Stop the Rot – helps us stop the scandal of pump corrosion

This week RWSN/UPGro hosted a webinar on:

• Overcoming the Rural Water Supply Scandal of Handpump Corrosion (RWSN) – Recording (English)
• Dépasser le scandale de la corrosion des pompes manuelles dans l’approvisionnement rural en eau (RWSN) – Recording (French)

The key points are:

• handpump corrosion has been known about for 30 years,
• it is avoidable
• yet every day, well-meaning organisations are funding or installing the wrong pumps, poor quality pumps or making false savings by not having independent drilling and installation supervision.
• This can leave water users a usable without safe water within 6 months.

In this webinar, Bony Etti and Jacinta Nekesa from WaterAid Uganda describe their shocking findings from investigating boreholes and pumps (in partnership with  Mitzi Erin Brett, a MSc student from Mercer University and linked to the UPGro Hidden Crisis catalyst study) some of which have failed or become unusable within 6 months of being installed.

Jake Carpenter, a consultant and former Peace Corps volunteer in Uganda describes the history, theory and practice of corrosion issues and provides practical solutions for resolving the issue.

Our discussants, Dr Peter Harvey (UNICEF) and Jess MacArthur (iDE) add their comments on why this avoidable problem is still around and in a lively Q&A session, some positive ways forward are discussed.

Although the examples in the presentation are from Uganda, we know that this problem is happening in at least 25 countries in Africa and Asia and many more.

If you would like more information to help inform and influence either your own organisation or those that you know of that are still installing inappropriate materials, then please let us know.