Reliable and Sustainable Borehole Safe Drinking Water Packages for Water-stressed and Underserved Communities in Rural Cameroon

Objectives:
1. improve the accessibility to a source of reliable and safe drinking water to primary and nursery school communities;
2. improve the accessibility to a source of reliable and safe drinking water to other kids, older men and women living in neighbouring communities to these schools;
3. reduce the incidence of water-borned diseases in these communities;
4. raise the nutritional status of kids living in these communities through a reduction in the time women spend searching for safe drinking water at distant locations;
5. improve the school attendance rate and the overall school performances of elementary and primary school kids

Implementation
1. involve school and adjacent communities in water access point siting right from the start;
2. work with rural councils, school parent-teacher association bodies, and existing community association groups to mobilize needed support labour for the project;
3. use the same institutions to elect a post-project water management committee to management and maintain facility with funds from council, the parent-teacher association and token monthly contributions from beneficiary communities;
5. ensure boreholes are drilled to depths that guarantee continuous flow of groundwater throughout the year irrespective of the season;
6 ensure all technical aspects, and needed parts are inspected before installation;
7. install durable push and release valves that hardly fail and institute a rationing policy whereby water is accessed only thrice per day at specific times.

Follow-up mechanism
1. deploy field inspection technical staff to identify all critical activities required for quality. Technical staff members perform direct field inspection of tasks to ensure specifications are met;
2. our quality control manager will work with field technical staffer to control quality before contractors are paid;
3. establish a project implementation time-line and perform weekly inspection of project progress to ensure work progresses according to plan;
4. create and review a work log book or timesheet to control assiduity and match claimed work to time indicated on logs

Governance and sustainability
1. rally key stakeholders: councillors, school heads and heads of village associations and reveal well ahead of time total project cost/budget, scope and expected duration
2. conduct pre-project meetings to collect data about the kind of borehole technology known to be most suitable, other specific needs and expectations
3. agree on amount to be contributed per month and how funds will be managed and who will be responsible
4. also agree on how to elect members of the water management committee
5. establish a code of ethics that is binding to all stakeholders

Factoring indigenous knowledge
1. create a community of practice (CoP) to collect indigenous knowledge in water conservation alternatives
2. organize knowledge transfer sessions with the CoP to transfer water management know-how to members of the community;
3. focus on sustainable water manage practices such as rainwater collection and treatment, and preservation of water catchment areas in order to ensure long-term availability of groundwater for the facility.