Water for All Ethiopia

Training Families to drill their own low cost water wells
Home
Water for All International
Addendum Discussion
About Us
Contact Us
Site Map
Slide Show
Current Activities
Water for All personel
With whom WFA works
partnering with WFA
Videos

 Please visit www.waterforallinternational.org


Water for All International
Sharing God’s love by empowering poor rural families to solve chronic water and food problems
with their own resources

 

By Terry Waller
Jan. 18, 2007
COLLABORATION FACT PAGE update 2/23/2007


HOW DOES WATER FOR ALL HELP PEOPLE?
Water for All teaches the poor to drill their own water wells.


Water For All (WFA) shares a burden for poor rural families who lack adequate water.

 

 *To help, WFA has developed a unique, manual/motorized, low cost water well drilling and pump technology that has proven to be very “family friendly” and is adaptable for use by the poor in a wide variety of underdeveloped areas. This means rural families can now be taught to organize, drill and maintain their own wells in many areas around the world. When this happens wells can be very inexpensively ($50-$150) and allows the prospect of families having, for the first time, a
personal family water supply.

 

*About 2,000 low cost artisan wells have been drilled by and for
poor people in seven countries. Wells in many different water bearing formations have been drilled to depths to 350ft with WFA technology.


 *WFA builds community and dignity. WFA is committed to teaching families to drill wells instead of training technicians to drill wells for families. Families working together with neighbors to drill their own wells, (called “water clubs” in Bolivia) build community and dignity and are the best way, in our experience, to reduce well costs enough to allow very poor families
to have their own personal family water points. Communities and families that are trained to drill and maintain their own wells are truly empowered to permanently solve their own water supply problems.


 * ‘Artisan,’ a person skilled with their hands, is not to be confused with ‘artesian,’ a well that flows under its own pressure. In this description, we are describing wells that have been drilled, cased, finished and fitted with a pump, all by the hands of a newly-trained rural craftsman.


*Over 2,000 total WFA wells in 7 countries have been drilled by and for the poor so far in Bolivia, Nicaragua, Cameroon, Sri Lanka, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Mexico. WFA also executes a long term Christian rural development program in Bolivia working directly with very poor Quechua homestead families in and around the village of San Julian.

 

* Water for All also develops, tests, and teaches complementary low cost water and agricultural technologies to help rural families, farmers, and their communities in developing nations. WFA has developed and manufactures very low cost “family friendly” windmills, micro irrigation systems, light zero till tractors, sprayers, and seeders.

* WFA’s drilling and pump technologies allow for mobilization of existent family and community assets. This results in end user ownership of water solutions and in rapid replication with a minimal need for external technical help and bureaucracy.


* All cultures and people groups have indigenous methods of organizing themselves to help each other do special projects. In North America it is called a “barn-raising.” In Bolivia among the Quechua it is called “Ayni.” Our technologies capitalize on this indigenous community asset.


* Our very low cost manual drilling approach means that, for the first time, many individual family or community compound wells are a real possibility.


* Prospects for an individual family water supply greatly increase enthusiasm and local ownership of drilling attempts.


* Local owner enthusiasm facilitates the mobilization of existing community and/or family assets for collective drilling.


* Many family wells drilled in an area means that water resources are spread out over a larger area.


* Less pressure on individual water points means families can be taught to build and maintain their own pumps. Expensive, heavy duty pumps require special technical skill to repair - this expertise is not always available.


*Teaching a whole community to drill many wells ensures long term, sustainable water security for families and communities.


* WFA’s focus on direct training of rural families often results in the spontaneous creation of artisan well drilling businesses. These will continue to ensure local water supply, at an affordable price, for the long term.


 *Training families to drill their own wells with WFA’s “family friendly” method makes individual family wells possible and keeps cost very low. The low cost and simplicity creates huge local demand and fosters spontaneous replication. In Bolivia and elsewhere our program of training families to drill has created many spin off artisan well drilling and tool making enterprises. These are started, owned and operated by and for the poor themselves.

 

* If many people in a community are trained to drill wells and make pumps, healthy competition keeps prices low.