Howden Foundation supports Sand Dams Worldwide to transform lives in Malawi

Sand Dams Worldwide is pleased to announce a new partnership with the Howden Foundation. The Foundation have pledged over £270,000 towards our sand dam programme in Malawi, working with rural farming communities vulnerable to extreme heat and drought to help improve their food and water security.

Malawi is among the world’s poorest countries, with an economy heavily reliant on agriculture. Most farmers depend on cultivating small plots by hand with little irrigation, leaving them vulnerable to droughts, floods, and other climate shocks.

In March 2024, Lazarus Chakwera, the President of Malawi, declared a State of Disaster in response to the extreme heatwave and drought affecting the region – marking the fourth consecutive year that Malawi has had to declare a State of Disaster due to a climate event.

Baseline surveys from our pilot programme in Malawi help demonstrate the extent of the problem. Average water use was just 27.5 litres per person/day (the World Health Organisation recommends 50 litre per person/day), and only 5% could grow enough food to last more than 9 months.

Sand dams also raise groundwater levels, enabling vegetation to recover, reducing soil erosion and in turn improving conditions for farming so that farmers can grow more food to feed their families. Funding from the Howden Foundation will play a critical role in helping to scale up our sand dam programme in Malawi.

This comes after our successful pilot programme which was completed last year and resulted in three sand dams being constructed – the first known sand dams in Malawi.

Over the next two years, four new communities will be supported to construct a sand dam, ensuring a year-round supply of clean, safe drinking water.

Each community will also be supported to implement conservation agriculture and a range of environmental protection techniques so that they can produce more food on their farms whilst protecting and restoring the surrounding environment.

Funding from the Howden Foundation will also go towards the cost of training our local partner CARD so that they can be certified in sand dam siting, design and construction themselves – a critical step in supporting the scaling up of sand dams in Malawi and upskilling local organisations on the ground.

About the Howden Foundation

Founded in 2014, the Howden Foundation is a charity registered in England and Wales (Charity Number 1156286), and is the corporate foundation of Howden, extending the charitable work of the business and its people across the world.

Howden Foundation has a vision of a world where everyone is resilient to the impacts of climate change. It funds projects which equip those most exposed to climate change, especially extreme heat and drought, with the tools to prepare, adapt and recover. To learn more about the Howden Foundation please click here.

About SDW and sand dams
Sand Dams Worldwide is a UK-based not-for-profit organisation which works with in-country partners to support rural dryland communities to build sand dams, providing themselves with a local supply of clean water.

Since its inception in 2002 Sand Dams Worldwide has enabled over 1,390 sand dams to be built in ten countries across Africa and India, enabling over 1.2 million people to gain access to clean water for life.  

Sand dams can store up to 40 million litres of water which is enough to provide a year-round supply for over 1,000 people. Each sand dam costs between £25k and £50k (depending on its size and where it is being built), and can last for upwards of 60 years (the oldest known in operation is 100 years old); along with the virtually zero operation and maintenance costs, it makes them a remarkably cost-effective, long-term sustainable solution to water scarcity.

For more information about how sand dams work, watch the short animation (above) or please click here.