Even before the recent earthquakes, life was a daily struggle to survive in the hills and mountains of Nepal. Many communities are based a long way from water sources, meaning people have to spend up to four hours a day carrying water just to grow enough crops to survive.
This exhausting ordeal takes its toll on people physically and emotionally, as Sumina, a farmer from Muralibhanjyang, Nepal, attested to in 2013:
‘‘‘Carrying water is heavy and hard, so I used to get problems in my stomach”, she told Gethin Jones in a BBC Lifeline Appeal “I wanted to water all the vegetables, but I just couldn’t carry enough water. I used to feel like crying. I used to feel so desperate.”
Now, with the country in chaos, many have lost everything. Survivors’ homes have been destroyed, their livestock crushed, their farmland wrecked by landslides. These people desperately need time and resources to be able to rebuild their homes and get their farms producing again.
But the need for water has not gone away. They must still carry out this daily chore, exhausting themselves trying to stave off thirst and hunger. Most families live off the land, and this land needs irrigating to grow food. If they cannot obtain enough water to irrigate their land they face starvation by the end of the year.
Brighton based charity Renewable World, who supply renewable energy to rural, energy-poor people across the world, have been working in Nepal for many years. They have used renewable energy systems to pump water to people like Sumina who live in some of the most remote and impoverished villages in Nepal.
The pumps provide much needed water for drinking, sanitation and irrigation and an opportunity to earn a more sustainable and stable living.
According to Nick Virr, Global Programme Manager at Renewable World “once water is readily available, it can be used for productive uses. You can start growing high value cash crops like garlic, chillies and tomatoes that can be sold at the local markets, increasing the revenue for a family by about forty to fifty per cent”.
The solar or hydraulic ram powered water pumping systems have provided a vital lifeline to communities supported by Renewable World during the aftermath of the first earthquake, and somehow have continued to function in spite of the wreckage around them. It is as yet unknown how the second quake has affected them.
Renewable World is determined to show those in other communities which do not yet have pumping systems that they have not been abandoned.
They plan to reach out to as many other communities as possible, helping them by installing water pumps to bring them water and allow them to irrigate their land, turning it from wrecked wasteland to working farmland as quickly as possible.
Helen Russell, Development Officer at Renewable World, told us “At the moment, people across Nepal are focussed on surviving from day to day. Our mission is to help them move past that to a stable and sustainable future. No-one can live on emergency relief forever, so our work helping people begin farming again is essential.”
If you like the sound of Renewable World’s work, you can donate towards it at www.justgiving.com/NepalUrgentAppeal, where you will be able to gift aid your donation.
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