Field Notes for July and August 2015

Cambodia

The tender for the construction of the 9 Community Water Treatment Plants in the selected communes (refer here to previous field notes for more details) were officially awarded in packages to 3 specialist contractors. The construction phase of the projects is expected to end in early September, with training of the entrepreneur and the community water management committee to take place after that. Health and hygiene promotion will also be conducted to the villagers after the training sessions and water quality testing is completed.

After a few months of discussions and testing of the water sources, we finally signed the Memorandum of Agreement with the Banteay Meanchey Provincial Department of Rural Development as well as the commune chiefs and commune council members of Bos Sbou and Phnum Dei communes, for the implementation of 2 new projects under our Community Water Enterprise programme. These projects are an extension of the Asian Development Bank funded Community Pond Projects. More details on this will be published in a separate post.

China

The projects in the 5^th batch of the Village Water Management programme in China were completed in July after several delays in Anshun due to national rail works in the province that have obstructed access to the selected water sources. These projects have been generously co-funded by the Coutts Foundation and have enabled 17,959 rural poor in the prefectures of Zunyi, Anshun and Bijie to gain access to piped clean water. Read more about the challenges and outcomes here.

From 24^th to 27^th August, the training workshop for the 8^th batch of the Village Water Management programme in China was carried out. 44 Student Village Officers, County Water Department Officials and other partners gathered in Chishui city, Guizhou Province for the workshop. The opening ceremony of the workshop was graced by leaders from the China Association for Poverty Alleviation and Development, the Chongqing Association for Poverty Alleviation and Development as well as management staff from CITIC Envirotech Limited who volunteered their time to share their professional knowledge about water treatment and career development lessons during the workshop. Find out more about their involvement in a separate post to be published soon.

The workshop participants represent 30 rural poor villages with clean water needs in Guizhou, Hunan, Shandong, Hebei and Chongqing. The 4-day workshop delved into topics related to small – scale water project management, with a particular focus on teaching participants how to conduct needs assessment and draft water project proposals. After the completion of the workshop, our team in China will be conducting on-site assessments of the 30 proposals and the final list of projects selected for implementation will form the 8^th batch of projects to be delivered under the Village Water Management programme in China.

Singapore

This update is a little late but we participated in the Humanitarian Forum and Fair on 30^th May, showcasing our Community Water Enterprise programme in an exhibit during the Fair. Held at Catholic Junior College, the Humanitarian Forum and Fair is a biennial event for dialogue, inspiration and connection on humanitarian initiatives in the region, organised by Caritas Humanitarian Aid & Relief Initiatives Singapore (CHARIS).