Drink Wise, Drink Tap was a campaign that sought to tackle the issue of rising plastic waste in Singapore through a novel approach of encouraging tap water consumption to reduce single-­‐use plastic bottled water waste.

As the first campaign of its kind in Singapore, Drink Wise, Drink Tap raised awareness on the safety of drinking tap water in Singapore. The campaign partnered with Singapore’s National Water Agency, PUB.

Watch the video below to find out the results of a blind test between tap and bottled water.

The Highlights

The Drink Wise, Drink Tap team participated in EarthFest 2019, and were invited to participate in ECo Day Out 2019, Terra Village iLight Festival 2019 and Singapore World Water Day 2019. The events saw a huge turnout, and the team reached out to 1100 people in total on-­‐ground.

The campaign gained media coverage by TODAYonline, The Straits Times IN, The Online Citizen and Class 95FM. Senior Minister State for Environment & Water Resources, Dr Amy Khor and Minister of Parliament Baey Yam Keng also shared the campaign on their social media.

The Memories

Water sampling station where participants made guesses on which jar contain tap and bottled water.
The Drink Wise, Drink Tap team at EarthFest 2019.
The team taking a photo with VIP guests, Senior Minister State for Environment & Water Resources, Dr Amy Khor and Mayor Low Yen Ling.
VIP guests participating in a water sampling session.
The team showcasing their project at ECo Day Out 2019, an event organised by South West CDC.

Reflection #1 – The Challenges

The team only took part in four on-ground events. This reduced the opportunities the team had to engage with Singapore residents, who they found to be more likely to develop an interest and desire to participate in the campaign through offline engagement.

Reflection #2 – The Takeaways

Consumer-led initiatives are only the start and can only achieve a limited amount of success without top-down initiatives.

Through this campaign, the team realised that the default choice for tap water needs to have cooperation from eateries, shopping malls and the government. Eateries can hop on board the “drinktapsg” network to offer free tap water refills to consumers and non-customers; while shopping malls can display stickers/posters to build confidence in the quality of tap water; and the government needs to ensure that there is no misuse of water coolers and public taps, so that consumers can confidently and safely opt for tap water when they are outside of home.

All these require long-term efforts and a lot more resources than what could be done during the campaign. However, with the right education and more on-­‐ground efforts to reach out to the public, the team is confident that Singapore can tackle the issue of plastic waste.