Supporting clean water in Togo |
Kenesswa Amadou says that the drilling of a borehole in the village of Kpark in Northern Togo saves her up to four hours that she used to spend each day collecting water for her household.
‘My house is just over there’, she says, smiling, as she points to a nearby home. ‘The well is very convenient, and I come to it up to four times each day to get water’, says the 34-year-old mother of five.
‘In the past I used to travel twice a day to the nearest well, which was more than a mile away, and we would often have to wait because there was a queue. Because of the delays you would sometimes start out at 5am in the morning, and only finish gathering water in the afternoon’.
Constructed at a cost of €4,500 with funding support provided to Self Help Africa by the Guerney Overseas Aid Committee (GOAC), the borehole at Kpark outside Dapaong in the Savanes Region of Northern Togo is one of five wells constructed in the past year by local partners TRAX Togo with GOAC backing.
Kenesswa Amadou is a member of the Kpark water management committee, a group established and trained by TRAX Togo in each community where new wells have been provided, so that the utility is properly managed and maintained.
She says that incidents of sickness and diarrhoea have reduced since they started using the well, and that a great amount of time in the day has also been saved, which can now be spent in a more productive way.
The new borehole at Kpark caters for the needs of more than 90 local households, and a total of over 440 people. The Guernsey Overseas Aid Committee’s support for five new wells – at Tami Zongo, Tami, Koumbok, Djaling and Kpark will, when complete provide clean water for over 2,700 people in this region of Northern Togo.
In the past two years, TRAX Togo have dug a total of 13 wells and repaired a further five boreholes. They have also supported the creation of 16 water committees in a project that has to date helped to ensure a clean drinking water supply to nearly 5,000 people.
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