…while you’re drinking Diet Snapple.
He’s in the house here at CGI as part of a “mega-commitment,” which includes the Global Water Challenge. Their $25 million commitment will help fund new projects to provide safe drinking water and sanitation for the world’s poorest people.
The projects were selected through a changemakers.net competition. It’s a really cool idea and a great way to forge the best ideas. Over 254 proposals for funding were submitted to GWC. I talked to executive director Paul Faeth about this for a while on Wednesday, and he loves developing this sort of marketplace for ideas. In general GWC are good folks and are doing great things.
The global water crisis may be the most underreported major global crises. Nearly 900 million people lack access to safe drinking water, and $2.5 billion lack access to safe sanitation. A lack of access to safe sanitation is what caused the Black Death…in the 14th century. In addition to the day-to-day suffering of nearly a billion people, access to water has and will continue to be casus belli.
Clinton has emphasized this issue several times during CGI. We applaud these groups for making such a generous and desperately needed commitment.