Mobilizing capital for good: How your donations go further with Water.org

By Lina Bonova, Chief Revenue Officer

Published July 11, 2024


Your donations make the most impact

We value your generosity, and we work to ensure your gifts do the most good, sustainably. Your donations to Water.org help bring lasting, affordable safe water and sanitation solutions to more people in poverty, faster. Through our approach, we can maximize the impact of every dollar and reach more people at an increasingly higher rate than other water charities. We are excited to share with you how your donations helped us reach more than 66 million people to date with lasting access to the safe water or sanitation solutions their families need to survive and thrive.

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Women in Indonesia meet with a representative from one of our in-country financial institution partners, Komida, to discuss loans for safe water and sanitation solutions.

Our motivation to reach more people, faster 

Right now, 2.2 billion people in the world lack access to safe water and 3.5 billion people lack access to a safe toilet. A lack of these essential resources leads to dire health consequences, gender inequities, decreased opportunities for education, less resilience to climate change, and fewer economic opportunities.

2.2 billion people in the world lack access to safe water and 3.5 billion lack access to a safe toilet.

Addressing the challenges posed on humanity by the global water crisis requires urgent action to implement strategic, affordable, sustainable solutions. This is why Water.org employs financial solutions that use your philanthropic gifts to leverage commercial capital, ensuring sustainable impact can be made at an increasingly high rate.

The power of mobilizing philanthropic funds to attract capital to change lives 

We know that creating lasting, cost-effective impact requires more than traditional charity. We found that when we put more power behind philanthropy, like using philanthropic dollars to attract more commercial capital, we can create greater impact for less. And we can change more lives, faster.

Through this financial approach we can multiply the value and impact of each of your donations, creating an effective solution for lasting change. To do this, we work with our in-country financial partners to add loans for water and sanitation solutions to their portfolios. These partners then mobilize funding from capital markets to provide affordable loans to people in need. People living in poverty use these loans to put a tap or toilet in their homes.

As a result, every repaid loan creates the opportunity for another family to get the safe water and toilets they need, fast and affordably. This is how every dollar donated to Water.org serves as a catalyst for greater impact.

A smart financial solution means your money goes further

Based on the capital we’ve helped mobilize and our expenses to date, $1 donated to Water.org results in $17 to help people in need get access to safe water and sanitation. In other words, your $1 helps unlock $17 for water and sanitation solutions for people in need.

Your money goes further with Water.org. It is a smart investment.

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You can make an exponential impact

Together with our 143 partners around the world, we’ve helped mobilize more than $5.5 billion in capital to support small loans that bring access to safe water and sanitation to millions of people in need. With those dollars we’ve reached exponentially more people than would be possible through traditional charity. The impact of our work is accelerating because philanthropy sets everything in motion. Just a few years ago, we reached about one million people in a year. Now we can reach that many people in a matter of months.

We’re creating a family of solutions that will reach more people, even faster. Our solutions break down the barriers between people in need and lasting access to safe water and sanitation. Our technical assistance, project development, and investment solutions work together to solve the global water crisis at scale, using a market-driven approach.

When you trust Water.org with your donation, you become part of a transformative approach to solving one of the greatest challenges of our time, efficiently and effectively. Your donation helps us deploy resources strategically, leveraging the expertise and experience of our team, our partners, and the people we serve to drive lasting change. Your donation doesn't just fund a safe water project for someone in need; it unlocks a chain reaction of sustainable impact, making safe water and sanitation solutions possible for exponentially more families and communities.

Donate today and your gift will make an exponential impact. $25 helps one family get lasting access to safe water.