FAQs

We work with our partners – from local communities to global allies – to reach everyone with clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene.

We work closely with communities to build sustainable systems that meet their specific needs.

We bring people together, sharing good practice and coming up with new solutions.

And we persuade decision makers to act, bringing about lasting change on a global scale.

Learn more about what we do

With our local partners, we work with communities to deliver low-cost, sustainable solutions that meet their needs.

We also work with local and national governments in the countries where we operate, developing solutions to help them provide water, toilets and hygiene to everyone.

And we work on an even bigger scale, too. We campaign worldwide, showing governments and key decision makers that investing in these basic services will have incredible, positive impacts.

Learn more about how we work

Many people live in countries where the national economy isn't strong enough to create water and sanitation infrastructure at the scale they need. Construction can also be difficult in many places because of extreme geography – like deserts, mountains and jungles – and not enough trained experts who know how to find long-term solutions.

Governments may let water and toilets get left behind while focusing on other important priorities, like industry, roads, schools and hospitals.

Vulnerable people in society are affected most. Those living in hard-to-reach areas can be forgotten entirely, people living in poverty can be priced out, and groups perceived as different can be denied access to services. That's why an important part of our work is supporting communities to understand and defend their rights to clean water and decent toilets.

Many people do. Hand-dug wells are the most common way people in developing countries get their water. Going to the toilet in a hole or outside in an area away from people is also common.

But both of these solutions are unsafe. Wells that aren’t dug correctly can be extremely dangerous to people’s health, and human waste in the open can contaminate water and spread disease.

Constructing safe, sustainable water systems and decent toilets requires more specialist knowledge than some communities have. So our local partners work with them to build simple, effective long-term solutions, and share the skills to maintain them, too.

Many communities have to use an open water source because they don’t have clean water close to home. But open sources of water are rarely safe; they can be contaminated with household and industrial waste, animal faeces, parasites, and waterborne diseases like cholera.

They are also unreliable, and can often dry up or run out. This means that people need to find a new source of water, which could be many miles away. Whole communities simply can't move every time this happens.

Land ownership is also an issue for many people; poorer communities often don't have the money to simply move to new locations, let alone find new work or land to farm.

It is therefore safer and better to create a water facility that is local, using water that needs only minimal filtering – like groundwater or rainwater – and that is owned collectively by a community.

People sometimes boil dirty water to make it safer, but we cannot expect whole communities to boil all the water they need for daily life in the long term.

As well as not getting rid of dirt, sourcing and burning a constant supply of fuel can be very difficult, expensive, and be bad for people's health and the environment. Boiling also doesn't neutralise other contaminants, like toxic metals, which poison groundwater around the world.

And it does nothing to stop millions of women and children spending hours walking for miles for water every day – leaving no time for paid work, education, or play.

It is fairer, cheaper and more sustainable in every way to create a clean water supply that is close by, safe at its source and will last into the future.

Water purifying tablets and filters are common in some of the places where we work. They can be vital as a short-term solution, such as in the aftermath of natural disasters when water sources have been affected.

But these products aren’t suitable as a long-term solution to the water crisis. The industry required to manufacture and deliver enough to all of the millions of people around the world still in need of clean water, every single day, would be impossible.

But more importantly it wouldn’t be fair. Making the world’s poorest people use short-term solutions as long-term answers creates a two-tier system. Everyone deserves access to the same thing: a local, sustainable supply of clean water as a service.

In many of the communities we work with, families split the duties necessary to survive. Traditionally, men will earn the family’s income through agricultural or manual work; women will collect water, cook, and look after children.

Providing a local source of clean water can drastically reduce the amount of time women and children need to spend collecting water, and vastly improve their health. It can also open up opportunities for women to earn an income themselves, and for children to attend school.

We train women how to maintain and repair their water and toilet technologies, and how to create a management board for them. Equipping women with these skills and responsibilities can help make vital progress towards gender equality.

Our partners can often provide a water point within a community, but depending on where groundwater lies and how the community is spread, it can be up to a few hundred metres away – a short walk – for some households.

In many places around the world, balancing heavy loads on the head is a cultural tradition practised for generations. There is no evidence to suggest it causes any long-term harm compared with carrying loads on the shoulder or back – however, any excessive load, no matter how it is carried, has the potential to cause painful problems over time.

On average, women and girls in developing countries carry back an average of 20kg of water each time they collect some from a remote place. Having a local source changes this completely, giving people the freedom to collect the amount they want, when they want it.

Although technology plays a vital role in getting clean water and toilets to people, the problem is not one that can be fixed with a ‘silver bullet’ technology.

Charitable distribution of inventions – such as filters, pumps, purifiers, water condensation units, rolling water butts or similar – has been tried many times in the past, but only ever achieves limited short-term impact.

Instead, the crisis is largely a management problem – one where governments and the local private sector desperately need finances, skills, coordination and dedicated institutions to provide water and sanitation services to citizens.

We want to see the eventual establishment of permanent services like these through governments and service providers. This is where real innovations in approach need to happen.

In our community work, we use reliable, simple technologies that are sourced locally, so that people and their governments are better able to maintain them sustainably in the future.

Since 1981, we’ve directly reached 28.9 million people with clean water. But reaching everyone, everywhere is still a huge task that needs support: 703 million people in the world – almost one in ten – don’t have clean water close to home.

And toilets are at a far worse stage, as 1.5 billion people in the world – almost one in five – don’t have a decent toilet of their own.

Every day, developed countries use water and sanitation infrastructure that developing countries simply cannot build on their own. People and governments around the world face challenges – extremes of geography, climate change, poverty, natural disasters, and conflict – that make work of this scale incredibly difficult without external help.

It’s therefore crucial that aid continues to be invested in water and sanitation infrastructure for those in need, and in ways that will last long into the future.

Often, vulnerable communities aren't aware of their entitlements to the human rights of basic water and sanitation services. We work with communities to increase their awareness of rights, and create dialogue between them and their local governments, whose duty it is to provide them.

No. However, we do work with governments and local authorities to change their policies and improve coverage and rights to clean water, sanitation and hygiene services.

We do this through policy, advocacy, campaigning and dialogue with key decision-makers.

We want to see all governments build strong water and sanitation sectors, with robust systems that deliver services and keep them running. Working together helps governments be more accountable to their citizens.

No. In underdeveloped regions, high birth rates among extremely poor people are partly a response to high child mortality: when a child is less likely to survive, parents are likely to have more children.

Investing in water and toilets helps address this, by improving health and reducing child deaths. A reduction in child mortality leads to a reduction in the need for families to have more children.

High birth rates can also be a symptom of a lack of women’s empowerment. Access to water and sanitation, and the time-saving and health benefits they bring, has been shown to increase girls’ school attendance and broaden women’s opportunities. Improving girls’ education and women’s social status are important factors in producing smaller, healthier families.

When we work with a community, it’s on the understanding that any solution will need their investment to be truly sustainable.

We cover the initial costs of planning and installation. Then, once the community is healthier and in a better financial position to look after the solutions, they take over – putting money aside for future maintenance and paying those elected to manage them.

Paying for services helps create responsibility and ownership of them within a community – vital to the success of a long-term solution.

All our projects are equitable and inclusive, too. This means that service bills are graded so that everyone can afford to pay them and use the facilities, regardless of gender, caste, disability or any other factor. Those who are unable to afford any grade of tariff usually agree on other ways to contribute within the community.

We know that every community faces different, individual challenges. For this reason, all our projects are designed in collaboration with communities themselves.

By starting with people’s needs, we can develop solutions most likely to succeed in the long term. We train people how to maintain and manage their community’s services, and use locally sourced parts to ensure everything can be repaired and replaced easily in the future.

We also conduct studies that judge the progress of services later down the line. These help us continually work to improve the sustainability of the services we and our partners deliver. The results of these studies are published in our annual reports.

With almost one in ten people worldwide still living without access to clean water close to home, and 1.5 billion people without a toilet of their own, the global water and sanitation crisis is vast. 

To ensure our work is as efficient and beneficial as possible, it is planned years in advance to a specific global strategy.

While we can't be everywhere we would like to help, our international advocacy work aims to change water and sanitation policies globally, even in regions where we don’t have a physical presence.

Unfortunately, no. Due to the scale of the water and sanitation crisis, and to be as effective as possible, we work to a global strategy, where work is researched and planned many years in advance. Because of this, we cannot respond to requests for specific advice or assistance.

However, there are many other agencies with different ways of working that might be able to help. We recommend visiting developmentaid.org, wango.org or other similar NGO directory sites to find out more.

Our WASH Matters website offers a wealth of technical information, insight and guidance for others to use.

Because we are a development organisation, specialising in long-term solutions, we are not set up to respond to emergency situations. However, if an emergency occurs in a region where we are already working, we will assist relief efforts in whatever way we can.

Yes, we are registered with the Charity Commission. Our registration numbers are ABN 99 700 687 141 (Australia), 288701 (England and Wales), SC039479 (Scotland), 802426-1268 (Sweden), EIN/tax ID 30-018-1674 (United States).

No. We do, however, gratefully accept support from religious community groups and partner with religious organisations in country programmes.

We are always keen to be as cost effective as possible, investing in both our current work and our ability to raise funds for future work. For example, in WaterAid UK last year we spent 76p of every pound on delivering services and making change, and invested 24p on fundraising and governance, ensuring that your donation is still changing lives tomorrow.

Our internal audit team also conducts regular assessments of our systems and practices, helping us understand how we can continue to improve on our value for money. A full breakdown of our income and expenditure can be found in our annual reports.

We are keen to be open and transparent about how we use our funds, and share our salary costs in our annual reports. The total employee benefits paid to the Chief Executive of WaterAid UK in 2023-24 were salary and taxable benefits in kind (including employer national insurance contributions) of £137,481 (2023: £134,067) and pension contributions of £15,975 (2023: £14,035).

WaterAid is a global organisation and the quality of our staff is crucial to reach as many people with clean water as possible. By employing highly skilled, experienced staff, we can bring lasting change to vulnerable communities. Employee salaries are regularly benchmarked against other charitable organisations, and our salary policy is agreed by our Board of Trustees.

We are determined to see a world where everyone has access to safe water, sanitation and hygiene by 2030, and we are committed to maximising our impact to help ensure that this is achieved.

We are aware of our responsibilities to those who benefit from our work, as well as to our supporters, donors, staff and the public. In setting pay, we take seriously our responsibility to ensure value for money in everything we do, always being effective stewards of our resources. This includes using our money wisely to ensure we pay competitive and fair salaries that enable us to recruit and retain staff with the right values, skills and experience to achieve our mission. We aim to remunerate and to review remuneration in a transparent way.

All of our staff have an annual performance review. We believe that basing an element of pay on performance demonstrates our commitment to value for money, accountability to our stakeholders, and reinforces the importance of high standards of performance for all staff.

Pay scales for all staff are set with reference to market conditions, comparing ourselves with similar not-for-profit organisations. Market pay is determined using recognised salary surveys specialising in the charity and international development sectors. We seek to pay between the median and upper quartile of these comparators.

Pay ranges for the Chief Executives and Directors are set with reference to market data for each individual role, benchmarked using at least three relevant remuneration surveys.

Each year, we consider an increase to be awarded on 1 April. Increases are determined taking into account the benchmark data, individual performance and affordability.

The People Committee of the Board provide assurance that WaterAid’s global remuneration policies and principles are being applied. The Committee reviews all proposed increases for Directors and recommends the remuneration of the Chief Executives for approval by the Board of Trustees.

Our Board of Trustees are not remunerated.

Yes, WaterAid is a global federation. We work with partners to provide clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene in 22 countries, supported by offices in Australia, Canada, India, Japan, Senegal, South Africa, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Our journey started in the UK in 1981 as a response to the UN 1981-1991 Decade of Drinking Water and the UK’s ‘Thirsty World’ conference. Over the subsequent two decades, our country programme work developed across Africa and South Asia.

WaterAid Australia was officially launched by the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs in March 2004 and we were approached, in 2003, by AquaAid, an Australian organisation rooted in the water industry which admired and sought to replicate the WaterAid model in Australia.

WaterAid America was formally registered as a non-profit corporation and as a 501(c)3 (tax exempt) organisation to strengthen relationships with public bodies and institutions, to raise funds efficiently and to advocate in America.

The relationship between the UK, Australia and America became known as the WaterAid ‘Alliance’.

WaterAid Sverige was registered as a Fundraising Foundation in Sweden in May 2009, and publicly launched in June 2009. A licence to use the name was signed with WaterAid in June 2009.

Discussions were also beginning on how WaterAid India could increase its impact and reach in India, and in March 2010 we registered Jal Seva Charitable Foundation as a public limited company in India and in April 2016, WaterAid India formally became an associate member.

WaterAid Japan was founded and joined the WaterAid federation in 2013.

In the same year, we joined forces with charity WaterCan, which became WaterAid Canada.

Learn more about our history

WaterAid international (WAi) was created in 2010 to support the development of our global organisation and to facilitate global decision making, global standards and co-ordination of global activities. It owns the name and logo and is responsible for establishing WaterAid member organisations in new countries. It comprises the international board and a small secretariat.

Having our central office in London gives us immediate access to the UK Government and other leading organisations, which is vital to our work. However, we are careful to balance out the expense this entails.

We have made considerable savings on rent since 1981, when we were originally given rent-free space within the offices of the National Water Council in Westminster. Later, when Thames Water left their Prince Consort House offices in Embankment, they donated the remaining time on their lease to us.

In 2005, once this lease expired, we moved to Durham Street, Vauxhall. At the time, rents in the area were much lower, especially compared with more central parts of London, but recent regeneration has changed this. Therefore, following a detailed and thorough review of the options available to us both inside and outside of London, we relocated our UK office to Canary Wharf in 2020.

This move will bring a long-term cost saving, consequently allowing more resource to be dedicated to delivering our vision for the future. It also helped us to create a globally-connected, inspiring environment where staff, volunteers and partners can work together. We have designed our new space to meet five key design principles around employee wellbeing, sustainability, flexibility, digital technology, and global connection.

Our agile, hybrid work environment is cost-effective and ensures UK-based staff, many of whom do not live in London, can collaborate effectively together. We also outsource key administrative functions to companies based throughout the UK, which helps reduce our costs and lets us operate more efficiently.

The huge scale of the global water and sanitation crisis means that, inevitably, there are many charities across the world trying to tackle it. However, attempting to merge these thousands of groups and work as one organisation would pose many challenges in logistics and practices, risking inefficiency.

There are already coalitions and networks that bring together and oversee many charities, and we regularly take part in partnerships of this kind for specific projects.

Such collaborations help to eliminate overlap and duplication of effort in areas where more than one charity may be working, and create opportunities to collaborate and share knowledge and ideas.

As a leader in the sector, our successful working practices are often cited by other organisations in their own work.

Thank you for your donation! You can set this up via the donate page on our UK website.

If you’d like to increase the amount you donate, please complete our Direct Debit form or, if you're in the UK, you can call us on 020 7793 4594. Our team is available Monday to Friday, 9am to 5.30pm GMT, and would be very happy to help.

Yes! Please visit Shop for Life – our online gift donation service.

Yes, the donation pages of our website are hosted on ‘https’ – an application which protects data securely. When you visit the page asking for card details, the ‘https’ padlock symbol will appear in your web browser’s address bar to indicate that information being entered is secure. We adhere to strict data protection protocols when processing supporters’ data.

Corruption is a serious threat to development work. To protect ourselves, we have a rigorous accounting system and an internal audit and compliance team, who report directly to the chair of an audit committee.

Between them, we track all of our expenditure, from our planning in offices to the work on the ground by our partners. We also conduct regular internal audits that offer fresh insights into improvements we can make in control, risk management, compliance and value for money.

Each year, after our own extensive accounting and reporting, we are then audited by the independent body PWC.

It is hard to give the general cost of a well, as the costs of specific items vary from country to country. Every community also has its own requirements; they may need an entirely different kind of solution and training, which could mean different costs.

We also prefer not to use donations for specific items or projects, as this helps us keep our administrative costs low. Instead, we designate donations as ‘unrestricted’ general funds, supporting our work in all the countries where we operate. This gives us flexibility in how we work and how we can help people.

We do not send volunteers to projects. We believe it is vital that each community takes responsibility for constructing, maintaining and managing their project themselves, while receiving specialist support and training from our local partner agencies in the region.

Because the communities we work with are often in very remote areas, any visit would also require detailed planning and use valuable staff time and resources. Out of respect for the communities, we do not encourage self-funded trips to our projects either.

Thank you, but we don't ship equipment overseas to our projects. All materials are locally sourced – this means the community can access spare parts for the future, and it helps the local economy. We sometimes suggest selling your equipment and making a donation instead.

Yes! We have a network of volunteer speakers who would be happy to give a virtual talk or educational workshop to your school or group.