Wells for Zoe reaches out to 500 000 Malawians with clean water
Wells for Zoe, an Irish voluntary organisation, has reached out to half a million Malawians by providing them with safe and clean water.
The revelation comes following a Nyasa Times’ follow up on the organisation works in northern Malawi since 2005.
Among others, Wells for Zoe focuses on enabling the rural poor to access clean, safe, drinking water, working with women’s self-help clusters that includes a package for preschool and girl child and adult education.
One of the volunteers, Jacquie Ni Riain, said in an interview that they are proud with the impact they have achieved so far.
“We estimate that we have provided [to] over 500 000 people with water in the Northern Region of Malawi. We do supply pumps to other NGOs that work in the South and Central regions but [as at now] we only install in the North,” said Riain.
She said their aim was “to stay involved with education programmes and provide water” to those who need it.
According to her, all the funds used for their projects are donations from the Irish people, and the volunteers that come to the country have to “source their own” flight and living expenses for the time they are here.
In Malawi, 1.7 million people of the 16 million population have no access to safe water, and 10 million do not have adequate sanitation.
According to statistics, more than 1 700 children die every year from preventable diarrhoeal deaths caused by poor water and sanitation.
