The actor and the engineer discuss solutions to the water crisis.

Access to clean water is a major issue across the globe. According to a 2020 report from the World Health Organization and UNICEF, 771 million people lack access to safe drinking water. 

This issue has also brought together two unlikely partners, engineer Gary White and actor Matt Damon, in the creation of the nonprofit water.org. Their goal is to help bring an end to this global need in their lifetimes. 

For this episode of the Crosscut Talks podcast, White and Damon describe what drew them to this work while laying out the problem as they understand it. 

In this conversation with Dr. Leah Stokes from the 2022 Crosscut Festival, they also detail how their efforts to facilitate the financing of solutions has made clean water available to more than 40 million people and tell the story of how their work has impacted those who previously spent hours each day securing clean water.

---

Credits

Host: Mark Baumgarten

Producer: Sara Bernard

Event producers: Jake Newman, Andrea O'Meara

Engineers: Resti Bagcal, Viktoria Ralph