Drops that leave ripples: Surge of the grassroots NGO

Solutions
Increasing public trust in charitable organizations is no easy task. Emphasising bottom-up programs and effectively carrying out projects has been proven to be one way to do it.

Research shows that while trust in big charities has decreased, small-scale organisations are still enjoying high levels of trust from the public. It's likely that the reason for this is that smaller charities need to test their ideas in order to get funds while big NGOs already have the resources to set up their programs and bypass the testing phase.

Fortunately, there's an organisation that recognizes the importance of smaller initiatives, Evidence Action.

Building on years of experience, Evidence Action strives to find the best solution for any specific issue. One example is the program "Dispensers for safe water," which distributes chlorination tablets at pre-designated water points in local communities. By the time someone walks back home from the water collection point, the water is disinfected.

Innovations for Poverty Action

Evidence Action gathers data on safe water usage through open data kit smartphones to ensure the community is consistently using the tablets each month. They started the "Dispensers for safe water" program first in Kenya and expanded to Malawi and Uganda. Each region is analysed before moving to the next one. As a result, over 4 million people now have access to safe water.

Evidence Action

As a bonus, the chlorine-tech water dispensers have an "ingenious revenue mechanism"— carbon credits. In international environmental law, developing countries are "paid" per carbon emission averted. In this case, communities no longer need to boil the water for sterilisation, which often uses carbon-dense wood. Evidence Action then reinvests this revenue back into the program.

The success of Evidence Action with small-scale organisations shows that it's not about the size of the organisation, but the effectiveness of a targeted project. Our hope is that the regaining of trust allows these charitable organisations to scale up even more.

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