The soap bank that invests in women’s independence and saves lives

“If we can save soap, we can save lives,” Samir Lakhani says. He came to this realisation while doing volunteer work in Cambodia. In one village, Lakhani witnessed a mother bathe her baby with powdered laundry detergent. On returning to his hotel room, he noticed that housekeeping had thrown out the soap he had only used once. Lakhani had a lightbulb moment – what if wasted soap could provide economic opportunity and better health? So in 2014, he established Eco-Soap Bank, an initiative employing vulnerable women to upcycle leftover soap and prevent disease. 

“It’s a sad statistic that in some regions only one percent of households have access to a bar of soap,” Lakhani says. According to the United Nations, one of the leading causes of death in children under the age of five is diarrhoea, which hand washing can reduce by up to 40%. “Proper hygiene and hand washing are essential to leading a healthy life because it’s our first line of defence against diseases,” Lakhani says. Every week, Eco-Soap Bank collects up to 40 metric tonnes of soap. “We employ women across the world to recycle leftover soap from factories, which is then redistributed to people in need,” Lakhani says. His initiative supports the livelihoods of 160 women in five countries in Africa and Asia. Besides providing them with a stable income, he offers an in-house tutoring programme for the recyclers to learn about financial literacy. 

Lakhani recounts that the first person hired as a soap maker was a Cambodian woman named Thearang who struggled with shyness. Eight years later, she is now running a workshop with 35 individuals and reusing thousands of soap bars in her area. “We want to help women become champions of their communities and not have to focus on survival and making ends meet,” Lakhani says. So far, Eco-Soap Bank has donated more than 26 million bars of soap, and reached six million people by educating them on the importance of hand washing. "We do something very simple, but very powerful,” Lakhani says.

You can contribute to Samir Lakhani’s work here.

Footage and photos by Eco-Soap Bank were used in the creation of this film.