1 Million Liters of Safe Drinking Water in Mexico

Dear GlobalGiving Supporters,

It has been a furious start to the rainy season this year, with the biggest storms hitting our watershed in more than a decade. Thanks to supporters like you, along with new institutional partners, a lot of that rain is being transformed into safe, healthy drinking water. 

Since our last update, we have been able to bring in over $7,000 in new funds through the GlobalGiving platform thanks in great part to new donors. This new infusion of funds will go a long way in our new large-scale community project. 

Pozo Hondo and La Vaciada

On our last update, we broke the news that after 10 months of waiting, we were officially awarded a substantial grant with the Gonzalo Río Arronte Foundation (Fundación Gonzalo Río Arronte), a private foundation here in Mexico that funds water projects throughout the country. That project is now well underway! We have been working with two communities, Pozo Hondo and La Vaciada, to implement 25 large-scale rainwater harvesting systems. We built our first rainwater harvesting system at the community church in 2017 to help form the initial interest. Today, we are finally building on that early momentum. 

The community well located in Pozo Hondo serves La Vaciada and a total of six rural villages in the surrounding area. The arsenic and fluoride levels are some of the highest we have ever registered, and it appears that has been the case ever since the well was first drilled over 30 years ago. 

“We used to drink from open-air ‘charcos’ (ponds). When they drilled the well, the water looked so much cleaner…we never thought it was secretly poisoning us,” said one woman from La Vaciada, participating in the project, and who is now a leader with United Communities for Life and Water - a grassroots, community-led initiative in the most impacted region of our aquifer. 

“Today, anyone under about 28 years-old has their teeth very badly stained [with dental fluorosis from drinking the contaminated water]. My son has it extremely bad. We didn’t know it was the water. That’s why we need these [rainwater] cisterns…to save future generations from that fate,” said a mother from Pozo Hondo, also participating in the project. 

In fact, in May and June, the National Public Health Institute began a study in the region where Pozo Hondo and La Vaciada are located. In a neighboring community, the study found that a staggering 82% of all the children surveyed already presented with mild-severe dental fluorosis. This is the first study of its kind in the region, and we are working on proposals in partnership with the National Public Health Institute to expand this work moving forward. 

Today, the work in Pozo Hondo and La Vaciada is off to an ambitious start. After we received the good news from the Gonzalo Río Arronte Foundation, we immediately began working with the communities to support in the organizing process. Last month, we finally broke ground for the first time in the community of La Vaciada. The Caminos de Agua team taught a 7-day intensive training in one of the community member’s homes. More than 30 people came out to participate in the capacity training, where the members learned about (or received a “refresher" on) regional water issues, rainwater systems, broke bread, and built their first 12,000-liter capacity ferro-cement cistern together.

Since then, the communities formed three work groups: two in Pozo Hondo where 16 systems will be built and one in La Vaciada where nine systems will be constructed. Long-time partners, Engineers Without Borders UK came out just a couple of weeks ago to see this project and talk to community members. To date, between the three working groups, five rainwater systems are already nearing completion. Just in time for the next round of rain storms that have been hitting the region hard. 

Over the next several months, along with building the rainwater systems and installing Ceramic Filters, we will hold a series of training workshops and community dialogues, test all of the community water sources (testing the deep community well, shallow wells, seasonal and household ponds, etc), and create a map of community water resources.

The funds provided by the Gonzalo Rio Arronte Foundation will only cover the materials for the first 20 systems. But thanks to the generosity of GlobalGiving supporters the past couple of months, we will easily be able to provide the additional five systems so that all of the current participating families will have access to safe, healthy drinking water before the rainy season comes to an end! So thank you all for your support!

These initial 25 rainwater harvesting systems in Pozo Hondo and La Vaciada will serve up to 75 families, or about 375 people. There are hundreds more families in these communities who still need access. Many are coming on board to participate in this current project and getting trained. The community capacity is growing and the momentum is massive. So, donations go so much further today - investing in communities where people are trained and eager to work. 

Thank you. 

Saludos,
Dylan & The Caminos de Agua Team

Links:

• New Aguadapt Ceramic Filter we're developing
• Caminos de Agua

Dear GlobalGiving Supporters,

As the rainy season gets underway, we’re working hard to take advantage of every drop possible to help more and more people gain sustainable access to safe and healthy drinking water. We are working with old partners and have secured new ones to help take this work to the next level. 

Terreros de la Concepción 

Thanks to GlobalGiving supporters, we were able to start working in the village of Terreros de la Concepción, in collaboration with CUVAPAS (United Communities for Life and Water in English). The village has some of the worst levels of arsenic and fluoride contamination in the entire region, at 6 and 8 times above World Health Organization recommendations respectively. On top of that, community members receive this contaminated water only 1-2 days a week, because the well is shared between several villages. 

Currently, 14 families are participating in this project, all from highest part of the village where water access is even more difficult. Just this month we finished the construction of three (3), large-scale, 12,000-liter capacity ferrocement systems. The families worked hard to finish this project quickly, just in time for the rains.

There is still much more work to be done. All of the families are currently sharing the water between these three systems, but the rainwater will not last the entirety of the dry season. To make sure all families have access, we need to help them build an additional 11 systems before the end of this rainy season.

Palo Colorado

We started working in the village of Palo Colorado at the end of 2017. This project is funded by Casita Linda, another local NGO that helps low-income families build their own homes. Last month, the Caminos de Agua team arrived in the community to begin another capacity training. We were stunned to see water trucks rolling through the community and dozens of 55-gallon drums waiting to be filled.

In turns out, the community well went dry, and literally collapsed in on itself, in January – leaving 300 families without any water access. Today, families pool money to buy water or wait for the municipality who trucks in water every two weeks. Community members were waiting for us this time more anxious than ever to start building rainwater harvesting systems. More than a dozen community members, from two different villages, participated in the latest week-long capacity training, led by Caminos de Agua. 

By the end, one family had a new rainwater harvesting system, all the community members were trained on the construction process, and two local masons received a more comprehensive training to take these systems on to the next homes. In total, three of these large scale systems have been built, and four more are currently underway. 

Pozo Hondo

Big news for us here at Caminos de Agua and for our community partners. After 10 months of waiting, we just received word that we won a grant with the Gonzalo Rio Arronte Foundation (Fundación Gonzalo Río Arronte). This project will allow us to work closely with the village of Pozo Hondo, which has extremely high levels of both arsenic and fluoride in their well. Over the next months, Caminos de Agua, members of Pozo Hondo, and CUVAPAS will be working together to build 25 large-scale rainwater harvesting systems, providing safe and healthy drinking water access to nearly 400 people! 

Many thanks to the Gonzalo Rio Arronte Foundation for believing in our work and helping us get ever closer to our goal of 1 million liters of rainwater storage. 

Local High Schools

Young women from one of the high schools we worked in last year, CBTis 60, won a state-wide science award for their work with Caminos de Agua on rainwater harvesting and water treatment systems! They are going on to the national competition in Merida, México at the end of this month. Wish them luck! 

Inspired by the young women of CBTis 60, another local high school, CecyTe, reached out to Caminos de Agua to see if we can replicate the program we provided to CBTis 60 last year. With funding and logistical support from long-time partner, El Maíz Más Pequeño, we plan on starting this new collaboration with CecyTe in June. 

So, keep your eyes peeled for our next update. And for Spanish speakers, we will post the local radio interview with the CBTis 60 team on Facebook soon. 

What can you do?

In the meantime, we urge you to make a donation to support the project in the village of Terreros de la Concepción (Terreros). The water problems in this village are second to none, but the families are taking the solutions into their own hands. They are trained, organized, determined, and they have the support of a wider community network.  

GlobalGiving supporters have helped build three systems in the village, we have 11 more to go. All incoming funds will go directly to materials to build these additional 11 rainwater harvesting systems in Terreros, which will give the entire upper part of the community, or about 100 people, a lifetime of safe and healthy drinking water. 

The rains are coming! Let’s get ahead of them and help get Terreros a sustainable water supply before the dry season kicks in. 

As always, thanks to all the supporters on GlobalGiving who participate in this work. 

Saludos,
Dylan and the Caminos de Agua Team