1001 Fontaines

1001 Fontaines : a story told by Water Ribbon, an initiative towards Water World Forum

Laurence Saquer

on the Tuesday, 17 April, 2012 - 09:14

Water Ribbon is an initiative that aims at collecting stories, testimonies, messages, dreams for water from all over the world.

Last week, 1001 Fontaines was the story told by one of the contributors of the blog.

Francois is someone that reminds us each time that he is invited to a conference, that we contract 80% of our own diseases through water. With Chay Lo, he created an association in Cambodia to allot two lieters of purified water per day, per capita to isolated rural areas. The action taken by 1001 Fountains is often discussed notably at conferences around the world about the processing of water. The solution of 1001 Fountains is a good investment, and much cheaper in expense, but results in different way to connect with the isolated zones on water.

To provide drinking water for a village, it costs around 15,000 euros. 70% of this is also for the machines and materials… There are 2,000 processing units and cylinders needed for each family. We reach 3,000 to 4,000 people with such a facility and when it is thought about, it’s not that exspensive to provide drinking water in a safe manner and improving the health of the people… In an orphanage for example, we went from 13 to 15 cases of typhoid fever per year, to an astounding 0 cases.[...]

To read full article, please, go to Water Ribbon.

Scale-up and social business : a roundtable with Lo Chai at Accenture

Laurence Saquer

on the Wednesday, 7 December, 2011 - 10:29

Mid-November, Lo Chai, the entrepreneur of  1001 Fontaines, was in France. On this occasion, a roundtable was organized by Accenture and danone.communities, about : "From a local solution to a global impact: how to change the scale of a model of social entrepreneurship? ".

The round table brought together several persons involved in using their specialty for social business:
• Anne-Claire Pache, Professor Chair in Philanthropy at ESSEC
• Emmanuel Faber, Vice President of Danone
• Christian NIBOUREL, CEO of Accenture France
• Martin Hirsch, President of the Agence du Service civique

To read an account of this meeting, please visit the online press clipping.

Here are two studies, conducted mainly by Anne-Claire Pache about the change of scale. Although a bit dated (2006 and 2007), these studies give a synthetic view of this issue, in particular the essential step that is the change of scale, different from replication.

(via Google Translate)

« Srei Saat » women, ambassadors of 1001 Fontaines

Aurélie Bureth

on the Thursday, 1 December, 2011 - 14:26

In Cambodia, it is mainly the responsibility of women to prevent health risks related to water and sanitation, very often despite unfavorable conditions and low resources.  The prevention of risks through water and hygiene depends directly on the level of education of the woman. While, in rural areas of Cambodia, illiteracy and gender inequality are still predominant (in 2005, national statistics revealed that only 7,5% of mothers had finished primary school and 53,6% of girls were literate).

The groups of women “Srei Saat” have been settled in villages where 1001 Fontaines works. The objective is to create a favorable space to facilitate exchanges and access to information.  It also aims to develop women self-confidence thanks to the group synergy.

 These groups have been based on the double meaning of the word saat , that can express in Khmer, both beauty and cleanliness, depending on the context. Thus « Srei Saat » can have the meaning of a «clean women» or a « beautiful women ».