Kenya: fresh ideas for clean water
Clean, safe water is a precious resource in drought-prone areas of Kenya, where Oxfam's innovative approaches are keeping supplies running.
Drought preparedness
Oxfam's programme in Turkana and Wajir, Kenya, has been helping people prepare for and cope with recurrent drought, and using new technologies and approaches to improve water supplies.
Photo: Jane Beesley
Water kiosks in Turkana
"We used to have to share where we collected water with livestock. You can imagine the congestion and fighting that was there! Since this kiosk was built people can take their water easily. There's no fighting. The distance they can to go to collect water has been reduced."
Mary Longor, member of the Water Committee, Turkana
Photo: Jane Beesley
Traditional well
"We used to have to pull up the bucket full of water by rope, which was very heavy and I didn't have the strength. I used to send the children... Because it was an open well it was very risky and I'd worry about their safety."
Idhley Abdullahi, Wajir
Photo: Jane Beesley
Rope wells
"With the rope well you don't need to have a lot of energy to get water. Now I can collect the water myself. If the children have to come it's safe – there's no danger of falling in," explains Idhley.
Water wastage is reduced with specially dug channels filtering spillage to fruit gardens.
Photo: Jane Beesley
Traditional riverbed wells
During the dry season people often collect water fron hand-dug wells in dry riverbeds.
"The water from the traditional wells is dirty water which causes us to get diseases, diarrhoea, and skin rashes," explains Pauline Akabonyon from Turkana.
Soon Pauline and others will be using a different type of well.
Photo: Jane Beesley
New riverbed wells
The new well's 'hydro dynamic' design means it won't be washed away or destroyed by fast flowing rivers during the rainy season. These wells provide cleaner, fresher water, and are safer than climbing into unprotected holes. They are time saving too as traditional wells have to be re-dug each dry season.
Photo: Jane Beesley
Defluoridation units
Lake Turkana is often the only water source for local communities. Lake water contains high fluoride levels – particularly harmful to children as their bones are soft and developing, causing dental and skeleton fluorosis – black teeth, bowlegs, and hunched backs. The unit's impact will be seen as children grow up without developing these problems.
Photo: Jane Beesley
'Biosand' filters
Filters make the water "...clear like the mineral water you can buy from the shops. Dirty water used to give the children a lot of diarrhoea, but since filtering the water there's been a change and the health of the children has improved,"
Saadia Abdi, Wajir
Photo: Jane Beesley
Generating oportunities
These new filters have only recently been introduced, but community reactions have been very positive. In some parts of Wajir, depending on the availability of the right kind of sand and gravel, they could become an income-generating opportunity. The filters are also more environmentally friendly than encouraging people to boil their water.
Photo: Jane Beesley
Looking to the future
These are examples of some of the initiatives being implemented as part of the public health programme in Kenya. For most of these it's still early days so their desired impact will have to be continually monitored, but so far the response from the communities has been very positive.
Photo: Jane Beesley
