Rainwater Tanks

Our Rainwater Tanks Transform Lives

The lack of a potable water distribution system has far reaching ramifications for the community that go beyond a mere inconvenience. It impacts the children’s ability to stay healthy as well as their ability to attend school. Kigalama residents must fetch water in jerry cans from remote water holes or contaminated wells to meet their needs. Fetching water is usually left to young children while their parents work the farm, impeding their ability to go to school.

Children as young as 5 years old must make the dangerous trek to these remote areas where they are subject to wild animal attacks, drowning, rape, and abuse by older children. They typically make two trips a day to a water hole that is at least two miles away, once before school and once again after school. This means that they are late for school and have no time to complete their homework before the sun sets. Not only does this consume their time, but there is also the scourge of contracting waterborne illnesses from the contaminated well water which also inhibits their ability to attend school.

With input from the members of KITCHIN we arrived at the conclusion that access to water was our main public health concern in Kigalama. Our research led us to believe that rainwater collection tanks were the simplest, most manageable way to provide water to families in very rural areas. In 2009, thanks to our generous donors, we were able to donate water cisterns to 16 families. Seven years later, we are up to 95 families, including over 500 children.