Successful grantees and foundation staff celebrate by blowing out the candles on the FIJI Water Foundation birthday cake.

FIJI Water Foundation celebrated its second birthday yesterday — two years of assisting in development projects in water, health, and education throughout Fiji. Supporters, friends, partners, and grantees joined to help us celebrate by officially launching our Foundation website and announcing the Foundation”s most recent group of successful grant applicants, one of who traveled all the way from remote Kioa Island in the north of the county to speak about how the FIJI Water grant will finally make it possible for the island and its villages to have direct access to clean water. We also heard from the Director of Project HEAVEN, a remarkable organization that screens kids in remote parts of Fiji for ear and eye disease, and then makes sure they get treatment if any problems are discovered.

FIJI Water already has a robust online presence on the www.fijiwater.com and FIJIGreen.com sites, which provide information about the brand and mission to customers around the world. Until now, however, online customers, grantees, and partners have had limited access to information about the foundation and our development work in Fiji. Thus, we are thrilled to share our new website with you and with the world. This new site features foundation history, project descriptions, grant application resources, Twitter and news feeds, and an interactive project map. It also links to the partners who have helped make our work here possible. We look forward to growing this list as more companies consider joining our efforts. Internet is still not widely available throughout all of Fiji, but it”s moving fast: The Kioa Island grant recipient accessed the application materials and applied via email all the way from Fiji”s rural Northern Division. We look forward to the increased visibility and accessibility this site will give to our projects and partners.

In addition to observing our birthday and launching the new website, the ceremony honored the work of the inspiring organizations and communities we work with everyday. Fourteen new projects were launched, including four library projects, three kindergarten projects, two new water and sanitation projects, support for an NGO that provides ear and eye screening for children, support of a volunteer heart surgery team, as well as the foundation”s first electrification project, which will help to illuminate an entire district, including three schools, a health center, and a nursing station.

FIJI Water Foundation has donated more than $240,000 FJD to these 14 development projects. Since its establishment in 2007, the foundation has funded over $1,400,000 in projects directly impacting more than 70,000 people in 13 of Fiji”s 14 provinces. The same passion and world-class approach we have brought to bottling water, we bring to our developmental efforts.

We look forward to working with these communities and organizations as they implement their projects, some of which are already underway. We are always looking for new partners who share our development goals and welcome applicants for projects to be funded in early 2010.

Read more about our second-anniversary celebration:

FIJI Sun: FIJI Water Foundation Comes of Age

FIJIVillage.com: FIJI Water Gives $240,000