About

Blacksmith Institute is an international not-for-profit organization dedicated to solving life-threatening pollution issues in the developing world. A global leader in this field, Blacksmith addresses a critical need to identify and clean up the world's worst polluted places, focusing on sites where pollution threatens human health, especially where children are most at risk.

Based in New York, Blacksmith works cooperatively around the world in partnerships that include governments, the international community, NGOs and local agencies, to design and implement innovative, low-cost solutions to save lives. Since 1999, Blacksmith has completed over 50 projects; Blacksmith is currently engaged in over 30 projects in 15 countries.

Blacksmith Institute is known for its annual World's Worst Polluted reports; for the creation of the Blacksmith Index (used around the world to rate levels of health risk from pollution); and for the Blacksmith database, the only resource of its kind, which currently documents over 2,100 of the world's worst polluted sites. Blacksmith is currently expanding this database with the Global Toxic Site Identification Program, a worldwide effort to assess and document some 3000 polluted sites in over 60 countries.