EWATERpay: Totally disrupting the aid business
DELIVERING WATER TO SCHOOLS IN RURAL TANZANIA
In Gidewari, a village not locatable on Google Maps, sits a large hyper-saline lake where the water is unfit for human or livestock consumption. Not far from the lake is Gidewari Primary School where eWaterPay have installed two smart water dispensers. According to WaterAid, 31% of schools globally do not have access to clean water, which affects approximately 570 million children. For children in rural areas of Africa, a good education starts with access to clean water and sanitation. Through eWaterPay’s remote pre-payment feature, government organisations, diaspora and international donors are able to purchase and send trackable water credit to individual tags and dispensers at schools and health clinics.
Several hours from Gidewari is the village of Endanachan, where eWaterPay have two more dispensers in the Primary and Secondary schools. The head teacher Elihuruma Mjemah explained the real impact of access to clean water on children’s education and health:
“Children would go and fetch water and this meant that sometimes they would miss class. Many times children complained to me of a stomach ache, but we don’t hear about that any more. The project has really made a big difference to our lives”.
The technology has helped to turn the village water distribution system from an unreliable and uncertain source of water to one that will provide water throughout the day. This allows people who are furthest away from the community water points to make the daily decision of travelling to the water points rather than unclean surface water. These are the most marginalised of the community, and by expanding the net of service eWaterPay is helping ‘leave no one behind’.
Furthermore, insufficient rural water supply disproportionately affects women and girls, who are often responsible for carrying back-breaking amounts of unclean water for over 4 miles everyday, resulting in many unable to participate in school or contribute to the local economy.
With the strategic locations of smart water dispensers in rural villages, the knock-on benefits to health, education and the local economy are undeniably positive..
happy farewell from the children at Gidewari Primary School Photo by eWaterPay Ltd
WATER AVAILABILITY IN MOSWERO, TANZANIA
The village of Moswero has 26 eWater dispensers which have served over 15,000 people since the beginning of December 2018. At eWaterPay availability refers to the performance of a water system against its ability to deliver clean water 24/7. Since installation in Moswero, the water system has consistently delivered water over a 95% service level standard.
In many parts of the world water is not available all day everyday. eWaterPay prides itself on continuously innovating to ensure that our technology is affordable to ensure that more dispensers can be placed in rural villages, resulting in smaller distances to collect water and less queuing at the water points.
eWaterPay graph highlighting status and availability consistently achieving over 95% in Moswero, Tanzania – December 2018 to March 2019