K-water ESG : Water, Nature and Humankind

K-water ESG
K-water’s social
contribution activities
K-water tries to deliver happiness through water through a wide range of its social contribution activities.
K-water enhances water security for citizens and creates social jobs through the ‘Water for Your Happiness’
project, while also creating social value through win-win growth with local communities.
Written by Choi Haeng-jwa Source K-water

Social contribution activities geared to serving local communities

Recently, regional areas away from Seoul and the wider capital area are experiencing a sharp decline in their population due to the country’s aging population and concentration of people and resources in the metropolitan capital area. As a result, some local communities are at the brink of fading out of existence. Many cities and counties facing such a risk are located in areas where K-water runs multipurpose dams and water supply systems. To help deal with problems confronting these local communities, K-water’s activities to create social value(CSV) are implemented to realize two goals of creating income and jobs for local residents and eliminating welfare blind spots. K-water seeks win-win growth with local communities, and works to create social value that contributes to developing local communities. In doing so, K-water performs its social contribution role, and builds a CSV system that generates economic benefits and resolve local issues.
K-water’s special projects executed under the vision of ‘K-water that grows with local communities’, include △forming and running voluntary river management cooperatives for partnership to protect river basin environments, △installing floating solar panels through a resident-participatory project that returns profit to local communities, △promoting an eco-market to create a virtuous cycle of job creation-income-reinvestment, △operating K-water scholarship to help build a future of local communities by developing human resources, and △running the ‘My Own Doctor’ program to make medical services available to patients in the comfort of their own home. K-water is improving the water access and water user environment for people from the vulnerable class through ‘Water for Your Happiness’, one of K-water’s major CSV activities.

Improving water access and the water-use environment for the socially vulnerable class

K-water’s ‘Water for Your Happiness’ project was launched in 2014 to ensure all citizens can access and enjoy clean water. As one of its major social contribution activities, the project focuses on repairing or remodeling water-use environments including kitchens and bathrooms or building new and improved water-use environments for the socially vulnerable class who have ‘limited access to water’ and lack a bathroom, having to resort to washing in their yard or cooking meals in a traditional-style kitchen with no running water outlet furnished. Specifically, the project includes △ repairing old water-using spaces such as kitchens and bathrooms, △building in-house bathrooms for households with a squat toilet or remodeling their bathrooms, △plumbing for water supply and sewage, and △relocating outdoor water faucets indoors and repairing or improving old water faucets.
Since the launch of the project in 2014, K-water has improved water-use environments at over 640 locations nationwide. The project allows K-water to catch two birds with one stone by realizing water security for people and creating social jobs. K-water is also working with the Community Chest of Korea, Korea Housing Welfare Social Cooperative and Public Workers Solidarity Foundation to ensure more families benefit from the project.