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WHAT COLOR IS THE WATER YOU DRINK?
THE
ENOUGH…..WE HAVE HAD ENOUGH….THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO EXCUSE FOR PEOPLE ON THIS EARTH TO HAVE TO DRINK BROWN WATER, THE SAME WATER THEY WASH IN, THE SAME WATER THAT IS USED FOR DUMPING……ENOUGH!!
We are asking that as you read this information that you open your heart, and know that by the Grace of God, what you are about to read and the pictures you see could be you, your children and or your children’s children yet to come….
We invite you to enter into this world of despair with us and reach out and touch somebody’s life, for the very life you save, could be your own….. We are going to
The organization in
Pastor & Mrs. Vincent Maina Water problem BUNGOMA The Dump for Food & Clothing
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WATER WELL AND BOREHOLE PROJECT
Mayanja and Khasolo
Project needs for ‘Mayanja and Khasolo clean water wells/boreholes’
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Vincent and Josephine Barasa Maina acknowledge anticipated financial support from the Individual donors, contributions of churches, gifts from friends, grants organizations that can help to shape these projects. We have authorized D&P Joubert LLC, who are Global Ministry Consultants to secure the publicity of this work and is authorized to handle the full collections of funds worldwide with documented proper wire and transfers to the contractors and hire for this project. We further acknowledge our many colleagues who assisted with the field studies, particularly pastors Robert Wafula and Manuel Juma in those areas of Khasolo and Mayanja. We also acknowledge the members of the churches involved who generously provided information about their inspired efforts at quest for water acquisition and management, especially Busolo Geoffrey. Needy women and young girls who walk long distances in search of water provided very useful comments and suggestions on what should be done.
This project is dedicated to the memory of our close friends, relatives and colleagues, who died as result of thirst and drinking dirty stagnant water from manholes and dumps and water dumps.
ABSTRACT
Safe water is widely recognized as both a fundamental human need and a key input into economic activity. Across the developing world, the typical approach to addressing these needs is to segregate supplies of water for domestic use from water for large-scale agricultural production. In that arrangement, the goal of domestic water supply is to provide small amounts of clean safe water for direct consumption, cleaning, bathing and sanitation, while the goal of agricultural water supply is to provide large amounts of lower quality water for irrigated agriculture. A new third use of water is now being given more attention by researchers: small amounts of water employed in selected household enterprises. This third use may be particularly important for women. There is a potential, therefore, that provision of modest amounts of water to smallholder farmers can enhance household economic production, save labor time for women and girls, and improve family health.
This project adds to the emerging information on the multiple values of:
Improved water supplies– improved health, time savings, and small-scale production.
Individual farmers and collectives– for the case of a rural community in the western parts of
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With anticipated minimum external support, these two communities have a desire to dig, construct, install and operate systems of spring protection, two wells and pump water to their members’ homesteads. Members of those households, particularly women, will benefit substantially in terms of time savings, health and small-scale production. The experience of this community also illustrates some of the challenges that must be faced for a community to effectively self-organize the investment and maintenance of a community-based water scheme. There are challenges of finance, gender relations, and conflict over scarce water supplies, group leadership, enforcement of community bi-laws, and policy.
Data from a census of springs in the same area show that successful collective action for water management is unusual, but certainly not unique, in this region of
CONTENTS
Introduction
Background
Impacts of Improved Water Supplies
Social organization for Improving Water Supplies
Cost of digging and drilling water well.
Conclusions
Contacts and References
WATER WELL AND BOREHOLE PROJECT TEAM
Pastor Vincent
Mrs. Josephine Barasa Maina,
Mrs. Phyllis
Other Team Members:
The Brothers Harris (parents: Mr. & Mrs. Harris of
Beauty for Ashes Ministries, Sharon Williams; Founder and Director of
INTRODUCTION
A major effort is required in this decade to fulfill (
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The system of rulers is biased against groups such as women, landless people, pastoralists, small-scale industrialists, or downstream irrigators. In Africa, across the vast parts of the landscape that depend mostly on rain-fed agriculture, the potential for multiple use of water systems is through the use of rainwater harvesting and domestic water supplies for domestic use and small-scale agricultural production.
In many
Legal or formal water rights (rights to control water) are typically vested in farmers or household heads, typically men. Water management structures – from the local to the basin level – tend to be dominated by men, particularly large-scale water users and administrative, political and economic elites.
The East African country of
Virtually no progress in reducing the proportion of people reliant on unprotected water sources has been made over the last 14 years.
In
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One option for expanding the coverage of safe and productive water supplies is to empower individual households and community groups to undertake and operate appropriate water supply infrastructure. With most of its population living in the region, there is great potential for communities to protect and harness water from natural springs. There will be relative success stories in these villages, Khasolo and Mayanja where community groups have to start mobilizing for improving water supplies.
The two cases are uncovered in the course of study on poverty and property rights dynamics recently undertaken results presented focus on gender relations, social organization, disaggregated impacts, and the challenges of uncovering the multiple contributions of women to local water management.
The two objectives are to: (i)- Identify institutions, processes and challenges that affect successful water supply to rural communities; and
(ii)- Identify and quantify the role of water-based activities in improving livelihoods of the rural poor, in addition to hygiene and health benefits.
BACKGROUND
Kenya’s National Water Plan of 1974: The Government of Kenya to ensured the availability of potable water, at reasonable distance, to all households by the year 2000 (Water Master Plan 1974). In the 1980s the government began to experience more severe budget constraints and it became clear that, on its own, it could not fulfill this commitment. Attention therefore turned to finding ways of involving others in the provision of water services in place of the government, a process that came to be popularly known as “handing over.’’
In 1983, the government policy of district focus for rural development became operational, shifting increased responsibility to districts in order to encourage local initiative and improve local capacities. This, together with harambee (pulling together), the local spirit of working together which was introduced at independence in 1963, gives the general framework for community management of water supply systems in Kenya.
The Water Act of 2002 prescribes very different roles for the government. The revamped Ministry of Water and Irrigation has become mostly a policy-making and coordinating agency. Responsibility for management of water resources is now vested in the semi-autonomous Water Resources Management Authority, and responsibility for regulating water services is vested in the Water Service Regulatory Board. A new fund, the Water Services Trust Fund, has been established to channel external resources for water supply to disadvantaged communities. In this new institutional setting, water provision is now seen as the role of private enterprises and non-governmental organizations.
Under the Water Act of 2002 there is no clear recognition of the role of community-based organizations, despite evidence of their importance. By the year 2002, eight million people who have access to improved water in the rural areas, 30 percent are served by community managed water supply schemes developed by self help groups. Community water associations are diverse in nature and capacity, ranging from fairly sophisticated systems with well structured tariffs to simple gravity schemes operated without any formal processes.
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While Kenyan law requires self-help groups to be formally registered, there is no specific legislation governing how they work. For instance, non involvement of women as formal members in community water associations is a common denominator of water projects in the
Overview of study area
Khasolo village is located in Kimaeti location.
The area is located in the upper catchments of the
Relative to much of the Bumula region, Mayanja village is relatively resourced. It is located at about 2000 meters above sea level, receives average annual rainfall of about 1500 mm, and is located several kilometers to large market town of Bungoma in a major sugarcane-growing area. By Kenyan national standards, poverty is high (50-60 percent), and community groups describe an even average rate of poverty according to their own definitions. The area is inhabited by people of the Bukusu (part of the larger Luhya ethnic group), a Bantu, Lubukusu-speaking people. Major farming activities in the village are maize production for sale and consumption, indigenous breed livestock keeping, local dairy farming and Sugarcane growing. Land tenure is freehold and adjudicated, indicating that the area was a native trust area during the colonial period. Improved water resource management is an important priority for communities throughout the region.
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Water supply and water resources in the study area
Government involvement in improving water supply in Bungoma district is limited to provision of technical advice to user groups. The Water Department issues the abstraction permit after checking the quality and potential quantity of the discharge from the spring eye and soil. As in many parts of
A census of springs in few administrative divisions of Bungoma district was undertaken in early 1982 in order to better understand the importance of springs as sources of drinking water and the prevalence of different types of spring management. Springs were classified into three groups: unprotected springs had no obvious physical improvement and little social organization around spring use; protected and not piped springs had some obvious physical improvement and a minimum of social organization to maintain that investment; and protected and piped springs had constructed concrete floor and pipes that carried the water by gravity flow to downhill water taps. The census uncovered 10 springs, 6 (60 percent) of which were unprotected, 2 (20 percent) of which were protected and not piped, and 2 of which were protected and piped (20 percent). Of the 2 protected and not piped springs, 1 was mostly self-organized by community group, while 1 was mostly organized by external agencies. The Water Act of 2002 implies less government support and more regulation of small community groups, further threatening the viability of community-based water supplies.
Evolving gender ideologies in Bukusu society
In pre-colonial and early colonial Bukusu society, men had a right to inherit and hold predominant control of land and livestock. Men’s rights to property were circumscribed by the fact that women were regarded as heads of ‘houses,’ with residual rights of control, and the right to pass land on to their male heirs. Women’s status and power were further sustained by their position as producers, processors and traders of food crops. By having sole control over harvested grain, women were vital in their husbands’ prestige and wealth and possessed considerable influence over the ways that power and influence were consolidated in the community.
Colonization and commoditization led to the privatization of land and the introduction of new crops for exchange. The introduction of maize as the staple food changed the existing division of labor; women continued to cultivate millet on a small scale but maize production and trade with maize came to be regarded as men’s ‘business’. Since maize was for both consumption and trade, women were obliged to work on their husband’s field as helpers. Thus women changed from being autonomous millet producers to being unpaid family laborers. In addition, women’s customary rights to the means of production were limited when land adjudication registered land in the names of men. Today, men thus own and control the major means of production and economically significant resources. They acquire exclusive rights to productive and reproductive services of their wives through payment of bride wealth.
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A man’s responsibility is to raise money to cover major household expenses by engaging in income-generating activities and through wage labor. Women’s fundamental roles in the household are to provide food, care for the children, carry water, tend cattle, keep the house clean and do whatever the husband wants her to do, e.g. help him in the sugarcane field.
Study Methods
A study of poverty and property rights dynamics in the Bumula division was conducted in 2006-2007, including an intensive survey of 14 villages distributed across the Bumula division. Villages were selected to be representative of 12 distinct zones in the region, with zones defined by family trees (chikholo che Babukusu), ethnicity (dominantly Bukusu and few Teso), land tenure (adjudicated – former native reserve, resettlement scheme, large-scale leasehold, undivided leasehold), water management (non-irrigated, irrigated private land, irrigated government land), land use (type of dominant cash crop, subsistence food crop and irrigation), and altitude (floodplain, mid-altitude, higher altitude). For each zone, a rural village was selected that had between 80-120 households. Through this process, Khasolo village and
Water sources and water rights
In Khasolo and Mayanja village locations, springs are the main sources of water, with some households located far from springs relying on small streams originating from the springs. Streams are important for all households during dry periods, especially for watering livestock. Rooftop catchments and wells are alternative sources of water. Fifty-three percent of the households who reported using open springs also collected rain water into drums and small pots during the rainy season.
Ten respondents indicated that they used water harvested from neighbors’ roof tops since they themselves had grass thatched houses inappropriate for collecting rainwater. Wells provide an alternative source of water to a small number of community members who are unable to join gravity water supply schemes because of being located above the spring heads. Well water is considered unsuitable for drinking and instead is used for watering cattle, cooking and irrigation.
Members of these community groups collect water at the springs 20 to 30 kilometers away and carry it by foot, to their homesteads for drinking, watering livestock, and irrigating nurseries for seedlings. Women and older children bear almost all of the responsibility for fetching water. Bathing and washing of clothes is mostly done at the springs and home compounds.
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Variations from that norm occur for the case of wells and springs in which individual land owners or groups of water users make specific investments in the water point. Prior to the Water Law of 2002, group rights to protected springs could be formally registered with the District Office of the Ministry of Water, with land owners recognizing that right by signing “no objection” forms. Wells are generally considered to be private property and consent is obtained from the land owner before water can be drawn. While there are no fees incurred for drawing water from “neighbors’’ wells, an annual maintenance fee is charged for cleaning the well and replacing the drawing container.
In the case of springs that are protected and pumped to colleting point downhill from the spring, access rights are negotiated with the land owners and other local users of the springs, often through very protracted discussions. Parties involved in the negotiation, acquisition and use of villages’ water projects include the owner of the land where the springs stand, group members, and the surrounding community
Once protected (excavated and covered) and pump, management and exclusion rights are held by members of community water associations. During dry seasons water is rationed and irrigation is limited to kitchen (vegetable) gardens for members. Non-members who draw water at spring during the wet season are forced to use alternative sources of water as overflow channels run dry during the dry season. Based on the village group’s bylaws, non-members can only obtain water from a member’s homestead when one is sick or has visitors. Lack of access to spring water during the dry season has caused animosity between villages inhabitants the surrounding community.
IMPACTS OF IMPROVED WATER SUPPLIES
This section of the project reports on the impacts of improved water supplies on water consumption, water allocation, and associated changes in livelihoods. Impacts of improved water supplies were calculated two ways: by comparing households currently with and without improved water supplies and by comparing before and after situations for households currently with improved water supplies..
Water allocation: time and uses
The 39 sample households that used an unprotected communal spring as their primary source of water reported using an average of 16.6 hours per week during the dry season and 6.5 hours per week during the rainy season to collect and carry water back and forth from the spring. The amount of time used during the dry season is almost triple that used in the wet season. As indicated earlier, 53 percent of users harvest rainwater during the wet season, reducing the number of times they need to travel to the spring. Each trip to collect water during the dry season may also take longer, as there is a high concentration of users at the spring and less water running from the spring. Besides a decrease in water volume during the dry season, the manner in which the container is filled influences the total time allocated for water collection.
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Increased water use
The five major uses of water in houses with piped water are livestock, kitchen gardens, bathing, washing clothes and tea seedlings. In households without piped water, livestock again was the highest water consumer followed by watering tea seedlings, cooking, washing utensils, and watering kitchen gardens. Households near to pump water use a much higher proportion of their water for washing clothes and a much lower proportion for human consumption. The largest proportionate increases in water use for households with spring water were washing clothes, watering kitchen gardens, and bathing.
The total amount of water allocated for productive uses is higher than the amount utilized for domestic purposes for both households with pump water and households without pump water. Households with close distance to pump water reported using 52.9 percent of their daily water use for watering livestock, watering kitchen garden and watering tea seedlings (productive purposes), and 47.1 percent of their daily water use for drinking, cooking, washing clothes and bathing (reproductive purposes). Households with long distance walks to pump water reported using 56.5 percent of their daily water use for productive purposes and 43.5 percent for reproductive purposes. The indicated total amount of water used by households far from pump water is not exhaustive as activities such as bathing; washing of clothes and watering of the cattle are undertaken at the stream, making it difficult to quantify the amount of water used.
Health benefits of improved water supply
Households with pump water were also asked to provide their perceptions of the benefits of the improved water supply. Of 30 households with improved water supply, reduced incidences of waterborne diseases were reported by 25 respondents, and frequent clothes washing and bathing were reported in 24 and 23 households, respectively. Other health benefits included reduction in skin infection and washing of utensil after every meal (previously utensils were washed once a day, after lunch)
Impacts of improved water supply on agricultural production and sale
There will be increased supply of indigenous vegetables, increased milk production was, increased production of banana seedlings, and increased production of tomatoes. These products will be important sources of monetary income for the households with improved water supply:
Other benefits of improved water supply
Other anticipated benefits noted during the group interviews include: time for relaxation, visiting friends and relatives, men spending more time doing casual work as they no longer have to hurry home to bathe at the far away river before dusk, and increased cohesion between wives and husbands as cattle will be watered and meals will be prepared on time.
Children, notably girls, will arrive promptly at school as they are no longer required to fetch water far away before and after school. This may be a result of women being ‘freed’ from fetching water and thus able to utilize the time saved doing extra activities.
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Registration of the community water projects
Once a suitable land and possible near water bed is identified, we will approach the landowner who is the de facto owner of the well as it is situated on his/her land. He/she then stipulate conditions to be fulfilled before he/she approves allocation of the well for protection and pumping installation.
For Khasolo and Mayanja water projects, once a verbal agreement is reached, the landowner is presented with a ‘no objection form’ to sign from the Ministry of Water. It is then given to the assistant chief for confirmation and approval. Subsequently, our group is church organization with the good terms with Ministry of Social Services but only after electing officials and writing project constitution/bylaws. Then it will be formalized.
COST OF DRILLING A WATER WELL
BOREHOLE COSTS
The cost of a borehole is dependent on the geological sequence, the nature of the water bearing stratum or aquifer and the depth to standing water in the borehole. It is also dependent on the yield required and the access to the borehole location. Some boreholes require a well screen and a gravel pack to restrict the amount of fine materials pumped through the borehole. Individual members should be approached initially for a guide price and then for a written estimate. Remember to include the cost of the pump, rising main, electrics and discharge in any estimate.
By describing the water situation in Bumula division of western,
An important aspect of boreholes is the way water is pumped. There are five possibilities: electric pumps, diesel pumps, solar panels, wind turbines, or manpower. In the past this choice was primarily limited to manpower (for shallow boreholes) or the diesel pump. In some cases a combination (e.g., solar panels and diesel pumps) is possible. The final decision is usually influenced by financial as well as technical factors, such as the depth of the borehole and the amount of water to be raised to the surface. Electric pumps are mainly found in the town area because of the availability of electricity but in
The development of boreholes in the
-One needs USD $1,000 for a professional survey.
-USD $30,000 is needed to hire bulldozers for digging.
-USD $ 9000 goes to construction and materials.
-The total is USD $ 40,000.
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*NOTE: There are some other nearly swap areas in
WELL COSTS
On a cost-sharing basis, the project is requesting for the financing of the improvement of the wells. The costs of an improved WELL are a maximum of
-The siting (Ksh 5,000),
-The digging (Ksh 30,000),
-The lining (Ksh 35,000),
-The covering (Ksh 20,000),
-The drainage (Ksh 10,000),
-The fencing (Ksh 15,000),
-The hand pump (Ksh 50,000), and
-Miscellaneous costs (Ksh 25,000).
TOTAL- Kshs 190, 000 (USD $ 2670 dollars)
The improvements include placing a filter, enforcing and lining the walls, covering the well and installing a hand pump. These pumps have proven to be able to produce at least as great a volume of water per time period.
CONCLUSIONS
The case studies presented in this project illustrate how rural communities can successfully mobilize any resourceful investment in water systems in an environment where most groups have failed to do so. Safe and easily accessible water will bring a range of benefits to those rural households, especially through activities where women have special responsibilities. Households with improved water access will report safe clean drinking water, time and energy savings, improved health, cleaner clothes, and increased production of garden produce, milk and vegetables, with the net result of significant increases in income controlled by locals.
These cases thus provide solid support for the proposition that access to small amounts of water beyond domestic needs can lead to substantial improvements in welfare, especially for rural folk.
Men and women will use their enhanced time and water resources for the good of all household members. Despite the obvious obstacles, a significant number of community groups in this
part of
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CONTACTS AND
20100,
Tel: +254721474165
Email: rmichurch@hotmail.com
Rev. Vincent Barasa Maina: maina104@hotmail.com
http://www.heritagec.webs.com/
USA:
Phyllis Mckoy Joubert, LLC.
OFFICE VISITS ARE BY APPOINTMENT ONLY
TEL: +1 973.966.5186
FAX: +1 973.966.5185
