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MANILA, Philippines — Clean water for all.
On World Water Day, a group of Filipino volunteers visited impoverished communities to help distribute and set up water filters.
Non-profit organization Waves for Water (W4W) Philippines, headed by Country Director Carlo Delantar, led a water relief effort on Sunday, March 22, encouraging Filipinos to raise awareness about water and sanitation.
The volunteers, dubbed as Clean Water Couriers, provided access to clean water across different remote areas nationwide. This included coastal towns and disaster-prone barangays.
Among the poorest of the poor, the water problem may not only entail more thirst but also diseases; at worst, death. (READ: Thirst world, PH water problem)
“People living in impoverished areas die every day from drinking dirty water. While having access to clean water is a luxury that many of us take for granted, there are billions living in nations with no safe water infrastructure in place,” Waves for Water said. “Kids drink from the same streams where animals and humans bathe and relieve themselves.”
Without clean water, these families are also at higher risks to cholera and other water and food-borne diseases.
Clean water couriers
To help end the world’s water problem, Waves For Water developed a do-it-yourself volunteer program called Clean Water Couriers,in which volunteers carry water filters in their luggage wherever they go. The volunteers are then introduced to local non-profits in a particular area they are visiting. Some volunteers also travel to villages to set the filters by themselves.
The whole set-up is easy, affordable, and only requires a few minutes and equipment: filters, paint buckets, a knife to make a hole. The filters instantly turn dirty water into safe, clean, drinkable water.
“The goal is to provide existing clean-water solutions to countries that need them,” Waves for Water added. “These solutions include point-of-use filtration and chlorination systems, rainwater harvesting, and the restoring of dead wells.”
The organization also works with the United Nations and other non-governmental organizations.
Waves For Water first started within a small surfing community, which later on encouraged other surfers and travellers to do something meaningful while going out on adventures.
Its volunteers have successfully distributed water filtration systems across the Philippines, Haiti, Indonesia, Bali, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, Nepal, Samoa, North Korea, Chile, Brazil, Kenya, South Africa, Ethiopia, Uganda, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nicaragua, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Laos, among others. — Rappler.com
To learn more about Waves for Water or to get involved as a clean water courier, you may contact Carlo Delantar at carlo@wavesforwater.org or visit their website here.
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