Philanthropy: AquAid, Christian Aid & The Africa Trust

Philanthropy: AquAid, Christian Aid & The Africa Trust

As of April this year, AquAid has donated over £20 million to charity. This staggering amount is a culmination of charitable donations which began in 1998. This includes over £2.8 million donated to Pump Aid, which enabled half a million people to gain access to sustainable supplies of clean productive water and decent sanitation in Africa. This work was continued by The Africa Trust, which was founded by the Chief Executive of Pump Aid, together with Paul Searle, who was the founder and majority shareholder of AquAid.

To date, more than three million people use Elephant Pumps [pictured above middle] installed by The Africa Trust, largely as a result of over £10.2 million donated by AquAid.  In addition, these funds have paid for entrepreneurial training [pictured above left] and loans, which have helped over 40,000 people to set up small businesses and support their families. With legacy projects in Liberia, Kenya and Uganda and ongoing major programmes in Zimbabwe and Malawi, The Africa Trust is using funding from AquAid to provide sustainable solutions to poverty for millions.

Ian Thorpe, Chief Executive of The Africa Trust said, “AquAid has achieved growth while incorporating an extraordinary level of charitable donations into their business model.  Customers drinking pure chilled water from AquAid water coolers in the UK directly enable people to gain access to life saving clean water in Africa. The ongoing funding is helping to lift literally millions of people out of extreme poverty in a sustainable way. Many congratulations on reaching this £20 million milestone!”

AquAid donations of over £3.8 million to Christian Aid have funded water and capacity building projects in Ethiopia and Malawi, improving the lives of 370,000 individuals. The Malonda Project stands out for its provision of affordable loans and business training to entrepreneurs and pigeon pea farmers [pictured above right] in Malawi. The results are impressive: a perfect 100% loan repayment rate and household incomes increased. Inspired by the success of the Malonda Project, AquAid, The Africa Trust and Christian Aid decided to launch the £1,000,000 Rural Entrepreneurship Assistance Project (REAP). It aims to lift 5,250 households in Malawi out of extreme poverty by 2025.

Director of Fundraising, Nick Georgiadis said, “Christian Aid believes that poverty eradication requires innovative partnerships including with the private sector. Socially conscious business has a critical role to play in building a just and sustainable future for people and the planet. We are thrilled that AquAid embodies such a positive social purpose, we could not be happier to celebrate this important milestone with them. We extend profound gratitude to AquAid for their unwavering support”.

 

Elephant Pumps & Underground Water in Africa

Elephant Pumps & Underground Water in Africa

As you know, here at AquAid we tend not to err on the side of caution when talking about water. Especially drinking water.  Clean, fresh drinking water in Africa, where millions of people do not have access to the life giving stuff as we do. It may seem a bit negative, but that isn’t really the case.

These two articles are case in point.

The first, from The Daily Mail, reads:

‘Huge reserves of underground water in some of the driest parts of Africa could provide a buffer against the effects of climate change for years to come, scientists said.

Researchers from the British Geological Survey and University College London have for the first time mapped the aquifers, or groundwater, across the continent and the amount they hold.

‘The largest groundwater volumes are found in the large sedimentary aquifers in the North African countries Libya, Algeria, Egypt and Sudan,’ the scientists said in their paper.’

The other, from The Telegraph, states:

‘Scientists using technology developed to search for oil have discovered a vast underground water reservoir in one of Kenya’s driest regions that if properly managed could supply the country’s needs for close to 70 years.

Researchers from a French-American firm, Radar Technologies International, worked with the Kenyan government and UNESCO to layer satellite, radar and geological maps on top of each other, and then used seismic techniques developed to find oil to identify the reservoir.

It lies in Kenya’s extreme northwest, close to its borders with South Sudan, Ethiopia and Uganda. The area is sparsely populated and prone to conflict over existing scarce resources.’

See, now, this is actually marvellous news, but with this, a word of caution:

“But knowing there’s water there, and then getting it to the surface, are two different things …” Brian McSorley, a water expert at Oxfam in Nairobi, said.

And therein lays the rub. Deep underground there is potable water – even in the Sahara Desert – but reaching it can be problematic.

That’s why sustainable, practical and cost-effective solutions are important. One such solution that has been in operation for over a decade now, addressing this exact problem, can be found through The Africa Trust.  A charity started by AquAid and Ian Thorpe. One of the many solutions that this award-winning organisation provides is the building of Elephant Pumps throughout disadvantaged communities across Africa.

No, they don’t use real elephants. The Elephant Pump is a water pump based on an ancient Chinese design. The pump has been adapted to make it stronger and more durable. It is built from and maintained using materials that are locally available in remote rural sub-Saharan African communities. The design and build of these pumps is such that 95% are still in operation today – a figure 40% above the average for the continent.

If you are interested in installing high-quality water coolers in your organisation, which not only dispense refreshing drinking water for your entire staff contingent but also ensure automatic donations that fund the provision of sustainable water projects for thousands of communities, contact us here at AquAid Water Coolers today.

 

 

AquAid celebrates the International Day of Charity

AquAid celebrates the International Day of Charity

Today is the International Day of Charity. As an organisation, AquAid, with our focus on giving back since our inception in 1998, acknowledging this day is immensely significant.

For over twenty-two years, AquAid has donated a portion of revenue to charities, predominantly to both Christian Aid and The Africa Trust.

Founded in 1941, the mission of Christian Aid is to eradicate the causes of poverty, striving to achieve equality, dignity and freedom for all, regardless of faith or nationality. AquAid have supported Christian Aid for more than twenty years, donating over £3.7 million to water and capacity building projects around the world.

Since its formation in 2010, The Africa Trust has worked tirelessly to create sustainable solutions that include establishing supplies of clean, productive drinking water and decent sanitation to thousands of communities in water scarce regions across Africa. Wealth creation is another important objective, with business skills training helping school leavers and villagers to start or expand profitable businesses.

This year’s International Day of Charity resonates even more so with all of us at AquAid as the company has recently reached donations exceeding £19 million. This amount has enabled us to provide life-changing assistance to more than 3 million people around the globe and predominantly throughout Africa.

We would like to dedicate this achievement to Paul Searle, AquAid’s Founder, Managing Director and Chairman, whose faith and unquenchable spirit was the driving force that kept AquAid growing and expanding for over two decades, all while never losing sight of the importance of contributing to charity.

Should you too wish to partner with AquAid in this continuing commitment to charity while keeping your organisation hydrated, please contact us – we will be happy to assist.

Sustainable Water Provision and your AquAid Water Cooler

Sustainable Water Provision and your AquAid Water Cooler

Irrespective of whether or not you believe in climate change, there’s no denying that the stats resulting from the radically changing weather patterns year on year or the crucial drop in natural water supply globally speak volumes:

844 Million People – 1 in 10 – lack access to safe water.

200 Million Hours are spent every day collecting water.

2.3 Billion People – 1 in 3 – lack access to a toilet.

One third of the global population lives without access to a toilet.

The ramifications of these stats and the volume of people it affects can seem quite daunting in terms of how to address this global issue.  There is good news though:  there are multiple organisations around the world that continue, every day, to provide sustainable solutions to the lack of water as well as adequate sanitation to those in need.

Sustainability may seem like the buzz word of the millennium – bandied about without much meaning, but the truth of it is – sustainability is vital in the provision of water and sanitation to those for who access to water is an ongoing fight for actual survival.

Sustainable water projects are those that include both short term and long term solutions which pave the way forward by enabling a community to begin water related projects that may provide them with a capacity to earn an income or to trade their produce or services to others.

There’s much truth in the adage, ‘Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime’, but before we implement this philosophy, help is needed to provide water to communities that more often than not, do not have the most basic of infrastructures for a steady supply of water.

That’s why here at AquAid Water Coolers we have, since our humble beginnings more than two decades ago, partnered with charities that not only provide emergency relief but also sustainable solutions to poverty around the globe, as is the case with Christian Aid and in the case of the Africa Trust, throughout Africa.

To learn more about the work that these organisations carry out, visit us at our website and see how your water and water cooler purchases are making a visible positive difference to others. Alternatively, if you are not yet an AquAid customer, but would like to find out more about how your drinking water translates into sustainable clean water provision for people in need, please contact us: we’ll be delighted to assist.

Say Hello to our ‘Baby’ Elephant

Say Hello to our ‘Baby’ Elephant

Here at AquAid, we’ve always believed that an integral part of good business practice is helping those less fortunate – especially those far flung communities in Third World countries.

This philosophy was put into effect by ensuring that a portion of proceeds from all sales of our water cooler products was donated to sustainable charities such as Christian Aid and The Africa Trust.

The Africa Trust itself has gone from strength to strength – with more than 5,000 water wells, known as Elephant Pumps, built throughout Africa since 1998.

Building the Elephant Pumps has taken the teams from Zimbabwe, Uganda, Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, and Liberia where these wells now provide potable water for millions of people.

The original Elephant Pump is suitable for high levels of usage and also for deep water tables. Although the aim is for one pump to be for around 300 beneficiaries per pump, in some cases many more people end up using a single pump.

But what happens when you enter regions where the water table is not that deep or the community is smaller? If you’re Ian Thorpe, CE of The Africa Trust and inventor of The Elephant Pump, you design an alternative.

So, without further ado, we introduce *trumpet* to you the ‘Baby’ Elephant Pump.

  • This smaller pump has recently been introduced in in a trial project in Mozambique, where there are areas where the communities are more dispersed with small clusters of families.
  • A pump which lifts water only 5-10 metres and serves just 50 or 100 people doesn’t need to be built with such robust materials such as is the case with the original ‘parent’ Elephant Pump, hence the design and building of the Baby Elephant Pump.
  • The design is cheaper and has been developed for individual homesteads rather schools or villages therefore the smaller pump costs less than half the cost of the more robust village model of Elephant Pump.

If you would like to find out about sponsoring the building of one of these pumps without any additional cost to you*, please contact Shelly or call 01223 508 109 – we’ll be delighted to assist you.

*This offer is only available to AquAid customers.