From Trickle To Torrent
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Providing displaced communities with access to clean water in eastern DR Congo
Nick Radin, our Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Advisor, recently returned from eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, where Action Against Hunger is bringing clean water to communities affected by ongoing conflict in the region. He reports from the village of Hombo, on the border between North and South Kivu, provinces that have borne the brunt of much of the fighting between rebel militias and government soldiers. This violence has terrorised communities and forced thousands of families from their homes.
Before Action Against Hunger arrived, this was the only place to draw safe drinking water for the whole village. We protected this spring with reinforced concrete to make sure it lasts.
Women and children can now get as much clean water as they need from the taps we set up along the river.
The river in Hombo where children bathe and mothers wash the family’s laundry. Before Action Against Hunger, families also collected water for household consumption here.
Drinking dirty water like this can lead to a number of deadly diseases like dysentery and diarrhea. Action Against Hunger is treating this river water and providing the whole community with sustainable access to potable water.
Our staff helped the community set up and continue to maintain these “onion tanks,” which provide the first level of water treatment.
We employ local residents of Hombo to ensure that the water filtration system is running around the clock.
The water is then pumped into these “bladder tanks,” where it’s treated a second and final time before making its way to the taps.
These women and children were so excited to see me and voice their gratitude for the new water system.
Since we arrived in Hombo, the prevalence of water-borne illnesses like diarrhea and cholera has been cut dramatically.
January 2010 | Hombo, D.R. Congo - The road to Hombo is a muddy mess. When it rains in D.R. Congo, driving a few miles, even in a four-by-four vehicle, can take hours. I’m travelling to see our water installations in Hombo with Mamady Camara, who began working with Action Against Hunger seven years ago in his native Guinea, and now manages our water, sanitation and hygiene programmes in the zone. We’re also accompanied by two national staff, Congolese water technicians named André and Bonaventure, who grew up in the area and know it inside and out.
Over the last six months, the people of Hombo have taken in a wave of new arrivals coming to escape violence and seeking refuge with local families. Compared to surrounding villages, Hombo is perceived as relatively safe because of its close proximity to a base of U.N. Peacekeepers. This recent influx of displaced people has increased the village’s population by nearly 40 percent and put enormous pressure on local resources.
Before Action Against Hunger arrived, the only clean water source for all of Hombo was an unprotected spring—barely more than a trickle, really. You had to stand there for more than two minutes just to fill one 20-liter jerry can with water. This may not seem like a long time, but because there were 5,000 people that needed water every single day, they would sometimes have to wait in line for hours to get it.
Since each family was only permitted to fill one jerry can of water per day, not nearly enough for all their daily needs and far below minimum humanitarian standards, they were forced to draw much of their water from a nearby river.
This is the same river where people bathe, mothers wash their families’ laundry and animals drink and defecate. You can get a whole host of illnesses from drinking dirty water like this, including cholera, diarrhea and dysentery, which kill thousands of children in D.R. Congo every year.
We get out of our vehicle by the river in Hombo and are greeted by a group of women ecstatically whooping and hollering. They are gathering clean water from the tanks Action Against Hunger has installed by the river, and the joy on their faces is contagious.
In June, our teams set up a series of tanks to treat and fully decontaminate water that’s drawn from the river. The clean water from these tanks is then fed directly into a row of taps, where the women and children of Hombo now come to collect water each day. These spigots provide more than enough water for the whole village, including the 2,000 newcomers that have arrived over the last few months, which means that all families now have access to as much safe water as they need.
I’m introduced to Bashige Dorcase, who, full of relief, no longer worries about having enough clean drinking water for all her children. Mamaday shows me the place near the river where our hygiene promoters are conducting sessions on practices like hand-washing, safe water handling and latrine usage. These are crucial steps in stopping the spread of water-borne illnesses that have ravaged communities across Congo, and they’re part of our integrated approach to fighting hunger and disease.
In addition to caring for her own children, Bashige has taken in her three young nephews. Full of relief, she tells me how she no longer worries about having enough clean drinking water for all her children. She also says that the residents of Hombo are getting along much better since they don’t argue any more over access to the limited water supply.
Bashige and her family aren’t the only ones whose lives have been changed. Two months after Action Against Hunger came to Hombo, the number of people seeking treatment for diarrhea at the local health centre was cut by more than half. There’s been a dramatic 95 percent drop in reported cholera cases, too.
My job takes me to villages across East and Central Africa just like Hombo. But seeing hope and gratitude on the faces of women like Bashige never gets old for me. At home in New York, it’s sometimes easy to forget how something as simple as a glass of clean water can make a world of difference. But today, it’s obvious. I hear it in the joyous shouts of the people of Hombo.
