Well Drilled in Namawanga!

Since beginning work with the village of Namawanga a major goal of the EWB Kenya Project has been to provide the village with a groundwater well. We are happy to announce that we achieved that goal this past fall! The well was drilled at the Machakha Polytechnic School in Namawanga which is a centrally located site in Namawanga that will be accessible to many village members. It is estimated that at least 1,000 people will collect their daily drinking water from the well. Three members of our project traveled to Namawanga over winter break to witness the opening of the well and help establish a plan for managing and maintaining the well. Ben Taylor, Patrick Border, and Peter Rasmussen traveled to Namawanga over the winter break and worked with the village of Namawanga to develop a system for collecting funds from users of the well and using those funds to maintain the well pump when future maintenance is needed. While there the team also traveled to nearby villages to perform assessments on village water sources. It is the hope that while continuing our work with Namawanga, we will be able to expand our projects to other villages in Western Kenya. To read more about EWB-UMASS projects or to donate to help make the projects a success please see our website at www.ecs.umass.edu/ewb