Water is Essential for Development
Transcription
Water is Essential for Development
Center for Renewable Energy and Appropriate Technology for the Environment 132 East Broadway Suite 416 Eugene, OR 97401 NEWSLETTER Fall 2015 “Water is Essential for Development” A crowd of residents gathered in Darou Diadji in July to help install the solar-powered pumping system at the garden site’s newly rehabilitated well. As the pump started up and brought water 200 feet to the surface from a well that had been unusable for 20 years, community members rejoiced! CREATE!’s Senegal Country Representative Omar Ndiaye Seck, who oversaw the solar pumping system installation, says of the occasion: “This moment will mark CREATE! field staff forever. Water is a sovereign source of wealth, a source of life, and an essential engine of development. Without water, development for Senegal is not possible. CREATE!’s intervention to ensure access to abundant water through renewable energy will now allow community members to grow bountiful crops throughout the year.” Women from each of CREATE!’s partner communities appreciate that they now have easy access to abundant, clean water. Ndeye Diop, 29, lives in Thanks to rehabilitated wells and solar pumping systems, CREATE! communities now have access to clean, affordable water. Walo with her two children. With a new solar powered water pumping system, village women like Ndeye no longer need to suffer the burden of drawing water by hand from the well. Thanks to CREATE!, Ndeye adds, “hope is reborn in our village.” She is thrilled that she can now learn to grow her own vegetables throughout the year. CREATE! Programs Provide Access to Water “Water is life.” This is true everywhere, and especially true in Senegal, where the annual dry season is nine months long. Throughout West Africa, unpredictable weather and drought stemming from climate change restrict water availability. Through our programs, CREATE! strives to expand access to water and fight desertification, which further limits water access for rural communities. Without an affordable and reliable source of water, year-round vegetable cultivation is impossible for these villages. Wells across rural Senegal stand abandoned. Extended drought and high demand deplete local water tables, rendering some wells unusable. In coastal communities, rising tides inundate wells with salty water. Water from the commercial well system is expensive, chemically treated, and often too salty to drink or use to irrigate crops. In the absence of reliable wells, many families in rural Senegal either use commercial water or walk long distances to collect water from streams or other sources. www.createaction.org CREATE! staff and community members worked together to rehabilitate Darou Diadji’s well, which stood abandoned for more than 20 years. Helping communities access abundant, clean water is an essential component of CREATE! programs in Senegal. Our field technicians work with local well diggers and community volunteers to complete necessary improvements to existing village wells or to dig new wells. Traditional continued on page 2 Access to Water, cont. Each of CREATE!’s solar pumping systems pumps an average of 2,000 gallons of water per day from as much as 200 feet below ground to an elevated reservoir. Gravity fed networks of above ground basins distribute water from the reservoirs throughout the cooperative garden sites. ingenuity of our staff helps strengthen the sustainability and self-sufficiency of CREATE! programs in Senegal. Members of the agricultural cooperatives in these communities now have access to clean water and can begin vegetable cultivation! Cooperative members in all of our communities are now able to grow nutritious fruits and vegetables for their households and sell the produce in local markets, providing a much-needed source of household income in a region of Senegal where economic opportunities for women are almost nonexistent. CREATE! Field Staff inspect young trees in one of CREATE’s tree nurseries. Darou Diadji village chief Mbaye Gueye says, “Trees are needed to bring back the rain that is becoming increasingly rare”. well diggers, working without heavy machinery or fossil fuels, are able to reach water at depths of over 150 feet! CREATE! field technicians work with community members to install solar-powered pumping systems in the improved wells. Each pump provides thousands of gallons of water each day, which a gravity-fed irrigation system transfers to basins located in the garden site. Even in cloudy weather, the solar pump can bring water to the surface at a rate of 40 liters per minute! Most recently, CREATE! field technicians installed solar water pumps and gravity-fed irrigation systems at new cooperative garden sites in Walo and Darou Diadji. These installations mark the first time that our technicians were also able to source all necessary materials, including solar panels, well pumps, and customized installation equipment, from distributors and artisans located in Senegal. The local knowledge and 2 CREATE! also works to address the root causes of water scarcity in rural Senegal. CREATE!’s reforestation programs stabilize local water tables and combat the spread of desertification in this region. CREATE! field technicians work with cooperative members to establish tree nurseries in garden sites and transplant tree seedlings during the short rainy season. This year, participants are planting almost 19,000 tree seedlings in garden sites, near schools and mosques, and within the yards of family homes. Participants also learn how to properly care for tree seedlings. Trees provide shade, moderate temperatures, produce fruit and nuts, and stabilize soils in the garden sites. Maturing trees in our partner communities serve as windbreaks and living fences, moderating local temperatures and providing refreshing shade. Planting trees also slows the spread of desertification in these villages. Our beneficiaries draw clear connections between climate change, desertification, and limited water resources in their villages. By providing access to water and training in reforestation practices, CREATE! ensures that our partner communities have the tools they need to work towards economic empowerment and self-sufficiency, even as they bear the burdens of climate change and desertification. www.createaction.org Letter from the Director Dear Friends, During my most recent trip to Senegal, I discussed with our field staff CREATE!’s philosophy of self-development and sustainability: • vibrant and voluntary local participation • social mobilization • building the capacity of villagers to address unmet needs in their community through skills training, education, and practical application • responding to felt needs with techniques, technologies, and strategies that are low-cost, accessible, and that can be easily replicated CREATE! Country Representative Omar Ndiaye Seck explains the design, use and benefits of the solar water heater to a rapt and attentive crowd in Gagnick Mack. Under the leadership of our Country Representative, Omar Ndiaye Seck, CREATE! field technicians integrate these tenets into their work, dramatically improving water provision, local food production, energy conservation and renewable energy, and income generation in our partner communities. Looking for further ways in which CREATE! could help in rural Senegal, I asked our field technicians if they were aware of other felt needs expressed by the communities. Almost everyone responded that hot water is a felt need and would be very welcome, especially at village health posts and maternity centers. When I visited the health post that serves the communities of Walo and Gagnick Mack, I met Ndam Diouf, the matron who delivers babies and conducts medical exams. Ndam told us that the health post often goes without hot water for exams and births because they cannot afford butane for their small gas stove. Utilizing the principles of passive solar energy, I worked with our Senegal field team to engineer an appropriatate technology solution to this problem. Together, we designed a solar water heater that requires no pumps, no electricity, no moving parts, costs about $200, and can be built using only locally available materials. This novel approach to producing hot water is easy to build and replicate, and will last many years. The entire community of Gagnick Mack worked together with CREATE! field technicians to build and install the solar water heater at the village health post. With residents of Walo and Gagnick Mack in attendance (including 50 school children), our staff took turns explaining the solar water heater design, principles, and functionality. The CREATE! field team, with community participation, then built and installed the solar water heater at the health post. When the installation was complete and we tested it to ensure that it worked as designed (it does!), there was great laughter, joy, and dancing! The health post will no longer need to rely on expensive butane to heat water — only free energy from the sun. For CREATE!, it is just as important to build the capacity of our field technicians and empower them to effect change as it is to empower our partner communities. Ongoing technical training and a collaborative approach to problem solving are vital and distinctive components of our program. Our successful water and solar projects would not be possible without your generous support. We are grateful for your ongoing commitment to these communities. As always I look forward to hearing your comments, questions, and suggestions. Best regards, Omar Seck and CREATE! field staff check the water temperature in the storage tank during the construction process. www.createaction.org Barry R. Wheeler, Executive Director [email protected] P.S. Interested in learning more about the passive solar hot water system? Visit http://createaction.org/resources.php to download a detailed construction guide. 3 Meet Moussa Ndiaye — CREATE! Field Technician in Walo and Gagnick Mack As agricultural technician for CREATE!’s new partner villages of Walo and Gagnick Mack, Moussa Ndiaye helps community members to organize self-managing cooperative groups, plan and prepare their garden sites, and put in place a work schedule that will enable their gardens to flourish. Moussa trains cooperative members in sustainable vegetable cultivation, improved cookstove construction, tree planting, Voluntary Savings and Lending Association (VSLA) techniques, cooperative group management, and other essential skills, all while reinforcing CREATE!’s principles of community participation and local empowerment. Moussa Ndiaye, CREATE! Field Technician in Walo and Gagnick Mack, shares, “Working with CREATE! has helped me better discover my own abilities and use them in the service of rural populations.” Moussa appreciates the opportunity to contribute to the economic development of rural communities. He says, “Thanks to my work with CREATE!, I have discovered that it is indeed possible to develop rural areas without large sums of money. It is just a matter of finding the potential in a community and encouraging development using means that are accessible to everyone. Working with CREATE! has helped me better discover my own abilities and use them in the service of rural populations.” Moussa studied chemistry at Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar and holds a certificate as a Senior Agriculture Technician from Emile Badiane de Bignona Agricultural Technical School. In his free time, Moussa likes to participate in sports, take care of animals, watch soccer, and listen to Senegalese rap. Water by the Numbers 358 million people in Africa do not have access to clean water. Nearly 10,000 people in rural Senegal now have access to clean, affordable water thanks to CREATE! water projects. The rainy season in Senegal lasts between two and five months. Senegal experiences about 37 rainy days annually, all of which occur during the short rainy season. The average annual rainfall in Senegal is 22 inches. With access to affordable water, cooperative members in CREATE! communities can now grow vegetables 12 months of the year. This newsletter in printed on paper with 24% post consumer waste content. CREATE! is a nonprofit tax exempt organization with 501(c)3 status, #26-1535453. 4 www.createaction.org