When water pumps are installed by various nonprofit development groups (including the United Nations), they tend to break within about a decade. According to Ned Breslin, CEO of the group Water For People, a substantial percentage, roughly 30 to 45 percent, of water pumps break within a decade. That’s why Water For People has created a smartphone app, called Flow, that lets people in the developing world snap pictures of water pumps that are broken, and hopefully connect with experts around the world who can fix these pumps.
Here is how the app works: Using Android cell phone technology and Google Earth software, FLOW provides anyone with crucial data for projects supported by Water For People. Community members, industry professionals, and volunteers gather data with an Android phone. At the touch of a button, data flows to the Internet and updates the status of a water point or sanitation solution on Google Maps and Google Earth.
The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) call for a reduction of the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water by half between 1990 and 2015. Call your congressional leaders to cosponsor the Water for the World Act if they haven’t already! Take action and make universal access to safe drinking water possible!
-Clare O.
SOURCE: CNN
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