Safe water and sanitation for all
Every year 1.4 million children die from water-related diseases that could have been easily prevented.
WaterAid is a leading non-profit organization that provides access to safe, clean drinking water, sanitation and hygiene education to poor communities in the developing world.
A water point in Madagascar provides safe, clean water for the local community.
Credit: WaterAid / Marco Betti
We work in 17 developing countries in Africa, Asia and the Pacific region, targeting our assistance to vulnerable communities living in poverty.
We help communities to solve their own water and sanitation problems through the use of low-cost sustainable technologies such as hand-dug wells, boreholes, rainwater harvesting and pit latrines.
In partnership with local NGOs we give communities the training they need to manage and maintain their water projects so that they can enjoy access to clean, safe drinking water for long into the future.
As a charity that focuses solely on water, sanitation and hygiene education we have developed the expertise in designing aid projects that effectively address the problems of water scarcity and water-related diseases across Africa and Asia for the long term.
Worldwide, nearly 900 million people lack access to safe water, while 2.5 billion people have nowhere safe and clean to go to the toilet. The result is widespread diarrheal diseases that kill 4,000 children every day.
You can help by making a donation to support WaterAid's vital work bringing safe, clean water and sanitation to poor communities in Africa and Asia.
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Clean water saves lives
Hope for Hansu and family
Safe water, sanitation and good hygiene are essential in reducing diarrheal diseases that kill 4,000 children under five every day.
Hansu (pictured above) is a mother from the village of Adiawanawaza in Ethiopia who lost her first child to diarrheal disease when the family was using a traditional, unprotected source.
Now her community has access to clean, safe water from a gravity flow water network built with WaterAid's support.
Hansu can now hope that her other children will be better protected from disease as she described:
“I used to get my water from the stream, but we used to have many problems with it. Our little child died of diarrhea from this water.
"Now the water is good and we are drinking pure, clean water and this has reduced our problems. We were often sick before and had to often go to the health posts, but now my children are healthy.
"This water is very pure and as we now have all this I hope that my two daughters will be healthy in the future.”
Photo: WaterAid / Caroline Irby