Self Help Africa has been engaged in a wide range of rain water harvesting activities with its beneficiaries over the past 20 years.
The provision of drinking water had been a problem for families living in the hot dry area of Dre Kiltu in Ethiopia for generations – and women and children were used to travelling the 12-15km round-trip daily to bring jerry cans of river-water back to their homes.
Self Help, as part of it’s Dodota Project, teamed up with local community members to construct the organisation’s first ever ‘ground catchment’ rainwater harvesting project for villagers and those living around Dre Kiltu.
Using labour provided by the community and with supervision and support from the Ministry for Water, Self Help invested just under €5,000 in the construction of a 475 sq metre rainwater harvesting pan, from which rainfall is channelled in to two 100,000 litre holding tanks, and from which a stand-pipe drinking water tap and animal trough are run.
The scheme has been a huge success, and now provides 91 local households (approx 580 people) with all of their drinking water needs.
A committee made up of local community representatives administers the scheme, under which each household receives 20 litres of water each day for a cost of 5 cent – this sum being invested by the committee in a savings account towards the cost of future maintenance and upkeep of the system.
Since the establishment by Self Help of the Dre Kiltu rainwater harvesting scheme the Ethiopian regional government and other NGO’s have embraced the concept, and there are now a total of seven other similar projects now up and running in the area.
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