Access & supply
Community-scale supply, storage, and last-mile delivery.
Focus — Natural Resources & Regenerative Systems — Water
WATER
IDEAS WE SUPPORT.
World Seed Fund supports people whose ideas improve water systems for the households who fetch, pay for, and manage water.
Why this area
WATER
IN CONTEXT.
Water determines health, food, schooling, work, and safety. Progress here rarely depends on a single device — it depends on hydrology, cost, maintenance, trust, and the institution that keeps a system working after it is installed.
Scope of the area
WHAT THIS AREA
INCLUDES.
Illustrations of scope, not a fixed list. If your idea belongs here but is not described below, introduce it anyway.
Quality & treatment
Affordable treatment and contamination detection people can operate.
Catchment stewardship
Watershed restoration, groundwater management, and shared governance.
Monitoring & repair
Measurement and maintenance that let a community see its system honestly.
Criteria to qualify
WHAT A WATER
IDEA MUST SHOW.
All five criteria apply. An idea does not need to be complete or proven — it needs to be specific enough that we can judge it, and grounded enough that a next step is possible.
A defined problem, in a defined place
We need to understand exactly who is affected, where, and how they cope today. General statements about a global challenge are not enough to qualify.
- Names the place, community, or system where water systems fall short.
- States the situation today in plain terms — water quality, uptime, distance walked, or cost per litre.
- Explains what the households who fetch, pay for, and manage water do now, and what it costs them.
Human insight behind the idea
The idea should come from knowledge of the situation — technical, scientific, operational, cultural, or lived — rather than from an assumption about it.
- Draws on direct knowledge of water systems in that place.
- Accounts for why earlier boreholes, filters, and schemes did not hold here.
- Was shaped with the households who fetch, pay for, and manage water, not only for them.
A credible next step
There must be a specific thing that can be attempted next, at a scale that can be observed honestly, with a stated way of judging whether it worked.
- A defined pilot with a stated size — households served, litres per day, or hectares irrigated.
- A stated measure of success — water quality, uptime, distance walked, or cost per litre.
- A timeframe within which the result can be judged honestly.
Value for people and place
The benefit should be meaningful to the community or system the idea serves, and describable in terms they would recognise.
- Improves time, cost, and illness for the households who fetch, pay for, and manage water.
- The benefit is described in words the community itself would use.
- Does not shift cost, risk, or harm onto neighbouring people or systems.
A path to keep working
Ideas qualify when someone can plausibly own, operate, fund, and repair the result after the first phase of support ends.
- A named utility, water committee, or cooperative able to carry the work after the first phase.
- Running costs, materials, and skills obtainable near the work.
- Ownership, permission, or agreement that lets the work continue.
Evidence & boundaries
WHAT HELPS,
AND WHAT DOES NOT.
Evidence can be modest. A careful account of a small trial is worth more than a projection.
Evidence we look for
- Any observation, record, or measurement of water systems in that place.
- Costs, materials, or time recorded from a small trial, however modest.
- Notes, letters, or agreements from the households who fetch, pay for, and manage water or the utility, water committee, or cooperative.
Usually outside this area
- Broad proposals about water with no named place and no named people.
- Equipment or funding requests with no operator and no running cost.
- Work that transfers cost, risk, or harm to neighbouring people or systems.
Submit an idea
INTRODUCE YOUR
WATER IDEA.
There is no application window and no required format. Answer these four questions in your own words and we will read them.
Who is affected, where, and how do they manage today?
What do you know about water systems that others working on it may not?
What could you attempt next, and how would you judge whether it worked?
Who continues the work afterwards, and what keeps it running?
Human potential is everywhere. Opportunity should be too.