Impact Stories
Making change happen across Australia and Asia Pacific.
Beyond the classroom: Victoria’s transformative trip to Cambodia
Since 2015, EWB’s Humanitarian Design Summits have created transformative learning experiences like no other. Designed for undergraduate engineering students, these study tours challenge thinking, push boundaries, and create first-hand understanding of just how...
Beyond the classroom: Victoria’s transformative trip to Cambodia
Since 2015, EWB’s Humanitarian Design Summits have created transformative learning experiences like no other. Designed for undergraduate engineering students, these study tours challenge thinking, push boundaries, and create first-hand understanding of just how...
The Handi-Plough tool has one simple job: to empower Cambodian women farmers
In Cambodia, nearly 80% of people live rurally and many operate small farms to feed their families and generate income. These agricultural holdings are often run, and worked, by women who face unique challenges in the field. EWB engineers Mengheang Hak, Mitch Horrocks...
Good will hacking – monitoring the moto
Patrick carries around five second-hand phones. On the weekends, he straps them onto the dashboard of his car and takes them for a drive through Sydney’s streets. Patrick’s not a covert criminal running some kind of dodgy operation. He’s conducting important work on a...
Aligning personal values with an engineering career
When most children get tired of their toys, they’re usually thrown away or donated to the local charity shop. As a young kid growing up in Adelaide, Stephanie May’s mum encouraged her to give away her toys to other children, to bring them some joy. Stephanie was also...
Developing emergency guidelines for Vanuatu
In Vanuatu, the world’s most disaster-prone country, there is not yet an approved approach or plan to guide a sanitation and hygiene response after an emergency. The confluence of Cyclone Harold and a global pandemic in March 2020 saw the significant impact on Vanuatu...
Eliminating disposable nappy waste across the Pacific Islands
Building on initiatives underway in Vanuatu that are exploring solutions to disposable nappy waste - the single largest contributing item to waste in Vanuatu’s capital - EWB is now working on a project to assess solutions to this challenge in 15 countries across the...
Enabling Gender Mainstreaming Through Policy and Programming
In October 2020, EWB’s Board Of Directors demonstrated the organisation's increased commitment to diversity and gender equality, by announcing a specific commitment to board quotas. Currently, five of the eleven board members are women, however, over the next three...
Spring water successes in Timor-Leste
Protecting spring water is critical to ensure the safe - and sustainable - supply of water in many rural communities of Timor-Leste. Timor-Leste is a beautiful but mountainous country, terrain which makes accessing water through borehole wells impractical. As a...
Engineering a decade of action
On World Engineering for Sustainable Development Day (4th March 2021) UNESCO released their second Engineering for Sustainable Development report. Both the report and the day acknowledge the critical role engineers can and must play if we’re to achieve the United...
EWB responds to Timor-Leste floods
Last weekend, and in the midst of a COVID-19 lockdown, heavy rain caused widespread flood damage throughout Timor-Leste. Over 11,000 people have been displaced from their homes, and 30% of Dili’s residents are currently unable to access water, due to severely damaged...