"BORDA helps" annual fund raising campaign

Overview:
BORDA helps is a fund-raising campaign that was organized by BORDA Bremen for the first time in the end of 2007 because of BORDA’s 30th anniversary. The fund-raising campaign is supposed to support specific BORDA projects in countries that BORDA works in. All projects are focussing on the improvement of the living conditions of disadvantaged people in rural and urban regions. The projects are linked very closely with BORDA’s core competences.

1. BORDA helps 2008 – Outcomes

Project 1: Water supply for Jalahallihundi
Project 2: Basic Sanitation facilities for the St. Angela Cheshire home in Lesotho

2. BORDA helps 2009 – The new campaign

1. BORDA helps 2008 – Outcomes

Duration: 2008-2009

Overview:
In the end of 2007 five development projects were selected and introduced to the citizens of Bremen. These projects showed the huge variety of the work of BORDA and the countries where BORDA works in, as well. All projects focussed on the improvement of the living conditions of disadvantaged people in rural and urban regions.
The whole fund raising campaign achieved a total amount of 21.167 € (special thanks to the East-Asian Society Bremen that donated 18.000 €), which enabled BORDA to realize two of these five Projects: A new water supply for the Indian village of Jalahallihundi and basic sanitation facilities for the St. Angela Cheshire Home in Lesotho.

Project 1: Water supply for Jalahallihundi

Background:
Jalahallihundi is a small Indian village that is situated about 60 kilometres south of the city Mysore. Life of the 800 inhabitants is affected by an extreme shortage of water. Up to four hours a day the woman were busy with getting water from a distant well. There were only 80 to 100 litres of water available for a family of four. The people arranged with the shortage of water, but the hygiene suffered, because there was not enough water to wash one’s hands regularly for example. This was specially a problem for women and children because they are more likely to catch diseases. Due to the lack of water there are also no installed sanitation facilities, so the inhabitants have to do open defaecation behind bushes.

The Aim:
The project aimed on a drastic increase of the water supply and also on the quality of the water. There will be positive effects on the personnel hygiene, the health of the whole village and even positive income effects can be ecpected.

The Activity:
The new water supply that was built is based on two new wells that were drilled in the village back in August. Both wells were so rich that the originally planed drilling of a third well was unnecessary. The construction of five cisterns that have four water taps and a volume of 2900 litres each are also part of the new water supply. The cisterns that are connected with the wells are located in different spots at the village to make sure, that the inhabitants have short distances between their houses and the cisterns.
Social trainings were held in addition to the construction work. In these lections the villagers were educated in the hygienic handling water, the storage of water and the personnel hygienic behaviour. Special emphasis was put on the positive effects of reasonable handling of water on health, harvest, education and vitality.
On the 26th of November 2008 the new water supply of Jalahallihundi was inaugurated. All parts of the new water supply were decorated with flower festoons and were blessed in a traditional way. Afterwards the commissioner of the district Chamrajnagar, Mr. Praksah, signed a contract, which states that the district takes over the responsibility for bigger repair and maintenance work. On a countermove he passed the key for the control unit to the people of Jalahallihundi. The village community takes over the responsibility for the every day work like the filling of the cisterns and small maintenance work. By distributing the responsibility between the district administration and the users the operating ability of the water supply is ensured in a sustainable manner.

Outcomes:
The effects, the new water supply has on the villagers, are remarkable. There is a time saving of up to four hours each day, because the time the villagers need to get the necessary water decreased drastically. Now there is more time available, which is especially important for woman. They are now able to work full day, so there is a positive income effect for the whole village.
The amount of water available for the inhabitants is also increasing and can be used for daily hygiene and for drinking which improves the health of every villager, but especially the health of the children. The frequency of sicknesses like fever, diarrhoea and headache will decrease.

Project 2: Basic Sanitation facilities for the St. Angela Cheshire home in Lesotho

Background:
The St. Angela Cheshire Home in Lesotho accomplishes help for disabled children since 1985 from all over Lesotho. At the moment the home has 36 inhabitants; half of them depend on a wheelchair. The situation for disabled people in Lesotho is very difficult. They are seen as useless, most parents are ashamed of their disabled children and many of them even hide their children. The St. Angela Cheshire Home takes care of these children and the home-sisters try to integrate these children into society as good as possible. The home-children visit the adjacent primary school or the high school, which are also visited by enabled children of their age. On this way the home is also trying to encourage the parents to support their children, which is successful in the most cases.
The sanitation facillities at St. Angela were in utterly devastating conditions. Those stand free on the St. Angela´s terrain and are used by the residents during schooldays. At the moment they are neither wheelchair accessible, nor do they meet hygienic requirements. There is no toilet paper, but all the worse there is no possibility for hand washing. The children with mobility problems have to rely on their classmates, because the wheelchair does not even fully fit in the toilet, not to mention turning inside this room is impossible. The pits are often overflowing because there is no money available for the expensive emptying. The insufficient hygienic conditions raise the risk of infection.

The Aim:
The project aimed on the improvement on the catastrophic sanitation situation in the home.

The Activity:
The home will now get new toilets and wastewater treatment facilities (DEWATS). Due to heavy rain the facilities won’t be ready to operate before March. The new toilet will consist of one handicapped accessible toilet, two normal toilets and additional urinals for the boys. A washing basin will also be installed, so the hand washing is finally possible. The DEWATS facility will treat the water from the toilets so that it won’t cause damage to the environment and the health of the community any more.

The Outcomes:
These new sanitation standards will improve the hygiene of the whole home and will decrease the frequency of diarrhoea sicknesses drastically. This increases the time the children can go to school and so their chance getting a good job after school is better. The water used in the toilets won’t flow untreated into the environment any more, so there is less danger to the health of the whole neighbourhood. The children will also feel much safer in the new toilets which will decrease the possibility of being molested a lot.
Two additional effects of the new toilets and the DEWATS facilities are one the one hand that the treated and nutritious water can be used for the irrigation of the home’s fields. On the other hand there is biogas that emerges when the wastewater is treated and that can be used for cooking in the home’s kitchen. So the harvest will be bigger and the biogas enables the home to cook the meal in a more efficient way.

 

2. BORDA helps 2009 – The new campaign

School must not sicken children
Support hygiene, safety and basic sanitation in schools of southern Africa and Asia

Duration: 2009-2010

Background:
2.5 billion Humans have no, or only insufficient access to basic sanitation. Especially children have to suffer under the consequences of this shortage. In countless schools in Asia and Africa are conditions that are unimaginable for Europeans.
The BORDA helps fund raising campaign 2008/09 is supposed to help children, teenagers and young adults in our project areas in Asia and Africa. Many of them, especially the poor, visit schools, which basic sanitation is insufficient. These conditions cause dangerous infectious diseases. Hundreds of million children get infected every day. Especially the girls suffer the consequences. A lot of them don’t go to school when they have their period, because they do not want to use the dirty toilets that have no doors. Because of the lack of privacy and insufficient safety on these toilets there are often sexual assaults towards boys and girls.

The Aim:
The aim of this year’s fund raising campaign is to provide basic sanitation in schools for children, teenager and young adults.

The Activity:
This aim is achieved by constructing toilets that meet the needs of boys and girls. These toilets meet hygienic requirements including the provision of fresh water and they are also connected to a decentralised wastewater treatment facility. Additional hygiene education and maintenance trainings are also integrated. The costs are varying between different regions, but in average such a project can be implemented from 10.000 Euro.


The outcomes:

  • Securing privacy in the sanitation facilities by providing clean toilets that are supposed to operate over a long time
  • Toilets that meet the needs of boys and girls are guaranteeing security and will lower the absenteeism, especially for girls.
  • Good hygiene behaviour by health and hygiene education for children and teenager, which is learned by using available hygienic toilet facilities and then improved in school and at home in a sustainable manner; like e.g. hygienic handling of water as well as knowledge about the causes for infection.Extreme reduction of sicknesses caused by infection
  • Environmental protection by biologic treatment of wastewater.
  • Guarantee of a permanent maintenance of the facility by providing training for the school employees in running and maintaining the facility.
  • Using the biogas that occurs at wastewater treatment for cooking in the school kitchen.
  • Using the cleaned water for irrigating the garden.