Vietnam drinking water sources

If you had been to ask an American company owner just what solitary thing was many essential to their workforce’s well being, the answer may be the electrical energy to power their gear or cars for their workers’ drive. But in numerous rural, establishing countries, the solution can be significantly more standard: clean normal water.

That’s what Timberland’s Supplier Sustainability Team (SST) discovered during an assessment of factories around Hanoi, Vietnam. Because Timberland is devoted to going beyond compliance about engagement with industrial facilities and employees which produce our items, our analysis includes identifying whether workers have a sustainable lifestyle environment (SLE). “We have actually conversations formally and informally with employees to know what facets of basic living requirements they might be suffering, ” states Colleen Von Haden, Timberland’s senior manager for provider durability and compliance.

According to reports through the World Health Organization and UNICEF, yearly 3.6 million people perish of water-related diseases—and 55percent of those who don’t have enhanced drinking tap water live-in Asia. Access to cleanse drinking tap water is among the fundamental requirements we work to guarantee all employees within our offer chain have actually. Evaluating whether or not workers’ fundamental needs tend to be met is a routine section of our SLE assessments. Although clean drinking tap water appeared as the #1 concern among employees within Stella Group’s Golden Star production facilities in Hai Phong City, Vietnam (a port town situated about 60 kilometers east of Hanoi), the water within the factory it self had been clean. “That’s as soon as we began examining water supply in the community, ” states Von Haden. Town is far from highways and government-supplied liquid source at factory. Their current address, workers and neighborhood people count on groundwater and rainwater for drinking and domestic usage, with little (if any) filtration.

Whenever Timberland learns that access to clean normal water is a problem in employees’ communities, we rely on our cooperation with Planet Water Foundation to help meet up with the need. Earth Water Foundation is a U.S.-based, nonprofit organization that strives to create clean water towards the world’s most disadvantaged communities through installation of water filtration and education on how best to utilize them. (Timberland had formerly partnered with earth liquid Foundation therefore the Farida Group to set up a drinking water tower in Ambur, Asia last year).