Ben Skoda from Venture Expeditions, talks about his organization’s efforts to fight poverty through adventure.
When it comes to addressing HIV/AIDS and water crises in Africa, most of us do not lack heart. Unfortunately, many of us have a desire to act, but are deterred by the lack of a platform or the resources to contribute.
Dan Haseltine, lead singer of Jars of Clay and founder of Blood: Water Mission, reflects on his experience at ONE and (RED)’s World AIDS Day event, and compares the HIV/AIDS epidemic to a dragon.
I’m sitting in a mostly quiet airport eating an international dinner (read: China Panda), trying to remember names and faces and which comments went with the particular faces and names I could remember with a little help from the pocket full of new business cards I acquired. My first thought is, “The Ronald Reagan Airport has great lighting.” My second thought, which has equally little to do with my day is, “I wish the Dunkin Donuts was still open.” But my third thought, the one that has been rattling around in my head since 6:30 a.m., was, “How do you kill a dragon?”
Dan Haseltine, lead vocalist of Jars of Clay, tries to help readers visualize what it means to bring clean water to 1,000 communities in Africa.
If I asked you to think about 384 million people, would you be able to find an image in your minds eye? If I tried to get you to visualize 147 million orphan children, would you be able to conjure up such a picture? In the swirl and confusion of conversations about the US economy and budget cuts, as we use the disembodied language of millions and billions of dollars, do you have a picture in your mind of a giant pile of bills and coins? Most of us will never see a trail of that many zeroes in our own bank accounts.
Musician and activist Charlie Lowell from the band Jars of Clay talks about an exciting new development with his organization, Blood:Water Mission. They’re on track to completing their thousandth water project next spring!
Jars of Clay in Africa
It started with a simple equation. A human equation. One US dollar can provide clean water for one African for one year. Too often, we are paralyzed by overwhelming statistics regarding the world’s poorest nations, and any attempt feels like just a drop in the ocean of poverty and injustice. It’s the same value that ONE.org shares — that you and I can quite literally can make a difference in this world.
Five years ago, Blood:Water Mission started the 1,000 Wells Campaign on the back of this simple human equation. We wanted to partner with 1,000 communities in sub-Saharan Africa, bringing clean water to the people in each community. It’s the most basic of needs, but suddenly women and children are not forced to walk miles to collect (dirty) water from a local source. Boys and girls can attend school, women can start micro-finance projects, and the health of the whole community is immediately strengthened. It’s the first counter-punch at poverty.
There’s a not to miss story in today’s Washington Post on keeping promises and meeting commitments. In 2005, the same year G7 governments made commitments to Africa at Gleneagles, the band Jars of Clay and the organization they founded, Blood: Water Mission set a goal and promised they would help provide clean water for people living in 1,000 communities in sub-Saharan Africa.
Not all the 2005 goals have been met. But, Jars and BWM have now met their goal and kept their promise. Read all about it here.
Here’s an excerpt:
Over five years, they ended up raising nearly $7 million for water and sanitation projects as well as hygiene training, and they made multiple trips to Africa to see the progress firsthand.
What they found is that life with clean, accessible water is much different. Women and children no longer have to walk miles a day to draw water from a dirty source or deal with the stomach aches, skin diseases and diarrhea that comes with it.
Keyboardist Charlie Lowell described one woman who proudly showed off her smooth hands, saying they used to be dry and shriveled, but now she feels like a woman again.
“It is about health, and it is about sanitation and clean water, but just under that there’s this human dignity piece,” Lowell said.
The band members emphasize that water projects are all led by locals, usually the women, who decide what type of water source their village needs and how to implement it.
To raise money, the band relies largely on creative grass roots efforts.
“It’s community driven in the U.S. as much as it’s community driven in Africa,” Haseltine said.
On World AIDS Day, our friends at Blood:Water Mission—an organization that works to creatively and thoughtfully raise awareness and funds for the HIV/AIDS and water crises (including some fantastic work earlier this year around the Water for the World Act)—unveiled a brand new website.
Check out the site today and read stories from Africa, watch the video on the homepage, even learn how to start your own campaign (including “Water Walks” and the Ride:Well Tour). And don’t forget to share it with others!
ONE is campaigning to ensure that the Congressional budget does not cut foreign assistance programs like Feed the Future that help people break the cycle of poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa is experiencing its worst drought in 60 years. More than 11 million people, mostly nomadic pastoralists and farmers in south-central Somalia, north-eastern Kenya, and south-eastern Ethiopia, are severely lacking access to food.
2011 marks 30 years since the first cases of AIDS were documented. Take a closer look at the specific, achievable goals we must hit by 2015 to make this year the beginning of the end of AIDS.
As aid agencies warn more than 9 million people could be affected by a food crisis in East Africa, world leaders are failing to keep their 2009 promises to tackle the causes of chronic hunger and support farmers in the world's poorest countries.
