Life without water in Ch'ew Berai Meno

Life is changing in Ch'ew Berai Meno.

Credit: WaterAid / Caroline Irby

In Ethiopia only 24% of the population have access to safe water supplies and only 15% have adequate sanitation.

Water-related diseases are rife and health services are limited. But behind these startling statistics lie the daily realities for people living their lives without these basic, essential services.

Here a group of committee members from Ch'ew Berai Meno, a community suffering with acute water problems and soon to have a clean water supply, describe what life is currently like living without this basic necessity.

"We have such a problem with water for our people; these are very difficult conditions for us to live in. People go in the morning at 7am and sometimes don't come back until the evening; they suffer the heat of the day and the freezing temperature of the evening.

"The water we get from the ponds and the river is not good, it leads to health problems and as we do not have a health clinic nearby people are dying. The illnesses that water has brought include malaria, scabies, amoeba, cholera, trachoma and jigger fleas.

"Every three days we travel to have enough water. Women go to the pond or the Dijo River and if that dries up we go to the Bilate River, with five hills to cross. Women carry the water on their backs or use donkeys.

"We have to be so careful to make the water last, women cannot give their children water at will, they clean themselves as best they can with leaves and not water. When a child wees, the cloth is taken out to dry like that, without being washed first.

"There is a saying, 'Weha ena enat atit'elam' that means there are no quarrels with water and a mother, but you should see the dirty water that we have to use. It results in many problems. We can even see the worms in the water but still that is all we have and it is so hard to come by that we have to treasure it and use it sparingly. We can only wash clothes at one or two month intervals. We cannot even wash our dead before we bury them."

But life is changing in Ch'ew Berai Meno and soon these stories will be a thing of the past. The community are currently learning about hygiene and will soon start work on their new water project. Once the project is complete, life will be different.

Four new water points will provide the community in Ashoka with clean water.

Credit: WaterAid / Simon de Tray White

The changes that have happened in Ashoka, where work has already been carried out, are testament to this. Here the community also used to have to collect their water from a pond or the Bilate River, but since 2003 four new water points provide the community with clean water.

Amina Abate describes how her life has changed. "In the morning we used to go to fetch water at around 7am.

"I would go with a donkey but those who didn't have one would go without, to the pond if there was water there, to Alaba town otherwise. In the dry season the queues were bad and I wouldn't get back until midday or later.

"Since the installation of this water, it has been so different. The drudgery has gone it takes just a few minutes to collect the water and the water is very sweet and clean.

"We have, in a few weeks become used to cleanliness. Before I would use two jerry-cans, (25 liters each), measuring it out carefully and it could last me five days. But we would suffer. Now I have the luxury of using two jerry-cans sometimes in a single day.

"The household can drink it when they want, I can cook with it and I even wash myself and wash the children in clean water. You have no idea what a difference it has made.

"Also we have built a latrine, it is good and makes us cleaner and we are growing with it and all the things we have leaned about how to look after ourselves.

"For the children especially it is good to have somewhere where they can go to the toilet and not leave their feces all over the place, we are training them and we are keeping the toilet clean. Many other families have also built latrines, there are 65 where before no individual household had one."

Another community member summed up the project by saying. "We used to die going to the river and back, women and children would spend so long collecting water. Before in this way we were dying, now our blood has come back to us and we are alive again."