Most people draw water from unprotected sources
* Every year tea farmers register high cases of diarrhoea and cholera due to use of water from unprotected sources
* There was an increase of 5% in the rate of diarrhoea, cholera, dysentery and typhoid between 2019 and 2020
By Kiran Ntapasha, MANA
Over 58,000 people from 37 villages under Senior Chief Khwethemule in Thyolo District are expected to access safe water under the United Purpose one year intervention called Beyond Borehole project.
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Beyond Borehole project’s water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) project manager, Chifundo Mandala said on Monday that the main objective of the project is to enhance health and quality life for most people living in villages around Thuchira Tea Association to ensure the villagers source water from protected water sources.
Mandala noted that every year tea farmers register high cases of diarrhoea and cholera due to use of water from unprotected sources.
He said this affects farmers’ livelihood such that there was an increase of 5% in the rate of diarrhoea, cholera, dysentery and typhoid between 2019 and 2020.
“These poor sanitation and hygiene practices pose risks to the value chains of the Tea Grower Associations,” he said.
He added that apart from benefiting the community, the project would help in achieving the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) agenda through the reduction of water challenges and attainment of good health among 58,237 tea farmers from the 37 villages.
“Lack of safe water is not only a health problem — it affects the education and security of girls in rural community where women and girls have primary role to fetch water from long distances at night.”
He hoped that drilling boreholes within a reasonable distance would reduce girls and women’s vulnerability to GBV that is associated with travelling long distances to draw water at night.
Thyolo District Water Development Officer, James Mselela hailed the United Purpose for implementing the project, saying Khwethemule and other areas are hard to reach and only depend on unprotected wells.
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“We are very grateful that UP has chosen to reach out to people in such areas and provide them with safe water.”
Mselela added that Thyolo has 73% of people with access to safe water with a supply access of 63% to the area of Khwethemule — leaving 37% of the population of the area with no access to safe water.
Initiated in January 2021, Beyond Borehole is a project under the WASH programme and has so far rehabilitated eight boreholes and is drilling 10 new in Khwethemule area before the project winds up in December, 2021.
Apart from drilling and maintaining boreholes, the project is promoting good sanitation and hygiene practices by discouraging open defecation among villagers under Khwethemule jurisdiction.
The project was budgeted at K148,521,561 with financial assistance from the European Commission in partnership with Irish Aid, United Nation Children’s Funds (UNICEF) and United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
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