Earth Month 2024

Through the power of Aveda salons, spas, stores, institutes, guests, and supporters, Aveda Earth Month strives to help those in need of clean water, decent toilets and basic hygiene. 

Since 2006, Aveda Canada’s partnership with WaterAid Canada has raised more than $5 million, reaching over 180,000 people with access to clean water.* This year, join Aveda Canada as they once again celebrate Aveda Earth Month, a month dedicated to ending the world water crisis.

This Earth Month, we'd like to introduce to Juliette who lived inthe commune of Manjakandriana in the central highlands of Madagascar. Sadly, Juliette passed away since we met her, but her memory lives on in her 11 grandchildren. When we met Juliette, she was surrounded by her grandchildren – running around her, giggling, and competing for a place on her lap. When she spoke, they listened to her words carefully, because her words helped keep them healthy. She would tell them:

“Be careful when you go down to get water, it’s been raining and the slope is very slippery. I know you’re thirsty but don’t drink the water if you see worms in it, they’ll give you a runny stomach.”

When we spoke with Juliette, she shared that without access to clean water in her village, people were forced to collect water from one of two contaminated groundwater sources on either side of the village at the bottom of slopes. When it rains, water washes down the slopes into the sources, taking animal and human waste with it. People from the village know the water is contaminated, but they have no choice but to use it.

An older woman stands facing the camera holding a bright yellow jerry can on her head. The WaterAid and Aveda logos are pictured on the bottom left of the image.
Image: WaterAid/ Ernest Randriarimalala

Get involved! 

 

"We wish that one day we would have clean water, because we are greatly suffering during the rainy season when we go to collect water, because the road is slippery and as an old person I sometimes fall on the way to get to the water point." - Juliette

Image: WaterAid/ Ernest Randriarimalala

Children are often tasked with collecting water for their families, like Johary, one of Juliette’s grandsons. What is incomprehensible for some, is part of his everyday routine. 

As Johary (pictured below) fills containers with water, it’s difficult to think of him pouring this into a cup and drinking it. Even the thought of him washing his hands and face is worrying. 

A young boy walks along a well worn path, carrying a bucket in one hand and a large jug in the other, both containing water.
Image: WaterAid/ Ernest Randriarimalala

Imagine how worried you’d be if you had to drink water that you knew was dirty or contaminated. Can you see yourself handing it to a small child? This is the unfortunate reality for Johary, his cousins, and many people across Madagascar. 

With the support of Aveda Canada’s networks – salons, spas, and storefronts, along with Aveda Canada guests and supporters – this can change.

Madagascar's water crisis

13.8 million people in Madagascar – almost half the population – don’t have clean water close to home.

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Image: WaterAid/Ernest Randriarimalala

25.2 million people in Madagascar – nine in ten – don’t have a decent toilet of their own.

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Image: WaterAid/Ernest Randriarimalala

almost 1800 children under 5 die every year from diarrhea caused by dirty water, poor toilets and no hygiene facilities.

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Image: WaterAid/Ernest Randriarimalala

The partnership's history

Since 2006, Aveda Canada* has raised more than $5 million, reaching over 180,000 people with clean water, good toilets, and hygiene education in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Madagascar. And their public engagement activities across Canada, has helped keep this vital issue at the forefront of people’s minds.

On behalf of WaterAid Canada’s staff, Board, volunteers and community partners, congratulations to each and every Aveda Earth Month participant for your hard work and dedication to this important cause! Your support of WaterAid’s vision of clean water, sanitation and hygiene for everyone, everywhere by 2030, is changing the world. WaterAid is incredibly appreciative of Aveda Canada's partnership and long-standing commitment to our mission. 

Stand up for Clean Water

From April 2016 to March 2019, the Aveda Canada network worked hard to support two of Madagascar’s poorest municipalities – Belavabary and Sabotsy Anjiro, together the size of Calgary. Each year they raised funds through the Earth Month campaign to support these communities gain access to clean water, decent toilets, and good hygiene. This means that every school, every health clinic, every village – everyone, everywhere – would have access to clean, safe drinking water.

Because of this campaign, every school, health clinic village in the two municipalities gained access to clean, safe drinking water - transforming the lives of nearly, 20,000 children, women and men with the power of this precious resource. This means no more illness and death caused by drinking dirty water, no more hours wasted carrying water from distant sources – it means brighter futures because of the fantastic Earth Month supporters.

*Partnership through Collega International