Cummins Inc. (NYSE: CMI) announced a new global community program called Cummins Water Works, which addresses the global water crisis by partnering with leading water experts and investing and engaging in sustainable, large-scale, high-impact water projects around the world. This new community program is supported initially by $8 million in Cummins grants focusing on five of the most water-stressed countries: Mexico, Brazil, India, South Africa and the U.S. By 2025, Cummins Water Works will bring fresh water to 20 million people who would not otherwise have access to it, while striving to produce net water benefits that exceed Cummins’ annual water use in all Cummins regions by 2030, and in all Cummins communities by 2050.
“The water crisis affects so many issues that are important to us in our communities, including health, education, gender equity, and economic opportunity,” explained Mary Chandler, Vice President of Corporate Responsibility and Community Relations at Cummins. “We are working to address climate change across all aspects of the company – improving our operations, developing new products and working closely with our customers and suppliers. In our communities, we are working to address one of the primary effects of climate change, namely water stress, through Cummins Water Works.”
Joining the Water Resilience Coalition connects Cummins with water-related non-profit organizations and more than a dozen major global companies focused collectively on analyzing, prioritizing, implementing, and managing high-impact water projects in major water-stressed regions around the world.
Cummins Water Works is a critical piece of the company’s ongoing commitments to sustainability and addressing climate change. For decades, Cummins employees around the world have worked on water solutions in their communities like the Monsoon Resilient Maharashtra project in India to help local communities devise ways to be less vulnerable to and less reliant on monsoons for their water and agricultural needs. To date, Cummins water projects have generated more than four billion gallons in annual water benefits to communities around the word. And, through PLANET 2050, Cummins’ environmental sustainability strategy, the company has reduced its own direct water usage by almost 30% and 16 of its sites globally have been validated as water neutral. Focusing on water sustainability through Cummins Water Works presents an important opportunity to make an additional positive environmental impact in communities.
