Well That’s a Deep Subject

We heard the clink of the metal hitting something solid, and my co-worker got really excited. He proceeded to let the head of the Bible school and then our regional supervisor feel the weight of the well measuring-line before and after it hit the bottom. The well at this Bible school was less than half the 50 m. that conventional wisdom thought it was. That was a common theme in the visit we had from another missionary who is planning on coming to work with our partner church on water and sanitation. But during his visit I heard lots of interesting info about wells and water access that I really had no idea about before. He spoke a lot about hand operated “rope pumps” which pump water up from a small bore-hole with the simple suctioning of a rope that travels in a loop. He’s had many encouraging stories of people in other countries making these wells for themselves and then being able to irrigate their own personal fields to grow food in times when the rest of the area is experiencing drought.

Our visitor also impressed upon me that often one of the big problems is not just the cleanliness of the source of the water for a village, but the sanitation of the buckets to carry it home or the cups dipped in it at the point of use. Also, people don’t often use enough water to clean hands or food prep items if they have a limited supply of water to work with each day. So, increasing the health of a household can be done best by giving them access to a larger amount of water, which can be done by making simple smaller wells for several families/groupings. People are also more likely to do the upkeep for the well and more likely to have the needed technology if the well is for a small group of people on a small scale. This missionary was also impressed with the amount of water work being done in the area surrounding our city (probably because water is such a dire need here). A NGO has already trained a small number of people in our city on how to drill bore holes with low technology and make it into a business. Then rope pumps can be used and hopefully this kind of business and benefits can be multiplied. It is all very encouraging, but still not exactly cheap as a small group of people would have to come up with about $2,000 in order to start this for their households and fields.

-- El Padre