ARAMARK, the food and facilities management company, has funded a PlayPump® water system for 290 South African children at a primary school in South Africa. Two representatives from ARAMARK, Clive Cooper (Purchasing Director) and Val Carter (Corporate Responsibility Director), were on hand last month (November 2007) to see the installation of the PlayPump® at Tholo Primary School near Zeerust, close to the Botswanan border.
The project has been financed through sales of One Water at ARAMARK units around UK. Since the summer of 2007, ARAMARK has been working with One Water and its clients to fund clean water projects in Africa. For every bottle of One Water sold, 10p goes towards a PlayPump® project, the first of which was completed last November.
Following installation, the simple, but ingenious, design means that as children play on the 'roundabout', fresh, clean water is pumped from deep underground into a storage tank from where it feeds, by gravity, to a nearby tap. The result is a continuous flow of clean water for the entire community. In Africa, women and children normally walk for on average five hours a day to collect water.
"This was an amazing trip," says Val. "To see the impact this will have on the school and its 290 children is life changing. I expected the key need to be fresh drinking water for the children and teachers. I didn't realise they had no water at all. The children weren't allowed to go outside and play in case they got dehydrated. Installing the pump means they can run around and play and they can start to cultivate a food garden, supplying fresh fruit and vegetables and allowing a more nutritious lunch. The children get involved with growing the food and therefore learn a critical life skill. The toilet block can also be re-opened, as without water, they had no means to flush and sanitise it."
During the trip, Clive and Val visited a school, where a PlayPump® had been installed for fifteen months. Val continues, "The visit to the school with an established pump was great to see. It made us realise just what a difference the water makes. The food garden was particularly successful, as not only were they growing enough food to feed the children, they also had excess which was being sold to generate funds for the school. For ARAMARK, a real purpose of the visit was to encourage greater participation in the One Water programme. To this end, a record of the installation at Tholo Primary School will be central to communication both within ARAMARK and to its clients. Clive comments, "What we've seen with our own eyes is the huge impact that can be achieved through just a small change in purchasing behaviour. By supporting One Water in their businesses most of our clients have the potential to fund their own project in less than 18 months. What we really want to see is their names on the pumps, with them and their ARAMARK account managers going to Africa and witnessing the benefits of this inspirational programme themselves."
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