On March 22, the world will acknowledge World Water Day to celebrate the importance of fresh water and advocate for the sustainable management of freshwater resources. Established in 1993 by the United Nations General Assembly, World Water Day is a reminder of the critical value of water to life, and a collective call-to-action to address the increased pressure that is threatening what is considered our most precious resource.
In the days leading up to World Water Day, The Coca-Cola Company, in partnership with World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and Global Water Challenge, launched the #ToastToWater social media campaign. The campaign asks people to publicly thank water for all it does while also educating site visitors about water challenges being faced around the world.
#ToastToWater encourages people to take a photo or video toasting water with their favorite beverage and then upload it to Facebook, Twitter, Vine or Instagram and tag it with #ToasttoWater. Starting on March 17, a selection of photos was posted to the campaign’s website, which also offers information about global water challenges.
Today, approximately 783 million people lack access to safe drinking water and more than 2.5 billion don’t have adequate sanitation, making billions of people vulnerable to disease and food insecurity. By bringing attention to this alarming and disheartening situation, the partners aim to drive positive change to consumer behaviors toward water — encouraging people to conserve and make a difference.
Contributing to that change, Coca-Cola set a 2020 goal to “give back” an amount of water used in its beverages and their production. To meet this goal, the Company is working to improve its water-use efficiency and treating all wastewater in its manufacturing operations. Coca-Cola also is replenishing the water in its finished beverages back to communities and nature through the support of healthy watersheds and community water programs.
Read more about Coca-Cola’s water stewardship efforts, including The Coca-Cola Africa Foundation’s Replenish Africa Initiative (RAIN). Learn how Coca-Cola and WWF are working together to tackle the natural resource challenges impacting fresh water, and how we’re helping accelerate the delivery of safe water and sanitation as a member of Global Water Challenge.
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Published Mar 18, 2014 2pm EDT / 11am PDT / 6pm GMT / 7pm CET