Thailand

The national government has done an incredible job at providing centralized care in Bangkok for some of the nation’s most vulnerable children. With this well-established network in place, we started out our first year in Thailand by working in some of the largest orphanages and centers for disabled children in the country. Not surprisingly, we quickly found that there were other, better equipped, and locally appropriate organizations who could do the work we do just as well– if not better. Surprisingly, we found them in the for-profit sector.

What did we do?

Thailand’s commercial market and distribution channels for water filtration are quite advanced. Yet poverty facing the urban poor continues to be endemic and deeply entrenched. As such, Splash partnered with a Thai-born publicly-traded filtration company (the same company that installs and maintains a significant share of multi-national food and hotel chains throughout Thailand) to design their CSR platform for the long term. We co-financed projects and worked directly with this corporation to plot out how they could best leverage their own core strengths to support the poorest communities within their existing business zones– effectively outpacing our speed and outperforming our abilities and paying for that work through their own revenue streams.

What did we learn?

The economy in Thailand was strong enough that the government can solve WASH issues at scale, and our presence could potentially have gotten in the way of local solutions.

Impact

Learn more about Splash's impact here.