In conversation with Tim Wainwright, CEO of WaterAid
Okay. Tim, welcome. Tim Woodwright, WaterAid. Welcome. Thank you for doing this.
Speaker 1:And, it's great to talk to you about something that's extremely important, to our society and to a long term survival. So, thank you for being part.
Speaker 2:Thank you for inviting me. Thank you.
Speaker 1:You're welcome. Can you just tell me a tiny bit about yourself?
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah. I I, so I worked for WaterAid, and I'm the chief executive, but how did I get there, and and what kind of person am I? I suppose there's a bit of it way back. So when I was a child, I lived in Hong Kong, for a while. While my father was an engineer, on a dam construction, which helped to secure the supply of water to the citizens of Hong Kong.
Speaker 2:This was in the late sixties, early seventies. And so maybe there's a little bit of the, engineer water engineer in me that from from way back. And certainly, from an early age, I remember also selling Christmas cards in the snow in aid of Save the Children Fund. In in the UK, this was where I spent most of my childhood, with my mother. So I've always had a, I guess, something of an instinct to be involved in issues that make the world a better place, I suppose.
Speaker 2:And at university, I remember going to VSO talk. So although I spent the beginning of my career in the corporate sector, 8 years, it it felt right to be moving into international development after that, which is how I spent the rest of my my career. And latterly so I've led a couple of organizations now. The first one focused on disability and development and now I work for WaterAid. I've the other thing I'd say is I've I really like working for organizations with a really clear focus, specialism, and being really good at that.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. And I'm I'm also, I think, attracted to causes and issues that are, well, forgotten maybe not forgotten, but certainly are not getting the attention they need.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Well, let's let's let's come back to that in a few minutes. And I'm really interested in some of the formative years, because I think that people go ahead. It's good to understand that because it influences people. But, you talked about, your father influencing you around water, and, selling Christmas cards.
Speaker 1:Are there other things in your, childhood and your, younger years that, drove you to this? Because you you said you started in the corporate sector. Were you not able to have an impact, making the world a better place in the corporate sector? Is that why you shifted out?
Speaker 2:I think I enjoyed working in the corporate sector and and yet Certainly. I was working for British Airways for 8 years, but I also felt like the ultimate aim of it was creating shareholder value.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I, and I didn't want that to be the purpose that we go to work every morning for the rest of my life. I wanted I wanted there to be a much stronger, wider sort of purpose that was linked to making the world a better place.
Speaker 1:Okay. And how did you how did you make that change? Because it's a big change to move from the corporate at least for some people, it is to move from a corporate sector.
Speaker 2:I I moved into the the where I started my career in the international development sector was actually on the fundraising side. And it wasn't a very big leap because I remember I mean, the guy who hired me, out of British Airways had had a career at McKinsey's, Procter and Gamble, you know, a whole a a sort of really blue chip corporate career. So and and the fundraising department, I I I started my career in the 3rd sector in in the international development sector at Oxfam, and the fundraising department is a long time ago back in the nineties. The fundraising department felt very corporate. So actually, I experienced a much bigger change when I moved across into working on programs, the programs, the delivery side, the inside of these organizations.
Speaker 2:And then I and then I and I spent 6 years in Asia doing, in roles for different organizations, in the same way. And, again, that was a huge change. Yeah. So I think I I that was a that was a and and that enabled me to get a broader understanding of how the whole the whole of these international development organizations function or or a large part of them.
Speaker 1:And why did you choose, ultimately, WaterAid?
Speaker 2:I knew WaterAid well because the pre in the previous organizer WaterAid has always been very good at including, persons with disabilities in in its work. It's it's a you know, it's obviously hugely important that for instance, somebody who who's using a wheelchair is able to access a toilet for instance. And so when I've been championing the rights of persons with disabilities and and particularly working on making sure that international development included and thought about the issues, of of, persons with disabilities in the in the design of what they did, I used to regularly call them WaterAid as an example of an organization that knew how to do this in their sector. So I knew them well. The other reason I knew them was that my predecessor at WaterAid, Barbara Frost, had previously been a chief executive at the same organization.
Speaker 2:So oddly enough, this, disability, ADD, Action on Disability Development, gave WaterAid to 2 different chief executives at different times. So we sort of knew each other quite well because of that as well. So I knew the organization and I really liked it and I remember without having any clue that I would end up working here, I always remember the the really lovely feel I got every time I walked into the office.
Speaker 1:There was that that feeling still exist?
Speaker 2:Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's a different office.
Speaker 2:It's a different office, but but it's the same feeling, which is which is a very, yeah, it's a very collegiate people orientated culture here, a very healthy one, and, and a very unpolitical one, actually, very almost uniquely I think in my career it's a very healthy environment which I don't take any credit for. Barbara, it was all here when I arrived Although I suppose I should say at 7 years in, I should say. I haven't I hope I haven't managed to mess it up.
Speaker 1:Well, I mean, that takes a special skill to maintain that kind of Yeah. Yeah. Well done. So with WaterAid, can you give, give us a sense of what WaterAid's doing, what some of the key issues are? And I'd be especially interested in, once you've done that, talk a bit about what's happening, for example, in North America and other areas where there's a lot of pressure on whether, there should be work done on the environment and stuff.
Speaker 1:That could
Speaker 2:Yeah. Of course. I mean, the we say water rate. We say that there is a well there is a water crisis in the world, and I don't think it's an underestimation to call it a crisis. It is that it it is not an area that has lacked progress.
Speaker 2:It it it is an area that did quite well. I mean, if you if you look back over the last couple of decades, the numbers of people who've gained access to water is in the billions. So it's a good number of people. And, there remain ridiculously large numbers of people who don't have access to this absolute fundamental as so many of us take for granted. And and also not just at the household level in people's homes, but in, health care facilities.
Speaker 2:So for instance, one of the early trips I did actually when I came into this role was to visit Mali where we've worked for many years and to to go to a health care facility where women were traveling for hours to deliver babies. And, until the work water rate did to bring bring a supply of water to this this clinic, the medical practitioners were having they were 300 meters away from any running water. So the ability to wash your such a fundamental of public health to wash your hands in between, intimate examination of women is such a fundamental thing. So half the healthcare facilities in developing countries don't have these basics of running water, soap, good toilets. So there is a crisis in the world and things like, big changes in the world like the, constant movement of people towards cities, urbanization, that makes it that creates risk because you get these especially smaller smaller towns growing their populations very fast and that puts a tremendous strain on facilities that are already inadequate.
Speaker 2:But also climate change, which is typically affecting the human race through either too much water or too little. And areas, actually what we're seeing is this sort of like climate whiplash effect where areas of the world that used to be flood prone are becoming drought prone and areas that were previously drought prone are getting flooded. And these create huge challenges. So just to give a couple of specific examples, if your sanitation is not well managed and you get flooding then nobody can drink anything. And if you get drought and water has not been well regulated and the groundwater sources have been over extracted then you're in really big trouble.
Speaker 2:So yeah all over the world it's an area that's in summary it's an area that's made progress, but it's an area where the risks are actually getting higher, not lower. And you mentioned America, same is true in North America, same is true in Europe. We saw flooding in Spain, and everywhere where water rate is working across Africa, across Sub Saharan Sub Saharan Africa, across South Asia. These countries, every single place, we're seeing major impacts.
Speaker 1:So what what does WaterAid do? What do you do to address the issues that you just talked about, the drought, the excess flooding, etcetera, etcetera?
Speaker 2:Sure. So so the aim is is to work with the communities, and governments and local organizations, in a partnership to deliver resilient water, sanitation, hygiene, and the aim is to do it for everybody. And what we do is we will tend to work with a significant population and get to a point where, you know, we work to the if you've heard of the sustainable development goals, SDG, the SDGs, SDG 6 is all about water. So we aim to meet the standards that have been set globally by the UN in a in a geographic area and then encourage, replication, use it as a case study to show, governments, and the utilities in countries that they they can do this in other parts of the same country or indeed in other parts of the world. So we we aim we do things on the ground, in partnership with others, but the aim is not just to do that, but also to get a kind of amplified effect across a much larger part of the world because, you know, water aid, I mean, it's great that we're able to meet the needs of, you know, often into the millions in a in a year, but, there are billions of people that lack these issue lack access to these issues.
Speaker 2:Okay. But I think that's an amplifier effect.
Speaker 1:Can you give me a sense of, how the partnership would work? So some examples of of what you what you do.
Speaker 2:Of course. I mean so so recently, I I was in, I was in Nepal, visiting Lahan, an area called Lahan, which is it's it's down in the plain, actually. People think of Nepal being mountainous, which is true of about 2 thirds of the of the, of the country, but actually it was down in the plain, quite low altitude, very close to the border with India. In fact at one point we drove past the road that had a sign saying India on it. And a complex area, quite diverse area and we were particularly working focusing on the Dalit community.
Speaker 2:So Dalit are the lowest cast, highly discriminated against group, and working very closely with the water utility, so the the organization which covers, they they cover about a third of the pool in the public sector, part of the part of the government with the water ministry both nationally and locally, and critically with a local, not for profit organization who were run by the the Dalit people themselves, and by and a long term partnership. And this also included a relationship with Anglian Water in the UK who were originally founded by the water companies, and they were providing pro bono support, some of their technical people and so on. And so we were as well as as well as fundraising. So we were working together, and, and, basically, what what you're doing is is at a community level is looking at where's the where's the water supply, starting to think about where how is sanitation being delivered, is are there other other do people have access to toilets? And and also, hygiene, you know, encouraging hygiene activities, hygiene clubs, hygiene promotion, and so on.
Speaker 1:When you get there, then you're doing research about what's happening. Is that correct? And then what do you do then?
Speaker 2:Yeah. We tend to start with some kind of baseline survey, conversations with government about what's going on and also critically some sort of forward looking analysis of the changes that are likely to occur, both demographic changes so you're not, you know, you know, you're designing with the population of the future population in mind, but also the the kind of climate risks that might be, in place as well as any other more specific risks like in Nepal of course you have to have a little bit of a think about earthquakes and building. So you wanna make sure that the investments that are made in better water sanitation hygiene are gonna be resilient in whatever situation you're working in. And then an absolutely critical area is to make sure that these facilities are owned and maintained by the community. And that's a mixture of, having some kind of system of governance, if you like.
Speaker 2:You know, either the either the local government or or the community or a mixture are involved in making sure they're being looked after, it depends a little on whether it's very rural or very urban, but also having some income so having usually a very affordable fee charge for the water, some metering in place, you know, that encourages responsible use, and it generates, enough income that the, facilities can be maintained adequately.
Speaker 1:Okay. So I'm still not getting a sense of of how you manage to achieve this. You go into the community. You identify issues. But how how do you get to the point where you've created something that's owned by the community and is, functioning financially, etcetera.
Speaker 1:How do you get to to there? I mean, so people can understand what what the process is. Because you just don't go in and say, oh, here's here's some problems, and then here's some solutions. I assume you don't No. No.
Speaker 1:No.
Speaker 2:This this is what I'm just I'm summarizing for you something that usually takes several years to achieve. Okay.
Speaker 1:Fine.
Speaker 2:And and and we'll and we'll probably go in stages in some, of some form. And sometimes we we, will go through intermediary steps like if the level of provision is very low and you're wanting to make some rapid improvements, you might for instance provide single, access point for a whole community or a series of access points, which is less than what the SDGs say everyone should have, which is on the household level, but you might want to do that as an immediate step in order to take people away from, drawing water unsafely from a river or from a a well whether quality of the water is not good enough. So yes, it's, there'll be and and as you can tell from the way I'm describing this, these situations are very varied. They're very context dependent. And so, yeah, we we have a process.
Speaker 2:We have WaterAid has a team of people in each country in which we work. There are people from that country and they are the ones leading this process. And they they understand the local context. You know, we have different skills, water engineers, community engages, as well as, you know, finance people and so on like any other organization. And they will work together with the utility, with the local community, to put in place, a plan, and, yeah, get to the get to the point where we meet people whose lives are very positively improved by the provision of water sanitation and hygiene.
Speaker 1:So could you give me a sense of some of the impact that, WaterAid's having then?
Speaker 2:Well, as I said, in any one year, we'll often meet the needs directly of in different ways of around a 1000000 people. Yeah. But we are also, at the same time, seeking indirect impact, multiplier effects where, so that that can happen in different ways. So that that will happen through developing the capacity of the utility. I mean, if the utility gets better, so for instance, in Ethiopia, we had a great partnership with 20, towns, the utilities in 20 different towns.
Speaker 2:And the one that I met there, they're, they had gone through this amazing transformation in their capability as an organization. So they were they were much, much better there. They weren't losing water anymore. They had very low levels of wastage. They had much better, they got much more income into their organization that gave them the ability to double the number of people they were they were reaching.
Speaker 2:So they'd managed that in 5 years. Once you get to that stage, they're they're functioning very well, but then we were getting them to link up with other utilities in neighboring towns so that the other utilities started to learn how how to run themselves in a more effective way. So we're constantly mixing this very much on the ground impact, direct impact with very with, you know, you can meet people and you you can be very moved by the impact of water and sanitation and hygiene on their lives. That's kind of reminds us all of why we do what we do, but we also have this eye to scale and thinking how do we get this to benefit a much wider population? And then we'll also be working with governments, national governments at at a national level to make sure that the policy environment is a good one, the regulatory environment is a good one, And the the water ministry is making an effective case to the, treasury, to the finance ministry for the the right level of funding for for water in that country and in that context.
Speaker 1:So the countries you go into, they have to be relatively stable, or do you go into unstable areas as well?
Speaker 2:We're not a humanitarian organization. We work we we play the long game. We and and so we we are we're not the right organisation for really extreme we don't work in war zones. We're not, for instance, we're not currently working in the Middle East in some of the conflicts there. But we do so we tend to work in more stable environments but in the countries which tend to be amongst the poorest in the world where the largest number of people lack access to the basics of water sanitation hygiene.
Speaker 2:So that has us across many countries in Africa, but we're also present in countries like Bangladesh, India, Pakistan where that that they may be they may be economically more a bit more developed, but the numbers of people, the absolute numbers of people in those countries who, do not have access to water, sanitation, hygiene remain remain high.
Speaker 1:Okay. How are you funded?
Speaker 2:We're funded we're funded by many, many, individuals. Of the water Members of the public, support WaterAid, particularly, I'm sitting in the UK, in the in the UK where WaterAid was funded founded. So, so, you know, something north of 700,000 people in the UK support WaterAid and that's fantastic and many of them have supported WaterAid for a very long time. Then we also work with some companies, we also receive a certain amount of funding from governments, from trusts and foundations, and, there's a wider Water Aid Federation. So there's also Water Aid America for instance, and they're raising funds and support from from the US, some sources of money in the US, same in Canada, same in Sweden, so on.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, we have quite a diverse range of, supporters around the world.
Speaker 1:Well, do you, have, wealthy philanthropists, who as individuals who are involved as well?
Speaker 2:We we we do have some, perhaps less than we would like, actually. We've tended to be better in over in the past at attracting smaller donations from larger numbers of people, if you like. But yes we do have relationships with some really wonderful philanthropists, some of whom have worked with us for a long time, and we would love to meet more, and I think philanthropy has a very exciting role to play in the future in in tackling this global world water crisis.
Speaker 1:And, what about from the other end of the spectrum of capital from Impact Investing? Are are you seeing, Impact Investors, supporting, the work that you do, around water?
Speaker 2:Less so, but it's, an interesting problem that we it's in it's very helpful if there is a revenue stream from water. We do everywhere in the world, we see examples of where it can be useful, and we see the we see the poorest people currently paying far more for water than they should. Because where water is not piped to people's homes, then they're often having to resort to well, either unsafe collection of water, which is very poor for people's health, and and, you know, very dangerous thing to do, or they're having to buy it, from vendors, buy the bottle at vastly inflated prices. So we generally find that people are willing to pay for water and we think it's a great thing if there is an affordable fee for water access with some subsidisation for the very poorest, perhaps it's typically a connection charge that is sometimes a little bit costly. So if there is a if there is a mechanism that that could be provided for free to the very poorest members of any community then that's a really good way of running things.
Speaker 2:So you would think that that then should be, could relate to investments that are in, ones that then generate a return.
Speaker 1:I don't know. I mean, is there much going on at all that you are aware of? Or is it just something that's a possibility, but not
Speaker 2:I think it's a possibility, and it's also a possibility at the larger scale where maybe you're moving beyond impact investment into commercial investment or or a role for, investment for a, a concessional concessional loans such as those either offered by impact investors, philanthropists, or or by organizations like the World Bank or multilateral development banks and so on. So yes. But at the moment, at the moment, it's relatively underdeveloped and the water sector generally is hugely under invested in compared to the level of of need. So and and and then the amounts of money that are needed are very large. We've had globally respected think tanks estimate this for us and in order to meet the aspirations of the SDGs on water, just on water in low income countries, they're talking about sums in the region of €250,000,000,000 a year if you look across the world.
Speaker 2:So probably actually when you're starting to talk at various levels you need to try to get a mixture of private and large scale blended finance investments being made which I associate with being larger actually than the Impact Investing World. And so I wonder whether the philanthropy is perhaps better directed at grant making in a in a way that enables some of those larger investments.
Speaker 1:Does does water rate have I mean, there are some international NGOs that have set up social investment funds, which are blended finance. Does water rate have something similar to that, or are you thinking of that?
Speaker 2:We do have something in it's not quite the same as what you've described because I think what you've described are are things that manage money. But we have we have started something called the resilient water accelerator, which is designed to it's more of a catalytic organisation that is trying to create the conditions for much larger investments to occur. But it's aimed as I said at bigger investments, so investments that could be in the 100 of 1,000,000 of dollars
Speaker 1:per Some of the people listening to this will be wealthy, but also will be, yep, wealth managers and stuff. I think it'd be really good for them to hear, what this fund is all about and what's happening. So if you can you just spend we're we're just out of time, but can you spend a minute just describing how it works and then how people might get involved?
Speaker 2:So the so this is a so because water WaterAid generally has a has a commitment, in its strategy to do do work on the ground, engage in climate and in health, but also to try to generate more money for the water sector. So this final thing that I'm talking about is very much in that 4th area and what it does is it's working on the ground in locations and engaging with the basically trying to take things that are currently very clearly there's a need for water investment, but it hasn't been properly studied and and a and a mechanism, a model for something that is investable has not been developed. And the idea is that by bringing together different technical experts and financial experts, we take it to a point where potential investors are ready to kind of move in and then we will and then we will disengage because I think we that is the gap. It's the gap between an idea, we need a wastewater treatment plant, we need the wastewater handling in this location through to how you would do it and how the investment model would weigh. That's the gap that's currently not being filled in which the Resilient Water Accelerator aims to, get.
Speaker 1:That's really helpful. Thank you. I just have maybe 1 or 2 more questions if that's okay. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:One is that there's a, an anti, environmental movement, anti sustainable kinds of things, whether it's in, investing or, in government policy or a whole range of other things. Is that movement, hindering you? Is it causing you issues? Is it is it a concern? I
Speaker 2:I'm I don't necessarily, think it is actually because, in my experience, I don't know anyone who doesn't think getting water to a a family is something that you could argue with.
Speaker 1:I just don't know
Speaker 2:everybody. And so I think, one of the advantages the water sector has is it's somewhat immune to to changes in politic political changes, because everybody understands that, and everyone understands how important that is. Yeah. So so no. I I don't think so.
Speaker 2:And and indeed, if you look around the world, you see left wing organizations prioritizing water. You see right wing organizations prioritizing water. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, that's that's good to hear. Okay. My last question is, is there a question I should have asked you that I haven't asked?
Speaker 2:I think the only thing maybe that, we haven't covered so much is is the the importance of getting water. We've talked quite a lot about what we need to do at a very practical level on the ground, but it's also really important to get political support. And I I have talked about the need to get financial support behind water. And, I think globally, the world's beginning to wake up to this. And we're recording this podcast in a few days' time.
Speaker 2:I'm off to Davos in a couple of days' time, and I don't know if you've yet looked at the every year, the the World Economic Forum do a list of the world's biggest risks. And, every year, they either say water there's always there's always water in there or it says something that is basically about water. So this time, it's even more focused on issues which are like the high impact of extreme weather events. Well, basically, that's about water. So, so I think the world is beginning to wake up to the need to do much more to safeguard the human race from ever more extreme, the slow onset of more and more and more extreme weather events that are putting communities at risk all over the world.
Speaker 2:And the communities, the countries where Water Aid is working in the poorest parts of the world are seeing some of the most extreme changes happening already and I think it's incredibly important we do something about this work together. So I just add that about the I hope that we can all encourage decision makers around the world to pay more attention to this issue.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you for, posing the question and answering at the same time. That was really cool. Thank you. Thank you for this. Really intriguing what you're doing, and I wish you luck at Davos in a in when you go.
Speaker 2:Anyway Yes. I'll be jumping on a train there shortly. And thank you very much indeed, for giving the time to to to read into this issue.
