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PepsiCo Prioritises Water Stewardship With $4.2 Million Commitment
The PepsiCo Foundation has shown that water stewardship is a top priority for the brand by expanding access to safe water to almost 16 million people in some of the most water-stressed areas in the world.
To this end, it has made a $4.2 million commitment to WaterAid, an organisation that strives to provide everyone everywhere with clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene in a bid to end extreme poverty.
Its donation will be used to help increase safe water access to at-risk communities in India, while $2 million will be sent to China Women’s Development Foundation (CWDF) for Safe Water Access in the country’s most in-need villages.
Because of water usage habits, climate change effects and population growth, some four billion people are now affected by water scarcity. And come the year 2050, it’s being predicted that global demand for water will rise by up to 50 per cent.
What’s more, two-thirds of our global population lives in parts of the world that experience water scarcity for at least one month out of 12, with around half of those affected living in India and China.
In India, critical challenges that the country face include water scarcity and the sustainable management of water resources. The PepsiCo grant will seek to find solutions that can increase access to clean water for over 200,000 people, while educating community members on adopting sustainable hygiene and sanitation practices, and building community and government capacity to better manage water resources.
PepsiCo is also the first Fortune 500 global corporation to take part in the CWDF’s flagship Water Cellars for Mothers scheme, which intends to provide safe and effective solutions to boost water access in parts of the country that have no water infrastructure at the moment.
Access to safe water will hopefully be provided to over ten million people by 2025 through improvement of environmental conditions close to the Danjiangkou Water Reservoir, where water sources are often contaminated.
Commenting on the announcement, vice-president of global sustainability Roberta Barbieri said: “Over the last decade, we have been focused on grassroots solutions to this challenge as well as partnering with experts in communities around the world to support innovative, sustainable and local water solutions.
“Access to safe water is at the heart of PepsiCo’s global water strategy, in which we aim to enable long-term, sustainable water security for our business and others who depend on water availability.”
If you want to do your bit to end water scarcity, you can start off by saving water wherever you can. You can do this through water leak detection and repair, water auditing and water monitoring, where remote monitoring equipment is installed on site to track water flow each hour for ten years. This means that efficiency can be maximised and leaks can be spotted straightaway so you waste less water and potentially save yourself thousands of pounds.