Why a Network Approach

Our Solutions to the Water Crisis on a Global Scale

1)  We need to raise the awareness and funding priority of the global safe drinking water crisis among governments, businesses, philanthropies and consumers. What you don’t see as a problem in your own back yard often doesn’t get funded.

2) Funds raised need to be managed so they reach down to the grassroots level and don’t focus only on the larger urban areas. Collectively, we spend billions on clean water.  It's more efficient to fund large projects in big cities than in scattered rural areas.  Yet half of the global safe drinking water crisis exists in rural areas of developing nations, so approaches must be customized.

3) The talent and experience of grass root implementing organizations must be fully utilized.  Having these groups merely carry out the plans of large international organizations does not take advantage of their very local knowledge, and adds another layer of bureaucracy to the process.

4) Solutions must be technology appropriate, customized to the local climate, geography and culture…and the community must take ownership of the project long-term.

5) Sharing project data with everyone is critical to strengthen the knowledge and abilities of all groups and letting great new approaches get maximum exposure. Data on the results and impact of thousands of water projects is difficult to find. Lack of desire to share information, inability to collect results or a central place to display them…there are many “reasons”. It is critical, however, to gather this data and leverage it to develop best practices and avoid duplicating mistakes. We have to go beyond just taking a picture to understand what is working and fix what is not.

6) Finally, there must be cross-border, sector-wide efficiency, transparency, and effectiveness in order to scale up to handle this enormous challenge. 

... This calls for a global network where the talents of all can be tapped to laser focus on how best to eradicate the global safe drinking water crisis.