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FROM THE FIELD

Ethiopia: Water gathering is a full-time job
22 Oct 2009 08:13:52 GMT
 Source: Oxfam GB - UK
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Background

•  Food and hunger

•  African hunger

•  E. African hunger

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Today is 25 years on from the 1984 famine, but the food crisis in East Africa continues. As a new Oxfam report calls for food aid to be re-examined, Oxfam’s Jane Beesley visits our ongoing programme in one of the driest regions of Ethiopia.



The light is eerie. Dust hangs in the atmosphere hiding the sun, leaving a strange orange glow. This is one of the driest areas in the Somali region of Ethiopia. It’s also one of the main routes to Djibouti. We’re following endless trucks that throw up clouds of dust making it virtually impossible to pass. What can it be like living next to this road?

There’s a women standing at the top of a hole in the ground - bright yellow jerry cans and donkeys surround her. There are nine other women down the hole she tells us… forming a human chain to bring water up from the bottom of a cave. They don’t need ropes because, “God has provided a ladder” â€" a series of rock-formed steps. It can take nearly all day, every day to collect water and they’ve been relying on this water source for eight months this year.

Our driver goes down the hole. Back on terra firma he tells us it was like being in a grave. They don’t tell him until he’s up that there’s a snake down there with them. When they’ve finished another team of ten women take their place. I can’t imagine what it must be like to have to do this. I wonder if they can imagine that back home I can easily get plenty of clean water, any time, any day… always just a few steps away. Is it unimaginable? Like going to the doctors, going to school and all those other things we take for granted.

The cave entrance, with the newly constructe rock dam wall in the background [Photo credit: Jane Beesley]
The cave entrance, with the newly constructe rock dam wall in the background [Photo credit: Jane Beesley]
Behind them is a concrete wall. We’ve recently constructed a rock dam. If the rainy season is good then the dam should fill, making life a little easier for some of the year for these women.

The day is spent visiting various sites where Oxfam is working, or planning to work. The difference in people’s lives is obvious. At some places there is lack of water and pasture. Others have water but it’s open to the elements and often rubbish and animal droppings fall in, or, like the cave above, is difficult to reach.

Where there is a borehole, and protected waterpoints, life is, comparatively, healthier and easier. Sometimes, in this work, it’s easy to get a little cynical and disheartened. Are we really making a difference? But today it’s been pretty obvious that constructing boreholes, protecting wells, working with communities on water management (and the many other activities) definitely makes a difference. As someone said, “All life depends on water.” Now the challenge is to do more.

Leaving a village, where Oxfam has installed, amongst other things, a solar energy unit to pump water, I suddenly see a cheetah running alongside my side of the vehicle. He runs for a short while before turning in front of our vehicle and bounding off into the bush. He’s in peak condition - a rare, chance sighting of a thing of beauty. Everyone in the car is excited and some how uplifted.

In the far distance we can see a black rain cloud… hopefully not another rare, chance sighting… and hopefully coming this way.

Ethiopia drought: Photostory on how Oxfam is responding

Find out more: East Africa Food Crisis

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More from the Oxfam Press Office at http://www.oxfam.org.uk/news


[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]

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Topics

•  Politics of Aid

•  Food and hunger

•  Water

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•  African hunger

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[ Any views expressed in this article are those of the writer and not of Reuters. ]

Background information

Briefings
E. African hunger - [Who works where]
African hunger - [Who works where]

Topics
Politics of Aid Food and hunger Water
Facts & figures
Djibouti Ethiopia

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Typhoon victims get water rations outside the evacuation centre in Muntinlupa city, metro Manila October 22, 2009. The Philippines is still recovering from two recent typhoons Ketsana and Parma that brought ...


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Last updated:Thu Oct 22 08:33:08 2009