Today, we our headed to the field to visit some completed projects near Axum with our implementing partner REST.  REST has been working in partnership with W2T since our beginning, and continues to be, They are the largest water NGO in Ethiopia, with a capacity to do about 1,400 projects in 2015. In 2015, W2T will represent about 6% of their total projects.

 

 

Pictured above is Weredekal Atsbeha (Wereda). He is the Director of Planning & Project Management for REST and oversees all partner relationships for tracking projects, budgets, completion reports, etc. He will be serving as our host for the next three days as we travel around Tigray. We get to know a bit about Wereda’s family…..he is married with two children, but his father is turning 100 next month.  He has 19 children and an extended family of over 150 children, grand, great, and great-great grand children.  Their family reunion must be a sight to behold!

 

With Wereda, we visit 4 completed projects today, including Ketema, May-Silam, Mai Liam and Hida Debena. These were all part of a group of 40 projects with REST, started in 2014 and finished in early 2015.

 

 

At each of the project sites, we get the first hand stories from the community beneficiaries about the impact that clean water is having on their daily lives. Good health, improved economic opportunities, improved education opportunities all are recounted by the communities we meet. One female water committee member in particular mentioned how much safer it was for the women and young girls to fetch water because they could do it in daylight. And their water committees are doing an excellent job of engaging the community, all with substantial money in the bank for the maintenance fund.

 

 

Near Hida Debena well, we get to meet a local farmer, Abraham, pictured above. Abraham should be nominated for Entrepreneur of the Year! Over the last three years, he has completely paid back an $800 microfinance loan, with which he bought a irrigation pump to pump water into his nearby fields of tomato, onion, cabbage. He is also growing mango and guava nearby.

 

 

Shown above, he demonstrated for us how the water flows from the open irrigation well to all of his crop areas using the irrigation pump.  Abraham has 9 children, with two oldest recently graduating from the university and two more already enrolled. He attributes his family’s ability to pay for the education largely due to his improved cash crop success using the irrigation water. Now he is serving as a role model to surrounding farmers…..teaching them these same new techniques…..a great example of playing it forward!

 

 

 

Today, we our headed to the field to visit some completed projects near Axum with our implementing partner REST.  REST has been working in partnership with W2T since our beginning, and continues to be, They are the largest water NGO in Ethiopia, with a capacity to do about 1,400 projects in 2015. In 2015, W2T will represent about 6% of their total projects.

 

 

Pictured above is Weredekal Atsbeha (Wereda). He is the Director of Planning & Project Management for REST and oversees all partner relationships for tracking projects, budgets, completion reports, etc. He will be serving as our host for the next three days as we travel around Tigray. We get to know a bit about Wereda’s family…..he is married with two children, but his father is turning 100 next month.  He has 19 children and an extended family of over 150 children, grand, great, and great-great grand children.  Their family reunion must be a sight to behold!

 

With Wereda, we visit 4 completed projects today, including Ketema, May-Silam, Mai Liam and Hida Debena. These were all part of a group of 40 projects with REST, started in 2014 and finished in early 2015.

 

 

At each of the project sites, we get the first hand stories from the community beneficiaries about the impact that clean water is having on their daily lives. Good health, improved economic opportunities, improved education opportunities all are recounted by the communities we meet. One female water committee member in particular mentioned how much safer it was for the women and young girls to fetch water because they could do it in daylight. And their water committees are doing an excellent job of engaging the community, all with substantial money in the bank for the maintenance fund.

 

 

Near Hida Debena well, we get to meet a local farmer, Abraham, pictured above. Abraham should be nominated for Entrepreneur of the Year! Over the last three years, he has completely paid back an $800 microfinance loan, with which he bought a irrigation pump to pump water into his nearby fields of tomato, onion, cabbage. He is also growing mango and guava nearby.

 

 

Shown above, he demonstrated for us how the water flows from the open irrigation well to all of his crop areas using the irrigation pump.  Abraham has 9 children, with two oldest recently graduating from the university and two more already enrolled. He attributes his family’s ability to pay for the education largely due to his improved cash crop success using the irrigation water. Now he is serving as a role model to surrounding farmers…..teaching them these same new techniques…..a great example of playing it forward!