Somewhere, a world exists where more people have access to smartphones than toilets. Oh, wait. That's us.

Today marks the 20th annual World Water Day, observed on March 22 since 1993 when the United Nations General Assembly declared a global effort to improve access to clean water. Today, hundreds of multinational brands, political figures, celebrities and NGO's are offering up innovative ways to participate. 

While Americans are drinking more water than ever before, the rest of the world's water crisis is becoming increasingly pressing, making it to the agenda of the 2012 World Economic Forum in Davos. That's when a report ranked water among the top five global factors equal in impact to systemic financial failure and fiscal imbalance, with 2.7 billion people affected by water shortages, compounded by climate change and a global population nearing 8 billion.

Two official meetings—in The Hague, The Netherlands and at the U.N. Headquarters in New York City—are taking place today to facilitate a global conversation on water cooperation, this year's theme, but hundreds of initiatives have launched across the globe in support of the effort.

In keeping with the theme of 2013 being the year of water cooperations, we've found some inspiring examples of the type of public-private partnerships spurring sustainable innovation to address the world's water crisis.Continue reading...

Earlier this year, Procter & Gamble moved the global headquarters of its beauty and baby-care business and the Pampers brand to Singapore from corporate headquarters in Cincinnati. Now, the CPG giant wants to make Singapore its worldwide capital for manufacturing of water-purification products.

In fact, P&G has just announced a lofty goal for the Purifier of Water plant that it is scaling up in Singapore: to cleanse enough drinking water to "save one life every hour by 2020" somewhere on the planet. The powder is a mini water purification plant in a packet. The small packets, when stirred into water, causes heavy metals, dirt and parasites to bind together then fall to the bottom of the container. Strained through a filter cloth and after 20 minutes, the water is drinkable.

P&G has been distributing these packets in more than 65 countries since 2004, attacking the global scarcity of potable water and raising awareness about the problem. Now it's increasing its investment in this commitment with its Singapore plant opening. "We've taken [P&G] innovation power and focused on one of our world's biggest challenges, clean drinking water, a lack of which takes the lives of thousands of children every day," stated P&G CEO Bob McDonald.Continue reading...

Heifer International is entering the digital age. Just in time for the holidays, the nonprofit organization that lets you give the gift of a goat, chickens or other livestock to help provide a source of income and related agricultural training for those in poverty and hunger, has released its first ever table app.

The free app, for iPads and Android-powered tablets, will allow users to engage with the stories, images and videos from around the world as featured in its World Ark magazine — making it the first NGO to create a digital publication.

"World Ark serves as a window into our work here at Heifer International and this interactive tablet edition will bring our supporters along with us to the field to see how their support changes lives every day," stated Heifer International President and CEO Pierre Ferrari.

“Myanmar is one of only three countries on the globe where Coca-Cola does not do business. The other two are Cuba and North Korea,” Coca-Cola stated this week. That's about to change.

The global beverage giant has not done business in Myanmar, a.k.a., Burma, for more than 60 years, but The Coca-Cola Foundation just announced plans to grant $3 million to support women's economic empowerment job creation — a show of goodwill and social and economic investment as a precursor to beginning business in the market as soon as the U.S. government gives sanction.Continue reading...

(Editor's note: The following has been updated with comment from Ikea.)

About 80 percent of furniture maker Ikea’s revenue comes from its stores in Europe — not the idea place you want to depend on your cash flow these days as the continent’s collective economy struggles to stay above water.

So Ikea is keeping itself busy expanding into – where else? – Asia, where it made $31.4 billion in its last fiscal year, which ended Aug. 31. Ikea had been opening one store a year in China but has now upgraded that to three, according to Bloomberg. And it is waiting to see what happens with legislation in India in hopes of entering that country’s retail space as well.

“Cautiously we are adding new markets,” Ikea CEO Mikael Ohlsson told Bloomberg. “We have big interest in opening in India. When the conditions are ripe in India we can start to prepare for an opening there.”Continue reading...

It's always encouraging to see a legacy brand reinvent itself, especially one that offers assistance to the world's people.

That's what CARE is doing with a newly launched website that features a new kind of "CARE Package," a phrase that became associated with the nonprofit organization when it was founded in 1946.

CARE, which stands for the Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere, was originally comprised of 22 American organizations coming together to send CARE Packages consisting primarily of food to World War II survivors.

In the next twenty years, CARE sent some 100 million CARE Packages to people in need in Europe and later in Asia and other parts of the world.

The phrase "care package" has become so popular that it's widely used for any assortment of items being sent to a student, loved one, friend or other individual — but it has also lost its association with its origins.Continue reading...