Progress & Updates

For those of you who are wondering, we are seeing some great success with Water.org. Right now we have projects going in Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Ghana, Haiti, Honduras, India, Kenya, Uganda, and are always working for more. If you navigate to the Watercredit tab of our website and click on Success Stories, you can see examples of real people who are reaping the benefits from this program. Also on the website, the front page features news updates and water headlines. If you want to really stay on top of what we're doing, there is a section in the top right corner where you can sign up for email updates about all the Water.org projects and progress. For any of you teachers out there, be sure to navigate to our Lesson Plans page and see how you can incorporate water into your curriculum or check out the Resource Links for fun activities and helpful tips. Last but not least, thanks for all the support guys! It's the little things that count.

Letters to my girls: Launching Water.org

July 16, 2009

Today, Gary White and I launched the nonprofit organization Water.org which is striving to provide safe water and sanitation to developing countries. We are starting in Africa, Central America, and South Asia, but I really hope people help Gary and I take this effort further. All of our projects are demand-driven and community-led. This means that the communities approach our local partners and that the communities themselves are involved owners every step of the way. Ownership increases sustainability and ensures that solutions last in the long run. Not surprisingly, it is often women leading the charge. Because women and girls spend most of their day walking miles to gather clean water, they miss out on many valuable educational opportunities. Therefore, women are really rallying their communities to organize and get small loans for water and sanitation. I understand their drive for change because I feel that same drive within myself. When Gary and I visited Ethopia recently, we visited a community where 6,000 people were sharing one well. Some people were standing inside of the well, while others were throwing tin cans tied with ropes into the hole. They were working so hard for this water, but I knew it would be the reason some of them were sick by the end of the day. We talked to a group of kids at the well, and as they held up the plastic bottles of brown water to show me what they’d have to drink at school. To me, their drinking water looked more like chocolate milk. I couldn’t imagine how their parents felt, being forced to give their child contaminated water and knowing it would likely make them sick but not having any alternative. Becoming a father to you girls really made this issue strike a chord with me because I would never want you to have to give up your dreams to focus on finding clean water or have to give you dirty water knowing it would make you sick. These problems are very real, but I know if I work hard at creating solutions, the world will be a better place for you and your kids. That is what keeps me going.

Letters to my girls: Running the Sahara Premiere

September 10, 2006

Tonight is the premiere night for Running the Sahara, a film I produced, at the Toronto Film Festival. I chose to do this movie because I thought it was more than just a chance to make a film. On the trip to Africa I recently told you about, I saw first-hand the public health issues of our time—the world water crisis which is at its worst in Africa. I also saw the hope in the people there when they have access to clean water that can save millions of lives. One day, I went and collected water with a girl there and we walked a couple miles to get the water. I realized how incredibly strong she was, and it was because she had access to clean drinking water. I realized how inconvenient that was for her, and how much of her day that took up and took away from her studying. We don’t think about it. We go and get a glass of water and then we can go to school or read a book or do whatever we want. If a lot of our time is spent just trying to survive, that obviously takes away time for us just focusing on things that might lift us out of poverty. Clean water is also a critical component to rebuilding shattered economies. Imagine the profound effect a well can have on the lives and dreams of all the people who have access to it—clean water can put entire communities onto that first rung of the development ladder. Ultimately I'm not particularly excited that we live in a culture that celebrities are listened to more than people with real knowledge most of the time, but I do recognize it. When you’re a celebrity, you start to feel a level of responsibility to direct attention to things that actually matter more than to silly things like where you had dinner last night. I want to use the attention I to bring awareness to the need for clean water. Worldwide, over 1 billion people lack access to clean water. In addition, every 15-20 seconds, a child in the developing world dies from water-related disease – and worse yet, it is entirely preventable. Knowing the facts and knowing the availability of solutions prompted me to help found an organization called H2O Africa, which will focus specifically on raising funds to support the execution of clean water programs in Africa. With our team and support from others, we will be able to make a profound impact on the lives of so many people in Africa.

Letters to my girls: Africa Trip

May 9, 2006

 I just returned from a six-day listening and learning trip to Africa, mainly Zambia, with your Uncle Kyle.  We went there with a group called ONE.org who partnered with Bono to organize a trip so that people like your Uncle and I could educate ourselves about the bigger picture and begin to look outside ourselves. I was always aware of problems in the world, but I didn’t want to come out of nowhere, start talking, after just having read some books. I felt like it was more important to go there and see it, then start building awareness. While we were there, I really tried to be keenly observant of my surroundings. Your Uncle Kyle and I were outed as complete wusses when we saw some of the bugs though. It was hard to view ourselves as tough guys, cowering under the net and clutching our malaria meds! It was an incredible trip though, it definitely changed my life. I went there and I felt really inspired, and there were incredible people on the ground there doing incredible work. Instead of talking numbers, I actually got to see the lives affected by money that’s being sent there and used properly in programs that are having this wonderful effect. This helped me realize that many of the problems are solvable. Solving these problems is important to me because I know the world I leave to you is going to be affected by what I do, or what I don’t do. When I was growing up, your grandma put this note on the refrigerator. It was something that Gandhi said: “No matter how insignificant it may seem, it is most important that you do it.” Remembering this quote helped me realize that the best way to honor and love you is to do what I can, here and now.