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08/02/2016 02:30 PMTurn on a tap and what do you get? Water. Run the hose and what comes out? Water. Stand under a shower and what streams down your body? Water. But not if you live in the rural areas of Malawi in eastern Africa. There is very little to drink, very little for basic sanitation, and very little for farmers to irrigate their crops.
“In my home village, people struggle for water,” said Father Austin Phiri, a native of Malawi who is now a Catholic chaplain at The Connecticut Hospice in Branford and at St. Raphael’s Hospital in New Haven. “I think about it here when I turn on the tap and get running water. Malawi is hot and humid; you can’t take a shower and there is no air conditioning and there is very little drinkable water. It is paining me that you can’t turn on the water there every time I turn on the water here.”
Even more serious, Phiri pointed out, there is only minimal water for agriculture, and farmers in an area that is now suffering from a drought rely on rain to water their crops.
“In Malawi, they are dependent on rain and agriculture is our main activity. Maize is our main harvest. It is a staple food. We use it to make the porridge that everybody eats. But if there is no rain, there is no maize and so there is no food. We have no supermarket we can go to,” he said.
If there were enough water, according to Phiri, farmers could harvest three crops a year, ameliorating the food shortages.
That is where where Malawi Farmers Inc., enters the picture. Malawi Farmers, a recently formed Connecticut organization, wants to build wells in Malawi, drilled deep enough so that water flows even in the dry season, which lasts from May to August. The new organization grew from Phiri’s contacts with a number of local residents as well as contact with fellow priests. It’s now growing further locally, thanks to former Essex resident Sam Powell, who met Phiri as a hospice volunteer and is the president of the new charitable foundation.
“I work closely with Father Austin and he told us about the desperate nature of Southern Malawi with no sustainable water. People live in desperate straits,” Powell said.
The goal of Malawi Farmers is to have a well drilled in Mphungo, Phiri’s native village, by this October.
“Once we have one well, we will look towards another. The first well will give the village hope for the future and show we are sincere in our promises,” Powell said.
Though cost varies depending on local conditions, the average amount needed to drill a well is $7,000. Malawi Farmers is now engaged in a fund drive to raise that amount. The organization has already completed the paperwork to comply with both federal and state regulations as a tax-deductible foundation.
Powell went to California to talk with Water Wells for Africa (WWFA), a charitable organization that has been drilling wells in Africa since l996. In fact, Malawi was the first country in which the group drilled its first wells. Malawi Farmers is raising the money and will engage WWFA to drill the well.
“They are the people who have the expertise,” Powell explained. “We don’t want to drill ineffective wells.” According to Powell, WWFA’s wells do not rely on high-tech equipment. Instead, he explained they are purposely low-tech, safe and sustainable so they can be managed and repaired by local residents.
The most important thing to know about well drilling in Malawi, Phiri pointed out, is when to drill. Effective wells, he pointed out, must go deep enough to reach water at all times of the year. That means the wells must be drilled during the dry season. Some existing wells, drilled in the rainy season, do not reach the water table during the arid months. And, shallow-drilled wells have a problem even when they find water. Because they are relatively close to the surface, they pump up liquid contaminated with sewage and become not lifesaving mechanisms but vectors for disease.
Unclean water, WWFA’s website www.malawifarmersinc.org points out, kills far more people in the developing world than armed conflict.
On a continent marked by extreme poverty, landlocked Malawi is rated as one of the poorest countries in Africa. The Human Development Index created by the United Nations Development Programme rates the country in its lowest category. The World Bank listed Malawi’s average per capita income as $350 in 2015. Once known as Nyasaland, the country changed its name to Malawi when it gained independence from Great Britain in 1964.
More than 8,000 miles separate Malawi from the United States, but the distance, according to Powell, is not a barrier to assistance.
“The problem is far away but the endeavor is worthwhile. Water would change their whole way of life,” Powell said.
Phiri echoed his sentiments: “Water is life; without water, life is impossible.”
To learn more about Malawi Farmers, Inc., visit www.malawaifarmersinc.org.