Boy drinking clean water from a tap.

Emeye's story

Emeye, 12, lives in a village in Banja, Ethiopia. Sadly, in her community, they had no source of clean water. The responsibility of collecting water mostly fell on mothers and children in her village.

Emeye’s morning routine wasn’t like many other little girls. She started her mornings with a long trek to collect dirty water from the spring.

“I had to wake up at 6:30 every morning to fetch water… then, I had to run to get to school on time”

Not only did Emeye have to walk miles for water, but it was also contaminated, which often made her sick and miss school.

But thanks to donors like you, water pipelines have been installed in Emeye’s community. Less children get sick and they no longer miss school.

What’s happening

• 844 million people in the world have no access to clean water.

• The average woman in rural Africa walks 6 kilometres every day to collect water.

• More than 800 children under the age of 5 die every day from diarrhoea because of poor sanitation and dirty water.

• 2.3 billion people live without access to basic sanitation worldwide.

• 90% of all natural disasters are water related.

 

Benefits of clean safe water

• Families become healthier - water, sanitation, and hygiene programmes work together to prevent the spread of illnesses and to reduce child deaths.

• Children can attend and excel in school - when children don’t have to walk long distances to get water, they have more time to attend school and more energy to learn.