Rwanda: Japan Donates Water Tanks to School

Rain water tanks at schools improve the lives of students and save considerable amounts of money in some areas, as the article below states.  Rainwater harvesting not only saves money at schools but educates learners about conserving water – the water tanks are in plain view and are seen every day by learners, reinforcing the water conservation message. School rooftops are also ideal for rainwater harvesting

The Japanese embassy inaugurated four rainwater collection tanks worth Rwf 60m at College Doctrina Vitae (CDV) in Ndera Sector of Gasabo District in the City of Kigali.

The support was provided through Grassroots Human Security Project (GGP) in order to address water shortages at the school.

The Japanese Ambassador to Rwanda, Kazuya Ogawa said his country was happy to collaborate with Rwanda to attain Vision 2020 goals that include increasing access to clean water, adding that the support has significantly played a big role in suppression of water crisis and related waterborne diseases in the school.

Solving hygiene problems:

“The school was obliged to meet additional expenditures fetching outside water and dirty water from lower land which consequently was affecting students, we believe the school has met national water supply standards for students and sanitary problems to be solved,” he said.

School officials say the water tanks are able to act as reservoirs for not only rain water from all school’s roofing but also tap water that can be used the whole month without any water crisis.

The chairperson of the school, Gaspard Ahobamuteze, said the water tanks have enabled them reduce water costs and tackle hygienic related diseases among the students.

“The water cost has effectively gone down after the installation of these water collection facilities. We used to spend around Rwf150,000 but now the cost was reduced to only Rwf20, 000 per month,” he said.

He also noted that the number of students affected by water borne related diseases has been significantly reduced.

Deo Sebudandi is a nurse in CDV own dispensary. He noted that since the students started using clean water from the water tanks the number of students affected by diarrhoea declined from 10 per cent to 2 per cent, skin diseases went from 7 per cent to zero whereas sanitation in general went up from 40 per cent to 90 per cent.

Source: AllAfrica.com (By Noël Turikumwe)