Four time zones, 23 countries, over 1000 tweets – WaterAid24 takes Twitter by storm

10 June

WaterAid used a 24 hour tweetathon to lift the lid on its work around the world.

WaterAid this week became the first international development charity to host a
24-hour tweetathon in order to showcase its work around the world.

WaterAid24 began in Australia at midnight BST on Tuesday 7 June and ended in America, with updates from Asia, Africa, the Pacific region and Europe in between.

The aim of the initiative was to shine a spotlight on the many teams, skills and areas of expertise that add up to the running of a successful global charity, from water engineers in the field in Ethiopia to internal auditors in India and Burkina Faso.

• View media coverage, including a Digital Campaign of the Week award from Third Sector magazine, on Storify here.

Tweet highlights included:

• Mozambique: New taps provide safe drinking water for children in 2 primary schools in Maputo #wateraid24
• Nepal: Nepalese gallows humour about a lack of water – 'God gave us the Himalayan rivers but not the pipes'
• Liberia: Had a meeting earlier today with the Public Works Ministry - they do not lavishly provision their meetings! #wateraid24

View more selected tweets from the day on Storify.

According to WaterAid's Website Manager Joe Downie: "Getting tweets and twitpics in from all our offices on one day was a first not just for us but for the sector.

"We wanted to show just how many layers go into our work to deliver safe water, sanitation and hygiene to some of the world's poorest communities and a wonderful byproduct was a genuine feeling of interconnectedness between WaterAid staff the world over."

Clarence House – home of the Prince of Wales, WaterAid's President – Plan B and Lauren Laverne were among the high profile retweeters of the campaign.

The total potential tweet reach was estimated by digital specialists The Rabbit Agency to be 1,147,759 and 1,111 tweets were issued under the hashtag #WaterAid24 in total on the day.

• See highlights of the day in pictures below:

Notes to editors:

WaterAid's vision is of a world where everyone has access to safe water and sanitation. The international organisation works in 26 countries across Africa, Asia and the Pacific region to transform lives by improving access to safe water, hygiene and sanitation in some of the world's poorest communities. 

Over the past 30 years, WaterAid has reached 14.38 million people with safe water and, since 2004, 9.4 million people with sanitation. 

For more information, visit www.wateraid.org, follow @wateraid on Twitter or visit us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/wateraid.