Monitoring

As always, monitoring is one of the most important steps in our filter project. This month we dedicated our time to monitoring in 10 of the 14 communities under the Carroll Creek Matching Grant.
Tacaulapa, Tencoa
Ceibita Sur, Ceibita Sur
Santa Ana, Ceguaca
Tierra colorada, Arada
Zorca Arriba, Arada
Zorca Abajo, Arada
Buenos Aires, Concepción Sur
El ocotillo, Arada
El Carmen, Atima
Berlin, Atima
Family with filter in Buenos Aires, Concepcion Sur. The woman second from the left is the head of the family and is hillarious. She attended all of the filter workshops and remembered everything about the filter and asked about Chris Green and David Putt from Canada.

Although we have focused on monitoring this month it doesn’t mean that we have forgotten about installing new filters under the Maine Matching Grant. A number of factors make initiation of filter installation in new communities quite difficult; including the coffee harvest, the rain and Christmas. First, as many of you know, Santa Barbara is a large coffee producing department, and many of the communities that we work with are primarily coffee producers. We are currently in the peak of the coffee harvest, which means that virtually everyone is participating in the harvest and if we tried to hold a community meeting we would probably find ourselves in an empty schoolroom. Second, the rain makes some of the roads to communities impassable by the large truck we use to deliver filters, so new deliveries are stalled. Third, Santa Barbara is in feria right now and Christmas is approaching which means that people are more focused on the holidays and traveling to be with family than hearing about new filters. We plan to reinitiate filter installation in new communities under the Maine Matching Grant in February 2008.

Deparisiting

Initiation of deparasting continues to be a slow process, although we are making progress. In order to demonstrate that there is in fact a need for deparasiting in the communities where we install filters (although we know that there is through experience) we ran lab tests of feces samples of seven beneficiaries of filters from Jimilie.

We found that each individual had between 1-4 different parasites, the three youngest sampled had the most. According to the World Health Organization, the prevalence and intensity of worm infections peak in children aged ~6-15. This is also the age at which parasites can affect the body most, causing malnutrition, anaemia, stunted growth, and can retard both physical and cognitive development.

We have also made progress working with Dr. Alvaro Perez, a Santa Barbara Rotary Club member to determine which medications we need to buy. The next step is to find the best source for the parasite treatments and get started.

If you would like results from the tests please contact Agua Pura Santa Barbara at aguapurasb@gmail.com for a copy.

CAWST Workshops

CAWST (Center for Affordable Water and Sanitation Technology) is an NGO based out of Canada that supports filter projects with technical information and trainings all over the world. The Agua Pura team was lucky enough to attend a filter workshop facilitated by Andrea Roach. Andrea Roach joined CAWST in 2005 to provide training and consulting services for the Central American region as well as Mexico and Brazil. Andrea is a Professional Engineer and brings to CAWST water and sanitation experience in El Salvador, where she lived for two years, as well as five years of experience in the petroleum industry. She holds a Chemical Engineering Degree from the University of British Columbia and is a qualified CAWST trainer including technical training in Biosand Filtration and other treatment technologies.

The workshop was sponsored by a church from the states that has adopted four communities in south east Santa Barbara (don´t worry, no interference with our project, only support) where they will be introducing filters. It was especially important for Sergio, Mauricio and Allison to attend the workshop, as they have never received outside formal training. Overall, we were able to hone our understanding of the filters and share our experiences with the other attendees.

From left: Andrea Roach, Alliosn O´Donnell, Nineth Mungia

Following the workshop Nineth went to Tegucigalpa to attend the Taller Centro Americano de Implementadores de Filtros Bioarena (Central American Workshop of Biosand Filter Implementers) held by CAWST and International Aid.