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March 19-25, 2012 is world water week. UNICEF’s Tap Project will ask restaurants to ask their customers if they will pay $1.00 for the glass of water that comes with their meal. UNICEF estimates that each dollar is the equivalent of 40 days of clean water for a child. They calculate that 4100 children die daily due to water borne diseases. Approximately 900 million people do not have access to safe water. About 2.5 billion people are without adequate sanitation.
Water access and sanitation cannot be completely resolved because of droughts that regionally affect many parts of the world. On a relative scale it is a problem that can mostly be alleviated with relatively little investment.
When Bill Gates decided to do charitable work on a full time basis he wanted to concentrate on large problems that could be substantially solved in a relatively short period of time. He applied a for- profit project model to charitable work.
There are many fine charities doing excellent work. Nonetheless, some concentrate on long term issues depleting funds that could be targeted at short term problems. Few problems exist in isolation, but charitable work suffers from a lack of centralized prioritization which would first focus resource on large problems which could be substantially resolved relatively quickly. To do this at the UN, the World Bank or other multi-national organization would encounter political squabbling. It might be partially achieveable if foundations cooperatively undertook such a process.
If children had access to clean water and sanitation child mortality would decline. This has been the case with nets and malaria. There are consequences to good results. Feeding an increased population in countries with subsistence farming, poor irrigation or violence becomes a larger problem. These too could be addressed in a logical order.
Clean water and riparian issues loom large as near term issues. It is an undercurrent in political boundary issues, such as between Israel and its neighbors, notwithstanding desalinization plants. It pits farmers against herders; rural residents against urban dwellers; agriculture against industry. Fresh water is not an infinite resource.
So try to conserve and contribute when you can. Next time you run a road race and you reach for water along the route, remember that somewhere in the world a child needs it more than you, and is probably traveling the same or longer distance to get it- if they can.
I support this movement 100%. I try to conserve as much as possible. I love writing grants for environmental projects and programs – my favorite by far! I’ll try to share this post with my followers – especially those that are conservation-minded – as much as possible. I hope this works out!
If you need any information on grants and grant writing, visit us at http://www.grantpros.org
We also update a blog every day that has the latest news on grant awards and fundraising. One of our five topics is environmental grants…
Thank you for reading my post and letting me know about your website on grants. I will keep you in mind and advise others. If you live in the U.S. UNICEF’s Tap Project Water Week will be national, so you may be able to participate at a restaurant near you, or if you contact UNICEFTapProject.org you can help enlist restaurants near you and spread the message. This is actually a world problem that is solvable.
Reblogged this on Dr. Matthias Michael – Marketing Experte.
Matthias,
Thank you for reblogging this. You live and work in Brooklyn? We are enlisting many restaurants. Mesa Grill and Blue Water Grill (and all the Be Our Guest restaurants in NYC) in Manhattan, and Seersucker, Chez Oskar, Abigails in Brooklyn I enlisted in the last couple of days. Rose Water and Applewood I know are also doing it. There will be many more because we are just starting.
Since you are in marketing, please don’t think me critical, but you need to check how the spelling came out on your WordPress heading (Experte…. suppor ). I figure you will want to correct this. I know sometimes what you type does not come up on WordPress. It has happened to me.
Glad you will be following.
Brooks
As we know water is a limited resouce. The sad truth is an insufficent supply of fresh water is a worldwide problem for everyone on Earth. Conservation and awareness do help. But unless worldwide attention is drawn to the matter difficulties will not cease.
Thank you for your article. Never enough can be done to solve this problem.
Eddie
What an insightful post. As someone who has grown up in third world countries, I know first hand that water can be scarce, and it is a valuable resource. How quickly we forget when we have access to it all the time!
Hi Maryam,
Thank you for your comment. I looked at your blog. You are quite prolific and interesting. This week is World Water Week. As you know with charity, it can be fleeting. Next week the problem will remain, but it will be some other charity’s moment in the sun. It would be nice if we could prioritize charities; solve the problems that can be resolved quickly and then resolve the next problem. Not sure who would get to decide. Keeping writing- I will check back from time to time.