![\"A](\"\/uploads\/images\/December_2013\/BUS_Water4_Dec13.jpg\" "\\"A")
Everything starts with water.
\nThat\u2019s the conclusion Water4 co-founder, Richard Greenly, arrived at during a
\n2005 business trip to China. In an outlying, underserved, impoverished
\ncommunity in one of the largest nations on earth, he watched as villagers
\nstruggled with poor health, lackluster farming and no education. All for want
\nof clean water.<\/p>\n
Solving the villagers\u2019 water
\nproblem became his personal quest, and he and his wife founded Water4 in 2008.
\nSince it\u2019s inception, Water4 has worked in over a dozen countries across the
\nglobe, changing the lives of a quarter of a million people. It\u2019s a good start,
\nbut there\u2019s a lot more work to do while 780 million people around the world
\nlive day to day without access to clean, drinkable water. But Greenly is
\nundaunted. \u201cWe\u2019ve proven it works. We\u2019ve seen it change lives. We\u2019re ready to
\nfix this problem anywhere and everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not so much that the water
\nisn\u2019t there. It\u2019s right under the ground. But getting it out requires an unconventional,
\nlow-maintenance, inexpensive and durable solution that can function in areas
\nwith little to no infrastructure.<\/p>\n
Greenly, a geologist and
\nco-owner of an Oklahoma City pump distributer, PumpsOK, turned to his lifelong
\nfriend, Steve Stewart, after founding Water4, and together they worked to
\ncreate a system unlike anything else they had come across in their research.<\/p>\n
They took a hard look at the
\nworldwide water crisis\u2014what aid efforts worked and what didn\u2019t. After creating
\na unique hand pump and a highly effective manual drilling system, Greenly and
\nStewart decided that simply drilling water wells for people in need wasn\u2019t the
\nsolution. They decided the key to the problem was to put the locals in business
\ndrilling and maintaining their own water wells. Water4 trains and equips
\nmembers of rural communities to drill and manage wells in addition to repairing
\nand fabricating their own drilling tools.<\/p>\n
The Water4 method doesn\u2019t just
\nprovide access to clean water, it creates a truly sustainable solution by empowering
\nthe locals to provide for their own water needs. By allowing the local men and
\nwomen an opportunity to drill wells as a livelihood, it stimulates the local
\neconomy as well as improves the overall condition of the region.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt all starts with water \u2014
\nfood, health, agriculture, education, the economy. And once the equipment is in
\nplace, the only other necessary element is personnel,\u201d says Greenly. Drilling
\nis now a vocation in many of the places we\u2019ve served. They\u2019re getting the
\nwater. And everything else slowly follows.\u201d<\/p>\n