Rogbom Kakalay Community

Project Status

Project Type: Borehole Well and Hand Pump

Regional Program: Port Loko, Sierra Leone WaSH Program

Impact: 147 Served

Project Phase: In Service - Feb 2025

Functionality Status: Functional

Project Features

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The 147 people of Rogbom Kakalay Community struggle to access sufficient water. Their only water source is a swamp, which endangers their health and lives every time they use it.

When the community members need to collect water, which is a daily task, they must travel to a swamp filled with snakes and other poisonous creatures. The water they collect is precisely what you would picture from a swamp. Filled with animal waste and other contaminants, sure to make them ill.

Field Officer Phillip James Allieu shared the state of affairs in Rogbom Kakalay. "Every morning during the dry season, the water users of this community will not rest until they fetch a little amount of water to their houses. When the water is filthy, they sometimes have no option but to fetch it from the swamp and filter it before drinking. The school-going children in this community walk about three miles to Kathoma Village to attend school. Their parents wake them up from sleep every morning to fetch water from the swamp before they can prepare to leave the community to attend school."

15-year-old Isatu K., seen below, knows the struggle well. She shared, "I need to rush to fetch clean water from the swamp early in the morning. The water would be filthy if I were late to fetch water. Everyone in this village rushes to fetch water from the swamp in the morning. It's not easy for me to fetch water [and] do other activities before going to school. I walk every day to attend school in Kathoma Village; it is a far distance."

"My weekend is always busy with work to do. It is during the weekend that I must make sure that enough [water] is available at my house. I also go to the farm to join my parents working. It's not good to fetch drinking water from the swamp because there are particles on the surface of the water. I am not happy to fetch water from the swamp," she continued.

Farmer Mariatu Kanu, 23, seen below, faces the challenge of obtaining enough water and still having time to tend her farm. Mariatu said, "I struggle to fetch water to do my daily activities. There is only one water well (pool of water) at the swamp where I fetch water. The swamp water well cannot provide enough water for everyone at the same time during the dry season. Everyone in this village rushes to fetch water from the swamp early [in the] morning. If I could not fetch water early, the water would be filthy before I get to the swamp to fetch water."

The only other option this community has is to collect rainwater; however, during the dry season, that is impossible. The Rogbom Kakalay Community is faced with an almost hopeless challenge. Installing a new well will be the first step towards improving their lives.

Installing the well will enable adults like Mariatu to focus on her farm and other life-improving tasks and children like Isatu to quickly and easily collect water before they make their trek to school. This will allow them to focus more on their education and create a better future for their community.

The Proposed Solution, Determined Together...

At The Water Project, everyone has a part in conversations and solutions. We operate in transparency, believing it benefits everyone. We expect reliability from one another as well as our water solutions. Everyone involved makes this possible through hard work and dedication.

In a joint discovery process, community members determine their most advantageous water solution alongside our technical experts. Read more specifics about this solution on the What We're Building tab of this project page. Then, community members lend their support by collecting needed construction materials (sometimes for months ahead of time!), providing labor alongside our artisans, sheltering and feeding the builders, and supplying additional resources.

Water Access for Everyone

This water project is one piece in a large puzzle. In Kenya, Sierra Leone, and Uganda, we're working toward complete coverage of reliable, maintained water sources that guarantee public access now and in the future within a 30-minute round trip for each community, household, school, and health center. One day, we hope to report that this has been achieved!

Training on Health, Hygiene & More

With the community's input, we've identified topics where training will increase positive health outcomes at personal, household, and community levels. We'll coordinate with them to find the best training date. Some examples of what we train communities on are:

Improved hygiene, health, and sanitation habits
Safe water handling, storage & treatment
Disease prevention and proper handwashing
Income-generation
Community leadership, governance, & election of a water committee
Operation and maintenance of the water point

Project Updates

February, 2025: Rogbom Kakalay Community Well Complete!

We are excited to share that your donation provided a safe, reliable well at Rogbom Kakalay Community. As a result, community members no longer rely on unsafe water to meet their daily needs. We conducted hygiene and sanitation training, which focused on healthy practices such as handwashing and using latrines.

"Now I have access to clean water to drink. I will be able to fetch enough water to store at home. I have clean water to launder clothes and bathe. Now, this well is here in my community. I will cook food quickly and have more time for my garden work. I will get [a] large quantity of production which help me to generate [an] income," said 22-year-old farmer Mariatu Kanu.

Mariatu Kanu.

"My parents will not be walking long distances to access water, and at least they have safe drinking water in the community. They will access it easily and have enough time to work at the farm. My mother will cook the food for us quickly," said 12-year-old Zainab.

"Now this well is here in my community, I will fetch water easily and concentrate on my studies," Zainab continued.

Zainab.

After construction was complete, we held a dedication ceremony to officially give responsibility for the well to the water users. Several local dignitaries attended the ceremony, including representatives from the Ministry of Water Resources, the Port Loko District Council, and local councilor Debora Kamara. Each official gave a short speech thanking those who contributed to this water project and reminding everyone to care for it. Then, Mariatu and Zainab made statements on their community's behalf. The ceremony concluded with celebration, singing, and dancing.

Zainab shares how the new well will make a difference in her daily life.

New Well

The community provided space for the drill team to store their belongings and meals for the duration of their stay. We were ready to begin drilling!

We drilled until we reached a final depth of 22 meters. The team did a soil test, bailed the well and flushed it, clearing any debris generated by the drilling process. This well has a static water level of 10 meters. Finally, we tested the water flow to ensure the well would provide clean water with minimal effort at the pump.

As the project neared completion, we built a cement platform, walls, and drainage system around the well to seal it from surface-level contaminants. The drainage system helps to redirect spilled water to help avoid standing water at the well, which is unhygienic and a breeding ground for disease-carrying mosquitoes.

Finally, we installed the pump and conducted a water quality test. The results showed the water was fit for drinking!

Community Education

Before conducting any hygiene training, we collaborated with the local water user committee to understand the community's challenges. We identified households without handwashing stations. With this information, community members worked together to improve hygiene and sanitation at home before the training.

We scheduled a time when members from each household using the waterpoint could attend a three-day hygiene and sanitation training and dispatched our teams to hold the meeting.

Learning how to make a handwashing station.

We taught the participants about proper handwashing, personal and menstrual hygiene, and healthy habits such as using latrines and maintaining a balanced diet. We discussed how disease transmission and water hygiene are crucial to community health. We emphasized the importance of maintaining and caring for the well pump and the cost recovery system.

"The participants had a great enthusiasm for the hygiene training throughout the three days. Each lesson [that] was introduced to them, they were eager and focused to learn because these lessons were new to them. They gave contributions and paid attention to these lessons," shared Field Officer Alie Kamara.

Mariatu helping during a training session.

"I am happy for this training. I usually fetched water from the swamp. During this training, I have learned new ideas, and this will impact my life [and] also my community people on hygiene practices in the community. I have learned how to take care of the water well or pump, maintain [a] clean environment, handwashing, tippy tap construction, and many more [ideas]," shared Mariatu, who was quoted earlier.

Thank you for making all of this possible!

January, 2025: Exciting Progress in Rogbom Kakalay Community!

We’re thrilled to share that, thanks to your generous support, significant change is coming for Isatu and the entire Rogbom Kakalay Community. Construction has begun on the well project, bringing them one step closer to having clean, reliable water.

But that's not all—during construction, we’re also providing vital health training. These sessions equip the community with essential hygiene practices, ensuring that the benefits of clean water extend to lasting health improvements.

We’re so grateful for your role in making this possible. Stay tuned for more updates—soon, we’ll be celebrating the arrival of safe water in the Rogbom Kakalay Community!

Project Type

Abundant water is often right under our feet! Beneath the Earth’s surface, rivers called aquifers flow through layers of sediment and rock, providing a constant supply of safe water. For borehole wells, we drill deep into the earth, allowing us to access this water which is naturally filtered and protected from sources of contamination at the surface level. First, we decide where to drill by surveying the area and determining where aquifers are likely to sit. To reach the underground water, our drill rigs plunge through meters (sometimes even hundreds of meters!) of soil, silt, rock, and more. Once the drill finds water, we build a well platform and attach a hand pump. If all goes as planned, the community is left with a safe, closed water source providing around five gallons of water per minute! Learn more here!