Water is scarce in the northern sector of Tsavo East National Park, but elephants know where to go. Word has gotten out among the wild herds that our Ithumba Unit provides a safe, reliable place to find a drink. At the peak of the dry season, it's not uncommon for more than 150 elephants to congregate for water.

But behind these full troughs is Water for Wildlife — our complex, fully committed conservation programme. Northern Tsavo is marked by high salinity levels, rendering much of its water undrinkable. As a result, elephants generally avoided the landscape, underutilising an otherwise pristine swathe of wilderness.

To solve the water challenge, we established a desalination plant in Ithumba. Now, we can take saline water directly from the Ithumba boreholes, process it through the plant, and make it potable. Multiple times a day, our bowsers deliver water and top up troughs, dispersing the wealth throughout the landscape. This innovation has also transformed operations for our teams and the KWS units who are also based in Ithumba.

The creatures who call northern Tsavo home benefit most of all. Since we began providing drinkable water, wildlife have come back to the area in droves. These reliable watering points encourage elephants to remain deep within the safety of the park instead of venturing onto community land in search of food and water, which helps reduce human-wildlife conflict.

In northern Tsavo, water is hard-won — but it has enormous ripple effects in an ecosystem.