushing, cleaning, and washing hands.
Water1st routinely visits our projects to evaluate and improve our work. Rigorous oversight ensures each project is generating the best possible outcomes. You can be confident your donation is wisely spent and making a real difference in the lives of the people we serve. Considering the industry-wide project failure rate is 35-50% after five years, we know monitoring is a worthwhile investment.
World Concern is committed to improving access to life-sustaining, safe, clean water in areas of greatest need in the world.
Whether building or rehabilitating wells, constructing sand dams, installing rainwater collection systems on homes and community buildings, or providing household water filters that remove 99% of germs, bacteria, and parasites, World Concern is implementing innovative, sustainable methods to ensure children and families are healthy and have safe, disease-free water for life.
Additionally, the cycle of sickness is broken when families understand the importance of using toilets, washing hands, and keeping themselves and their surroundings clean. We help build latrines, provide vital hygiene training and supplies, and deliver handwashing stations to communities in need.
Yemen is the poorest countries in the Middle East. The country has experienced multiple conflicts that intensified around 2010, with large protests taking place in 2011, internal fighting in 2012–2014, and a war and blockade that started in 2015 and continue to date. The war and blockade have had a devastating impact on every vital sector in Yemen including public services, agriculture, and health, which faced large-scale destruction and led to significant economic loss and inflation. However, the most affected are water supply, sanitation, irrigation, and agricultural services. This led to the deterioration of population health , especially women’s and children’s health. The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation latest Sustainable Development Goals was published for year 2017 and shows that Yemen has a very low score of 32 and is not expected to meet any of the water and sanitation goals. The dire situation of poor water quality and sanitation has led to several outbreaks of cholera and other infectious diseases. The country made progress on polio eradication which is now at risk of resurgence.
In response to the deteriorating water situation in Yemen, Yemen Relief and Reconstruction Foundation (YRRF) prioritized water in its strategic plans . YRRF supports several projects including 1) Water purification and desalination systems using solar energy for three hospitals in Hodeidah, the most affected Governorate by infectious diseases and malnutrition; 2) providing water filters to thousands of people with no access to clean water; 3) providing water tanks and water trucking to areas hosting internally displaced populations; 4) Providing water tanks to people in mountainous areas to allow storage of clean water.
As the war in Yemen continues with little attention, especially who compared to other conflicts in the world, Yemeni children continue to suffer and a generation is at risk of falling behind. It is time to support Yemen by lifting the blockade and starting the internal dialogue for peace without external intervention. Yemenis can and will rebuild their country but need our support and help.
A Q&A between Stephen Sara, Senior WASH Advisor (Team Lead), Save the Children, and Kristen Dailey, Executive Director, Global Washington on May 16, 2022
Our member, Save the Children, has a long history with clean water and WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene) programs in the international settings where they work. Steve describes the history, motivations and impact of their work, with examples and lessons learned.
Q&A with Americares WASH Technical Advisor Matteo Cinquemani
Americares installs a handwashing station at Pointe Sable, Cayemites Island, Haiti, in 2020. Photo by Almando Etienne/Americares.
1. What is your name, role, and history with Americares?
I am Matteo Cinquemani, Americares WASH Technical Advisor.
I joined Americares in 2020 to oversee and coordinate WASH projects globally, as well as to provide technical guidance and support to colleagues in the field.
2. How did Americares get started working on water and sanitation issues in international settings?
Despite being two separate sectors in our industry, Health and WASH are deeply connected. Americares is a health-focused organization that saves lives and improves health for people affected by poverty or disaster. It is virtually impossible to achieve this goal without having access to adequate water and sanitation facilities, which is not only a precondition to ensure basic hygienic conditions at a health center, but also an issue of dignity and safety for both patients and health care workers.
Americares has long addressed the issue of lack of WASH services and infrastructure in health facilities and has expanded its broader WASH projects in recent years to improve community health. A community with safe water, adequate sanitation, and a sound understanding of basic hygienic behaviors is a community with far lower prevalence of many diseases, including diarrheal disease, and skin and eye infections. At the same time, nutrition for infants and toddlers improves.
Americares installs a handwashing station at Pointe Sable, Cayemites Island, Haiti, in 2020. Photo by Almando Etienne/Americares.
3. What are the primary differences of safe water access, good hygiene, and sanitation (WASH) in America as opposed to internationally?
While parts of the U.S. such as some Native American reservations and coastal areas are facing a critical situation primarily due to a combination of poor water resource management/overexploitation and the impact of climate change, the U.S. is largely shielded from the challenges other countries face accessing safe water. Here in the U.S. and other wealthy industrialized countries we take for granted that any hospital or clinic is at the very least equipped with functioning restrooms, piped water, and adequate septic and sewerage systems. In many other countries, health care workers often don’t have access to water to practice frequent and thorough handwashing. They might have to bring their own water bottle from home or buy water in the street, and patients avoid going to the local health center because of the risk of contracting infections, or simply because they know they will not be able to use a toilet while there.
Many low-income countries lack the support structure, capital investment, sound regulatory frameworks, and private engagement needed to develop, operate, and maintain water and sanitation services for the whole population.
4. How does Americares get clean water access after a natural disaster or during a conflict?
In the aftermath of a natural or man-made disaster access to safe drinking water is critical. Much depends on the context of humanitarian response and the level of service coverage that was present before the crisis. In places like the U.S., something as simple as the distribution of bottled water is generally viable. In some extreme cases, the only realistic solution is to distribute water treatment items, such as powder packets or tabs that can quickly disinfect small volumes of raw water for human consumption.
At the international level, one quick and effective way to deliver safe drinking water to displaced populations that are congregated in camps or informal settlements is to truck in water. Another approach that is frequently adopted is to distribute WASH kits, which include buckets and chemicals that can be used at household level to treat water collected from unsafe sources.
More complex and longer-term interventions include setting up a treatment and distribution system for a whole community or rehabilitating the existing supply system.
A young boy washes hands at a handwashing station donated by Americares at Chidzanja Market in Balaka, Malawi, in 2020. Photo by Thoko Chikondi/Americares.
A young boy washes hands at a handwashing station donated by Americares at Chidzanja Market in Balaka, Malawi, in 2020. Photo by Thoko Chikondi/Americares.
5. Climate change is drastically changing access to water, particularly in low-income countries. How is Americares helping to solve the problem?
The current water crisis is a health crisis for most of the world’s population.
To ensure access to clean water and sanitation for all we need to see huge investment and political commitment like we have seen in China, India, and several other countries that were able to lift billions of people from poverty. Financing WASH services, as well as addressing climate change or the economic incentives to allocate freshwater to agriculture, are all extremely complex to tackle below the country level.
At Americares, we strive to improve resilience to sudden and frequent changes in water availability. We employ a variety of approaches such as using a combination of wells and rainwater harvesting to ensure reliable water for a rural health center, or increasing the storage capacity of an existing water supply system to accommodate demand during the dry season.
6. I’d love to hear more about one of Americares signature clean water and or WASH programs?
In partnership with Xylem, a leading global water technology company, Americares is improving access to water and sanitation as well as providing WASH education in health care facilities and low-income communities across more than a dozen countries. This program is showing great results, particularly with respect to the cost-effectiveness of WASH interventions, and the huge return on investment that these types of projects can achieve. Together, we have reached over 5 million people with WASH interventions in the first two years of our collaboration.
Our average project can cost as little as $20,000. Typically, we target health facilities in need of critical repairs and improvements to their water and sanitation infrastructure and we work with them to bring their facilities up to standards, whether it is by drilling a new borehole or building a septic system for the existing toilets, etc. Some of the funds are usually set aside for training and capacity development. Given the extremely high ratio of health facilities to population size, such small investments can generate a very substantial impact for thousands of patients per year.
Americares installs a handwashing station at Pointe Sable, Cayemites Island, Haiti, in 2020. Photo by Almando Etienne/Americares.
Americares installs a handwashing station at Pointe Sable, Cayemites Island, Haiti, in 2020. Photo by Almando Etienne/Americares.
7. What are the differences between providing access to clean water and WASH programs in rural versus urban environments?
A typical rural household has lower income and fewer resources to pay for services such as water. However, they have stronger relations with the rest of the community and tend to be more engaged in local politics and decision-making processes. They are more likely to personally invest in community improvements as they likely own some of the land and their family will benefit from any structural improvements. In an urban or peri-urban context, all these aspects are basically the opposite. This can greatly influence how you design a WASH project and the chances of long-term success.
The second difference has to do with the concept of “economies of density.” Infrastructure improvements—whether it is to the water or sewage system, cable internet, gas supply, or a stormwater drainage system—are generally more cost-effective in densely populated area. In rural areas, each linear meter of pipe will reach far fewer users, which in turn makes it much more expensive to finance, operate and maintain the exact same service in a sparsely inhabited area. As a result, sometimes infrastructure improvements are not always viable, and on-site technologies have to be considered. But such solutions are typically more expensive and less efficient.
Please welcome our newest Global Washington members. Take a moment to familiarize yourself with their work and consider opportunities for support and collaboration!
Sehgal Foundation
Sehgal Foundation has been working closely together with the S M Sehgal Foundation in India to improve the quality of life of the rural communities in India. Sehgal Foundation has five main program areas: Water Management, Agriculture Development, Local Participation and Sustainability, Transform Lives one school at a time, and Outreach for Development. These programs are supported by a skilled research team that engages in participatory research, impact assessment, and interactive dialogues to determine informed actions to achieve sustainable results. Smsfoundation.org
By David Albert, Olympia Friends Meeting and co-founder, Friendly Water for the World
(From WesternFriend, April 2022, reposted with permission)
Climate change is here. Now. It is not a matter of an occasional snowstorm, hurricane, tornado, or short heat wave. In other parts of the globe, it is now part of the daily struggle for existence.
Friendly Water for the World, a Quaker-founded organization, partners with communities, schools, and families in parts of subSaharan Africa and India. We have seen what is happening at close hand. In central Tanzania, among the Maasai, women, who are used to walking for water every day, leaving at 3 a.m. and returning at noon, now walk as much as 13 hours each night, leaving at 11 p.m., with their daughters taken out of school for this purpose. Each and every night. In western Kenya, a Friends school reports that half of the children are leaving classes to walk for water. In some places, while rainfall hasn’t diminished, it has been concentrated into shorter, more intense periods leading to serious flooding. At the same time, dry periods are becoming longer and longer, leading to crop failures. In Chennai, in southern India, the entire city of more than seven million ran out of water for several months. People couldn’t take showers for weeks; clothes couldn’t be washed; factories shut down; restaurants closed because they couldn’t supply water to their patrons. People left for the countryside, where there was also little water to be found. Continue Reading
Pangea welcomes Green Community Volunteers (GCV) as one of our new partners in Southeast Asia. This organization was founded in 2009, and operates in the Xiangkhouang Province, northeast of Laos. GCV is the only local group in Laos that has been founded and run by indigenous women, and it seeks to empower communities on environmental issues such as biodiversity preservation through art and cultural exchanges. Earth Rights International first introduced Pangea to the work of GCV.
Women and local communities will be first to face climate change and other emerging risks. Let’s engage and support them as the central actors they are.
From the Tostan team
Two Senegalese women dancing in celebration. Photo: Tostan.
As April comes to a close, many people are discussing Earth Day with a renewed sense of urgency given the bleak news on climate change and realization that rapid action is needed.
This offers an important moment to consider the challenges women, girls, and communities will face as climate change accelerates. These challenges join many others already confronting them. Yet this need not be only a negative story: Imagine the potential if women and girls could contribute their very best to develop and elevate solutions for positive change—in climate change and the other issues they face. Continue Reading
