‘Access to safe water’: PepsiCo extends partnership with WaterAid to enable programme

ISLAMABAD: PepsiCo Foundation has extended its partnership with WaterAid to enable its ‘access to safe water’ programme for rural communities here on Thursday.

According to an announcement of the company on Thursday, the partnership was announced during a programme launch ceremony held at the Government Girls Elementary School Mirzapur in the Depalpur Tehsil of District Okara. The announcement was made by PepsiCo Senior Director Commercial and Corporate Affairs Mohammad Khosa in the presence of the WaterAid team, local government officials and members of the local community.

The programme will enable safe water access for more than 24,000 people (including 2,400 school children), through the construction of seven community managed water filtration schemes. In addition to the water filtration plants, hygienic toilets and hand washing facilities will be developed in four schools. Community members will be trained on WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) related behaviours and practices.

Senior Director Commercial and Corporate Affairs, PepsiCo Pakistan, Mohammad Khosa, commented that “we strongly believe in creating smiles for everyone; especially for the communities we work with. The rural extension of our safe water programme will focus on provision of safe water to underserved communities in the potato growing belt of Pakistan so that potato growers, field workers and the entire communities that they are a part of can benefit from this facility. I thank the PepsiCo Foundation and WaterAid for their partnership on this programme,” he added.

Through partnerships funded by The PepsiCo Foundation, the company’s philanthropic arm, PepsiCo since 2006 has helped more than 55 million people gain access to safe water through distribution, purification, and conservation programmes, far surpassing the company’s original target to help 25 million people by 2025. In Pakistan, PepsiCo has enabled safe water for over 200,000 people in the urban underserved areas of Karachi, Islamabad and Lahore.

PepsiCo Pakistan’s safe water programme is part of its PepsiCo Positive mission which is focused on charting a new course to drive positive action for the planet and people. Under the PepsiCo Positive agenda, PepsiCo strives to create growth and shared value with sustainability and human capital at the centre. WaterAid Country Director Arif Jabbar Khan said that “through our long-standing partnership with PepsiCo, we are bringing positive changes in the lives of millions of people. The rural extension programme in Pakistan opens our support for several communities in need.” Khan also said that WaterAid has that WaterAid designs programmes that are comprehensive, sustainable and localized to community needs.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022