Ripple taps RLUSD to speed water finance for Water.org’s Get Blue campaign
Ripple has signed on as the exclusive digital-asset and payments partner for Water.org’s Get Blue campaign, bringing its dollar-backed stablecoin RLUSD and payments infrastructure to efforts that finance safe water and sanitation in emerging markets.
Why it matters
- More than 2 billion people lack safe water at home. Water.org — the nonprofit co-founded by Matt Damon and Gary White — addresses that gap through WaterCredit, a microloan model that helps families install pipes, pumps, toilets and other basic water and sanitation systems. Water.org reports a 98% repayment rate for those loans, allowing recycled capital to reach new borrowers.
- Ripple’s involvement aims to lower transfer costs and shorten settlement times when moving donor funds to local microfinance partners, using RLUSD as the settlement currency.
What Ripple is providing
- Seed funding and on‑the‑ground payment support for transfers to local finance partners in emerging markets.
- RLUSD, a U.S. dollar‑backed stablecoin that Ripple says is collateralized by dollar deposits, short‑term Treasuries and cash equivalents, and which runs on both the XRP Ledger and Ethereum. RLUSD has already been used by Ripple in pilots such as drought insurance for pastoral communities in Kenya and in broader initiatives including a previous $25 million commitment to U.S. education groups (DonorsChoose and Teach For America). Ripple has also expanded RLUSD payment and treasury services in Africa via partners such as Chipper Cash, VALR and Yellow Card.
Context within Get Blue
- Get Blue, which launched publicly at the World Economic Forum in January, aggregates corporate funding and consumer donations into Water.org’s WaterCredit model. Participating brands named alongside Ripple include Amazon, Gap, Starbucks, Ecolab, AccuWeather and TikTok.
- The campaign links everyday purchases to donations — for example, Gap is contributing $5 from items in its Get Blue collection, and Starbucks is donating $0.25 from selected drinks during a limited promotional window.
Statements and next steps
Ripple said it is “proud to join Water.org in support of Get Blue,” and Water.org’s CEO Gary White has emphasized that brand partnerships invite wider communities into the work of expanding water access.
What’s still unclear
Neither Ripple nor Water.org have disclosed the size of RLUSD allocations, which countries will receive the first transfers, transaction volumes, or the names of the initial microfinance recipients. Those details will be important to evaluate the scale and speed of impact once funds begin moving.
Bottom line
The partnership highlights a growing use case for stablecoins in humanitarian finance: faster, cheaper cross‑border transfers into local lending ecosystems that can multiply impact via high repayment rates. The proof will come as RLUSD-backed transfers roll out and transparency around volumes, destinations and outcomes becomes available.
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