Subsidies ownership and drillers

Regarding subsidies and ownership for EMAS wells    you may have different experiences?...

Wolfgang Buchner 2024.

During most part of my life I have been developing technologies that are so simple and inexpensive that they can be carried out by local well drillers and paid for by the families themselves. Actually, it is an almost revolutionary concept, because wells in developing countries were and are usually quite expensive communal wells, equipped with a massive hand pump, drilled by a specialized drilling company with heavy equipment and financed by third parties. The clients who order these wells are mostly state or church agencies, but also NGOs. Private households cannot afford a village well in their yard. Our concept is to drill family wells with a small diameter and without the use of machinery at a very low cost, and it has already proven itself about 70,000 times.

The EMAS family wells have an average depth of 25 meters. Usually the whole family works on the drilling. The well driller only comes with one helper. This way, a price of about 10 euros per meter can be achieved. This price includes the well pipe, filter and an EMAS hand pump. Thus, an average well would cost 250 euros. About as much as a bicycle or a quarter of a motorcycle. If you see how many motorcycles there are in rural communities in Africa and Latin America, you can estimate the potential for family wells.

The difference is that for many people in rural areas, water must cost nothing or almost nothing, because as rule village wells were financed and built by someone else. Wells are almost automatically associated with external financing. Now that drinking water is a human right, many believe that a right must not cost anything. The fact that a well of one's own raises personal status is only slowly catching on. At the moment, a motorcycle is still more useful. A warm shower, a convenient kitchen sink or a vegetable garden that can be watered increase the added value of a private well. I am sure that soon having your own well will have the same status as having a motorcycle. In any case, this is a process that can take up to 20 years. No development organization can or wants to wait that long.

Donors, development agencies, governments, etc. want rapid change. They owe it to their partners and electors. They quickly need a list of as many beneficiaries as possible, a large number of wells, and many beautiful pictures with smiling villagers in front of a new well.

Some donors and development organizations have now heard that EMAS wells are very inexpensive and that they can be used to implement a new approach.

Some believe that an EMAS pump can replace a heavy iron pump, such as an Indian Mark II. After all, the price difference is about 1:20.

Some project managers think that a 1.5-inch EMAS bore hole can replace a 4-inch village well.

Sometimes one believes that the same relief money is better invested in drilling many family wells instead of one large and expensive village well.

And this is precisely where the problem begins. Either you subsidize one village well or you use the same money to subsidize many family wells. For some development agencies, the calculation is clear. Drilled well = drilled well. If they can show 10 instead of just one with the same money, then the donors are satisfied. In addition, most families prefer their own well instead of the shared village well. And this raises the question:

• Does it make sense in terms of development strategy to subsidize wells that families could also finance themselves (including savings)?

•  Who should select particularly needy people for subsidies and according to which criteria?

• What about partial subsidies? From what well depth would a subsidy be justifiable?

• How should a subsidy be paid? Will the needy apply for it? Indirectly through cheaper material? Directly in cash by the project executing agency on the day of billing the customer?

• What about maintenance and repairs? For fully subsidized wells, for partially subsidized wells, for self-financed wells? For subsidized wells for the particularly needy?

•  What does ownership have to do with maintenance?

• And what role do local water suppliers and well drillers play in the whole system?

I'll start here with ownership of fully subsidized wells. In most rural areas of Latin America and Africa, there is no land registry. Often the land belongs to the village community, it is state property or it is subordinate to a chiefdom (a kind of indigenous nobility). People are allowed to cultivate the land as if it belonged to them. However, it does not serve as security for a bank. The house they have built on it belongs to them and their children, and they can also sell it if they move away. If an aid organization comes and drills a well near the house and tells the family that the well now belongs to them, then the question of ownership arises. Officially, the land belongs to the chiefdom, the state or the village community. The family has not paid for the well, only for some services during the drilling. Who really owns the well? About 50% of the families believe that the well belongs now to them. They take good care of it and take care of repairs. The other half considers the true landowner the state, chiefdom, community etc. as the real owner of the well. They use the well until the pump breaks. They themselves do not dare to touch the well for fear of breaking it even more and they do not feel responsible for hiring a technician to repair it. This explains why about 50% of the subsidized family wells no longer work after about 2 years.

With partially subsidized wells, the situation with ownership is different. The well owner has paid a certain amount of cash for materials and labor. This automatically makes him the owner of the well. Even if it is not the real amount, he has still paid cash. The work performed is often not considered as real financing, because most rural community residents have to do unpaid work for road maintenance, schools, etc. The value of local materials such as sand, stones, wood, etc. that were provided hardly counts here either. Payment in cash is crucial for ownership. It is almost always the case that the small-scale cattle raiser sells his animals first and pays for the well in cash.

Now I come to the well drillers. It is good when families have a sense of ownership and take care of the protection and maintenance of their well. But what about the well drillers in the medium term? In the short term, they have work to drill the wells in the case of partially subsidized wells. They get their wages. But what happens when the subsidy program expires? Usually the subsidies are indirect, that is, the pipe material is bought wholesale at a reduced price by the project sponsor and sold on even cheaper to the well drillers. If the program now expires and the subsidized material is used up, the wel driller has to procure it himself. He does not have the capital to buy a lot of pipes at once wholesale and have them delivered by truck. He has to buy it in the small hardware store in the next larger town. There the material costs at least twice as much, if not three times as much.

Now, when a new customer wants to order a well, the technician has to tell him the price without the subsidy. The customer is shocked when he hears the price and thinks that the water technician wants to rip him off. He gratefully declines. If this happens often, the well driller will look for another job. Not only because he no longer gets orders, but because he no longer wants to incur hatred.

Now I come to the types of subsidy There are indirect subsidies, e.g. through the material, of which the customer is usually unaware, and there are direct subsidies, which actually never take place because they are relatively costly for the project sponsor. Personally, I find the direct subsidies in an EMAS well program to be the most reasonable, because the customer receives the subsidy amount in cash from the representative of the program in the moment when the well is billed with the well driller. In doing so, the client hands over the total and real amount of the well together with his own share to the well driller by means of a receipt. This makes it clear to everyone how much the well really costs. In addition, the customer must first submit an application to his project sponsor (parish, NGO, etc.) and possibly prove his need.

Nevertheless, the material can also be procured on a large scale, only in this case the well driller buys the material from the project sponsor at the local price and the profit from this goes back into the subsidy fund.

Initial advertising with subsidy. Apart from direct and indirect subsidies, there is also the form of subsidy known as promotion. Especially when a new well driller starts work, he has to find customers, which is not easy because no one knows his work. He should build the first well or cistern at his own home so that he has something to show for his work. This first well is still counted as training and the material is financed by EMAS or its partners. The next 10-20 wells can still be partially subsidized. The well driller does advertising for this. For example, the first five wells are drilled at a 50% discount, the next five at 30%, the next at 20%, then 10% and from the 20th well onwards only at the standard price.

Whether at all, and if so, from what depth and at what level of poverty an EMAS well can be subsidized.

In principle, I believe that an EMAS well should not be subsidized, except for advertising. In exceptional cases, such as particular need, it would be best to provide a direct subsidy. Only the village community knows who is really in a big need. Outsiders usually cannot. But what good is the well if the poor family cannot maintain it? It would be better for them to get their water from a neighboring well.

If a well has to be drilled deeper than 40 meters, then it can be assumed that an average rural family cannot manage this EMAS well alone. In this case, it would be a joint project with the neighbors and thus a community well. However, the fragile EMAS pump made of plastic pipes is not suitable for community wells, and a massive pump like the Mark II, Afridef etc. does not fit into the thin well pipe. This means that only the suction variant, or the air-lift method is feasible. However, a relatively deep well with a solar-electric suction pump plus water tank, valves and panels is a major purchase and can only be financed collectively. Our well drillers/water technicians are trained for such projects.

Another extremely important aspect in a development concept is that people should gain dignity and pride from what they achieve through hard work and perseverance. So anyone who improves their water and sanitation supply for themselves and their family through their own efforts is recognized and is glad. This provides new strengths for other positive developments in the family and in the community. If, however, he or she is given a well for free, or almost given one, then this does not happen. He or she feels incapable, in need of help, like a supplicant or even a beggar. You have to save up for a small motorcycle just as you do for a well. But when you finally get it, you are happy and proud.

The ethical aspect

Sometimes people accuse me that my stance against subsidies is quite un-Christian because one should give alms for the poor. Free wells are seen as alms from richer countries. I also want everyone to have drinking water close to the home and at a reasonable price. If I heavily subsidize wells or give them for free, then in the medium and long term there will be no more well drillers and ultimately none from the poorer classes will be able to get a well after the subsidy program ends. The well drillers went away or have quitted their job. Finally, all the effort and money for training will be spent in vain. That is why I am against subsidies. Another reason is that human dignity is their highest good. They should be untouchable. However, when I give away wells, I turn people into supplicants, I quickly treat them like beggars and take away their pride and dignity. Is that Christian?