Look To The Stars News: PlayPumps

Jessica Biel To Climb Kilimanjaro For Charity

Tue, 29 Sep 2009 12:30:00 -0000

Jessica Biel is the latest star to climb Mount Kilimanjaro for charity.

The actress will join Isabel Lucas and several others for the trek in January to raise awareness about the need for clean water.

“This is a basic human necessity that needs to be addressed now,” she said. “I want to help any way I can in order to raise awareness toward the life-threatening clean water crisis happening not only in Africa but around the world.”

Biel’s boyfriend, Justin Timberlake, is also set to take part in the climb, which will also raise money for the Children’s Safe Drinking Water Program, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and PlayPumps International.

“I’ve been training four times a week to get my VO2 – oxygen consumption – levels up to expand my lungs,” he said. “We’ll climb for a week straight, carrying 30lbs on our backs. It’s going to be intense, but it’s going to be so rewarding. We’re going to be ready for it.”

Jay-Z Honored By United Nations

Fri, 03 Oct 2008 14:30:00 -0000

Written by Tim Saunders

Rapper Jay-Z has been honored by the United Nations for his humanitarian work in Africa.

The performer and president of Def Jam Records was praised for his work when he attended the United Nations Global Leadership Awards Gala in New York on Wednesday. He recently returned from Africa, where he has invested heavily in programs to supply clean water.

“Many charities, you close your eyes and cross your fingers and hope that the money gets to the people who really deserve it,” he told People Magazine. “But with this, I got to go to Africa, see the water pumps. I got to see the kids turn them on.”

The rapper first visited Africa in 2006, and recorded an MTV documentary of his visit called “The Diary of Jay-Z: Water for Life.” Since then he has been paying for PlayPumps water systems to be installed in African villages where clean water was not available.

Hayley Westenra Records PSA For UNICEF

Wed, 06 Aug 2008 12:30:00 -0000

Written by Tim Saunders

New Zealand-born singing sensation Hayley Westenra has recorded a special message for UNICEF.

The 21-year-old shot to stardom in 2003 when her first international release, Pure, went to number 1 on the British charts. Now she is the youngest UNICEF Ambassador in the world, and she has recorded a special public service announcement asking people to join her by becoming a UNICEF Global Parent.

“With UNICEF, your contributions go further,” she says during the advertisement. “[It] helps not just one child, but many, many children all around the world.”

In 2005, Westenra visited Ghana with the charity to see firsthand the work UNICEF does. While there, the young star launched ’Hayley’s Bikes for Ghana’, a project that has already provided 6,000 bikes for children so they can attend school and find a better future. She also supports ‘PlayPumps for Ghana’, a project which aims to take clean water to over 6,000 children and their families.

“Meeting young people that are the same as me but with such a different world of opportunity has a profound affect on you,” she said after her visit. “I aspire to be a singer, which seems so unessential compared with their simple desire for a regular cup of clean water. You can’t go somewhere like that, meet those people and come back unchanged.”

Westenra is also involved in the Women’s Environmental Network, a group that raises awareness of environmental issues affecting women.

Hayley’s latest PSA can be viewed here.

Jay-Z To Raise Awareness Of Global Water Crisis

Fri, 11 Aug 2006 20:02:00 -0000

Written by Steve Purcell

Jay-Z, rapper and president of Def Jam Records, announced on Wednesday that he will work with the United Nations and MTV to get children involved in the fight against the worldwide water crisis. He cited statistics that 1.1 billion people live without clean drinking water and 2.6 billion lack proper sanitation.

The singer said that when he visited Africa on tour he was shocked at how many of the world’s poor had no access to sanitary water services.

“As I started looking around and looking at ways that I could become helpful, it started at the first thing — water, something as simple as water,” he said at a news conference at U.N. headquarters with UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

MTV film crews will follow the rapper on his worldwide tour, which begins Sept. 9. “The Diary of Jay-Z: Water for Life” will record meetings with people around the world who lack water.

Jay-Z said he wants to build 1,000 PlayPumps in Africa by the time the tour is over. He also hopes that children who learn about the crisis will tell their parents, who might be able to do something about it.

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