Dirty drinking water used to be the scourge of one Ethiopian community until the local church intervened. Tearfund's Joanna Watson reports.
Just off the main road between Addis Ababa and Djibouti, lies a red dirt track road.
It passes through open countryside, dotted with huts, animals and trees and eventually gets too narrow for vehicles, becoming instead a meandering path. It is there that the community of Denbi can be found.
Denbi has just over 100 households. It is a close-knit community where people rely on each other. Until recently, it was also a community where people relied on one communal lake, several miles away, to access water for washing, cleaning, cooking and drinking.
Biggest needs
'It used to take a long time to collect enough water,' says Walanassa, a self-confident and articulate young mother-of-three. 'It was a long way to walk.'
Walanassa has been introduced by Mogus, a senior water and sanitation programme officer for the Kale Heywet Church (KHC), one of Tearfund's partners.
Mogus explains how the KHC congregation in Denbi identified water and sanitation as one of the biggest needs of the community. They then turned to the KHC central office in Addis Ababa for help.
As a result, they brought in Johannes, a specialist who helped identify the best location to drill for ground water and build a well.
'We have a 90 per cent success rate,' he says. He goes on to explain how mobile machines test water samples to make sure that ground water sites have not been contaminated. Only when they are sure do the engineers begin drilling.
The Ethiopian government has given KHC permission to drill for ground water, and build wells in many parts of Ethiopia. The government also provides any necessary technical support. However, the financial support comes from donors like Tearfund, who have funded the well in Denbi.
Pride of place
The well, which is cordoned off to protect it from animals and contamination, takes pride of place in the community and benefits around 500 people.
As well as drilling the well, KHC provided the community with basic training in hygiene, water and sanitation.
'Our KHC volunteers cover topics such as how to cook, how to wash, how to use latrines, and the connection between dirty water and ill-health,' explains Mogus. 'It really makes a difference.'
Walanassa agrees, 'Before the water used to make us sick. Now we do things differently.'
