A Year Later: Ilinge Community

A year ago, generous donors helped construct a sand dam and hand-dug well for Ilinge Community in Kenya. The contributions of incredible monthly donors and others giving directly to The Water Promise allow teams to visit project sites throughout the year, strengthening relationships with communities and evaluating the water project over time. These consistent visits allow us to learn vital lessons and hear amazing stories – and we’re excited to share this one from Lilian Kendi with you.

People living in Ilinge are seeing much more successful farming activities since the provision of water through the sand dam and well system here. There is now food security for this community. The water from the well is fresh and easy to access, now that it is less than 500 meters from people's homesteads.

Thumbs up for a transformative source of water! From left to right: Lillian Kendi, Regina Nzau, Nicholas Kitusa

Mr. Nicholas Kitusa and Mrs. Regina Nzau met us at the sand dam and well to tell us more about how this system has impacted life over the past year.

"The hunger that was there initially has reduced tremendously because most members have the ability to farm at their homesteads," shared Mr. Kitusa.

Mr. Nicholas Kitusa

"Improved standards of hygiene can be observed, from the use of latrines to installing handwashing stations at our homesteads and also how we organize our utensils. The lessons have helped us a great deal."

The environment in Ilinge has improved drastically due to the presence of water; it is cool, serene and very lush with fruit trees such as mango, pawpaw, and other shade trees. There is great farming and irrigation being practiced in the region.

"We have managed to plant trees at our homesteads because there is water present," said Mrs. Nzau.

Mrs. Regina Nzau pumping water at the sand dam.

"We would also walk for very long distances and the water we would get was not clean or fresh for direct consumption. However, that is just a distant memory of the troubles we encountered. Currently, water is easily accessible and we walk for less than 500 meters to fetch the water. There's always water even during the dry seasons as there's a lot of sand along the river bed," said Mrs. Nzau.

Construction of the dam and well is only one step along the journey toward sustainable access to clean water. The Water Project is committed to consistent monitoring of each water source. Our monitoring and evaluation program, made possible by donors like you, allows us to maintain our relationships with communities by visiting up to 4 times each year to ensure that the water points are safe and reliable.

This is just one of the many ways that we monitor projects and communicate with you. Additionally, you can always check the functionality status and our project map to see how all of our water points are performing, based on our consistent monitoring data.

This is only possible because of the web of support and trust built between The Water Project, our local teams, the community, and you. We are excited to stay in touch with this community and support their journey with safe water.

Read more about The Water Promise and how you can help.