Sivan Yaari brings clean water, hope to African villages

Sivan Yaari, the chief executive and founder of Innovation: Africa, which uses solar energy to address Africa’s water crisis, accepted her 2024 Bertie Lubner Humanitarian Award at this year’s Investec Jewish Achiever Awards. Unable to attend last year’s ceremony due to her father-in-law’s death, she was thrilled that the 2025 event was sponsored by Investec, which was instrumental in her expansion into South Africa. 

Amid a standing ovation honouring the staggering impact of Innovation: Africa which, to date, has brought clean drinking water to more than six million people across 10 African countries, Yaari accepted her award. Reflecting on the fortuitous timing of Investec’s awards sponsorship, she described how the company funded the first 11 South African villages that have received access to clean water with Innovation: Africa. 

Convinced that South Africa was a rich country that didn’t need her services, Yaari was sceptical seven years ago when former Investec Chief Executive Stephen Koseff called her and asked to meet. Upon his insistence, she cancelled her flight out of the country to see what he had to say. After their meeting, Yaari travelled to some of South Africa’s rural villages. 

“What I saw in the villages didn’t make sense to me,” she said. “They had TV, electricity, and yet, the women were walking hours every day just to get to a small, dirty, contaminated source of water or to the rivers. But what really touched me were testimonies from the women.” They told Yaari of their fear, how they were attacked and some were raped walking to get water. “They feared for their daughters, and were begging me to help them.” 

Afterwards, Yaari called Koseff and said, “Let’s do it.” Today with Koseff’s continued involvement, Innovation: Africa provides clean water to more than 200 villages across South Africa and counting. “More than one million South Africans are getting access to clean water thanks to Israeli technology,” she said. 

Yaari attributed much of her organisation’s success in South Africa to the country’s Jewish community. “I’ve never seen such a community, and I’ve been around,” she said. She made special mention of the Kirsh family. 

“Thanks to them, millions of people today in Africa have a better life. They trusted us. They pushed us to dream bigger. It’s an incredible family, an incredible legacy, and I owe them almost everything.” 

South Africa is just one of the African countries in which Innovation: Africa operates. While there is much still to do, Yaari’s non-profit organisation has reached millions in more than 1 300 villages across Africa, including in Cameroon, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Senegal, Ethiopia, and more. “The knowledge of Israel, the technology of Israel is now providing them with a better life, with hope and dignity,” she said. 

Yaari revealed that she was born in Israel to a poor family who moved to France seeking a better life when she was 12. Later, she moved back to Israel, and by chance saw an advert for a job at Jordache Jeans. She was hired to do quality control at its factory in Madagascar because she could speak French. “This is how 27 years ago, when I was 20, I got to the continent, and haven’t left,” she said. 

“I didn’t have much growing up in Israel, but the poverty that I saw in the villages was quite different. When I grew up, I had shoes, I had a bed, I had a blanket, I had water, I had electricity. The poverty I saw didn’t make sense. I remembered growing up in Israel and seeing solar panels all over, and I said to myself, ‘It doesn’t make sense that they have to go and get dirty water.’ Some of them were dying from thirst because there was no water at all. Schools and medical centres had no electricity.” 

With sponsorship from Jordache, Yaari attained her a masters in energy from Columbia University in New York. “As a student, I went back with two solar panels to a small village in Tanzania, and that was the first one. Then I did another, and another,” she said. Today, she has almost 100 employees across Israel and Africa. “We’re working hard, going village by village to try to change the lives of people because it’s the right thing to do, because people deserve access to clean water,” Yaari said. 

Innovation: Africa is only one of many Israeli organisations doing good work around the globe, Yaari said. “I hope that one day, the world will see the real and vast contribution that Israel is making to the world, a country that, despite all its challenges, continues to give, share, and innovate. One promise I will make tonight is that as long as I can, I will continue to fulfil our Jewish destiny to empower others. I will keep going village by village, using Israeli innovation to improve lives and show the true face of Israel.”