By Kareem Sheta
When one hears the word “Nestle”, his memory often directs the brain to a picture of a label wrapper around an engraved plastic water bottle with a miniature depiction of 3 people raising their hands in the sky. Funnily enough, if you examine the picture below from a recent Nestle event, you will notice its resemblance with the 3 figures to a certain extent. Which means what? That the logo is not just a design of a happy family scribbled on the front of a sticker, but a symbol of a way of life that the brand seeks to provide for its customers by “Enhancing the quality of life and contributing to a healthier future”.
Bearing their core purpose in mind, Nestle Middle East celebrated the UN’s “World Water Day” this year.
“Water is a precious resource that is shared among individuals, farmers, industry, the environment, and others,” said Rime Raya, Nutrition, Health and Wellness Manager at Nestlé Waters. “Raising awareness about the importance of water amongst the local communities in which we operate on World Water Day is one of the ways we bring our commitment to water stewardship to life,” she added.
Thanks to the incredible labors of Nestle Waters and its global NGO partner, Project Water Education for Teacher (WET), over 70,000 children have been educated across the region, including Bahrain, Jordan, Lebanon, and the United Arab Emirates, about the importance of water to “promote healthy hydration as part of a healthy lifestyle” and to “further implement their healthy hydration awareness programs for teachers and kids providing a better understanding of the benefits of water as key to healthy hydration.”
Several concrete steps have been taken to execute solutions for the water crises in the Middle East. Firstly, a collaboration was made with the Ministry of Water and Irrigation in Jordan to construct a well in the village of Hussainiya, using state of the art technology, to supply 20,000 people in the area with clean drinking water. Secondly, via a partnership between the Shouf Biosphere Reserve and Nestlé Waters, an extensive study was conducted in Lebanon’s Shouf Mountains, one of the most abundant freshwater-generating areas in the Middle East. The results highlighted the need to “minimize groundwater depletion caused by seasonal shifts in surface water flows in the region’s rivers and springs”. A wide-ranging committee was formed to steer the action plan to ensure integrated management of resources in the water basin.
