UNDP: The Bottled Metric
Costa Rica has never suffered a drinking-water shortage, and that comfort has created a culture of waste. But according to the WHO, the country faced its worst drought on record in 2025.
For UNDP, we created The Bottled Metric: a tool that converts daily water consumption into 2-liter bottles to make it visible, understandable and actionable.
Changing a habit starts with making it visible.
The problem wasn't a lack of data — it was a lack of connection. Costa Ricans didn't see their consumption as excessive because they had never experienced scarcity.
The behavior had to shift without raising alarm, translating abstract figures into something anyone could understand and apply in daily life.
A local tool with regional impact.
The tool was championed by media, influencers and a former president of Costa Rica, generating $3.2M in PR value. The Bottled Metric was integrated into the 2025 Ministry of Public Education curriculum, with potential impact on 58,000 teachers and 1,120,000 students — 22% of the country's total population.
It was also adopted by the Latin America and Caribbean Educators Network, which represents 51,000 teachers across the 9 countries most affected by drought.
