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Our Co-op has a long history of supporting communities around the world, thanks to our partnerships with The One Foundation and Water Unite. Last year we brought safe water to 150,000 people around the world through clean water projects.

Water #TheCoopWay

We donate 3p for every litre sold of Co-op branded water* to The One Foundation and 1p for every litre sold of branded water to Water Unite. In total, during 2017, we raised £1.3 million from Co-op water and over £400,000 from our new commitment on branded water – taking our total to over £1.7 million to fund clean water projects.

When Co-op Members choose Co-op branded water they also benefit their local community, through our Local Community Fund. Co-op Members earn 5% backon select Co-op products and services, as well as1% back for their choice of local community cause.

Thanks to you buying water at Co-op in 2017, you have helped us;

• raise £1.7 million for clean water projects
• reach 150,00 people with clean water
• repair 300 broken water pumps
• drill 10 new boreholes

Our work has been building sustainable water systems in four African countries, Rwanda, Malawi, Kenya and Ghana and we have been able to provide water for four humanitarian crises.

26,000 people in Nairobi now have access to clean water

In Nairobi, Kenya, we built pipelines that have enabled low-income communities gain easier access to clean water. These pipelines deliver piped water to community water-kiosks and tap stands.

This infrastructure, combined with education for residents and landlords, has helped reduce exploitation from cartels using illegal water connections.

Watch Dorcas explain the difference her family water stand has meant to her:

48,625 people in Malawi alone have been reached with our clean water projects

In 2017, we upskilled local community members to enable them to manage, maintain and repair their own water points in the future. For the first time we piloted school workshops and after school clubs on pump maintenance to build a new generation of skills that will keep water flowing in their communities.

All this was in addition to our continued programme of providing new water points through drilling boreholes and building gravity fed water systems.

Around 884 million people around the world have no access to clean water so there’s still a lot of work to do. Thanks to the support of Co-op Members we are able to help people in communities around the world where water is shockingly scarce. Having been to Malawi and seen the positive change our work brings, I’m absolutely committed to making as big an impact as we can.

CJ Antal-Smith
Director of Trading Ambient & Non-Food

Read more about water #TheCoopWay;

• Co-op becomes the first retailer to join the Global Investment Fund for Water (now Water Unite)
• We’re supporting the DEC Myanmar appeal, with 50k from our own brand water

*Applies to still and sparkling water. Co-op branded flavoured water and small bottles of Co-op branded soda water. Varieties as ​stocked, subject to availability.