Philip Wilson- Founder of Ecofiltro. A man with a mission
You have to be up early to catch Philip Wilson, founder and CEO of Ecofiltro. Up at 5AM, he starts his day with a boxing training session and really his whole day is full on! I met him at 7:45AM in Central Park here in Antigua Guatemala, watching him oversee the latest project that he is involved in. “Nuestra Antigua Limpia” (NAL) which operates within Fundacion Valle del Panchoy.
He is a serial entrepreneur with a huge social conscience and an amazingly positive outlook to life. He really could be an excellent life coach!
Anyway, back to Ecofiltro. Started in 2009, it has been a great Guatemalan success story. According to Philip Wilson, 80% of global illnesses is caused by the lack of access to clean drinking water, and Guatemala is no exception. Developed by Dr Fernando Mazariegos, the clay and silver filters are now in over 260,000 homes in rural areas, which is a pretty amazing achievement.
The new construction
At my last visit to the factory a few weeks back Philip gave me a tour of the new construction, costing 4 Million Quetzales in land, construction and machinery which will double the production of the filters from 10,000 per month to 20,000. Hopefully, this will enable his very personal mission to be achieved-To have a million filters in rural family homes by 2020.
The school program is very much dear to his heart. In conversation, Philip said to me:
“The way we get into the community, the way we establish credibility is we donate filters to rural schools. Right now, we are in just over 2300 schools. Today, which is a school day in Guatemala, over 700,000 kids are drinking out of an Ecofiltro and they end up becoming our ambassadors; they end up educating their parents about the importance of clean water in the home. So, it’s part of our strategy of trying to get to the million families.”
As I leave the factory, Philip is filling me in on his latest idea- clean burning stoves for the local communities. But that’s for the next article!!!
Since this article was published in June of 2018, Ecofiltro has accelerated its growth with its School program. the statistics are heartwarming. From 2014-2018,
4,642 schools have their filters.
27,980 filters have been installed in these schools.
839,400 children now have clean drinking water.
Philip mentioned deservedly upbeat told me that by 2020 the million mark should be reached- that is a million children will have clean drinking water!
Written by Scott Stanton
Contact Information:
KM 77, Aldea San Lorenzo El Cubo, Ciudad Vieja, Sacatepéquez
