Long Walk To Water
When and Where
Tabitha
Therefore, providing safe and reliable water is a vital part of the Tabitha Community Development programme. Tabitha gives 85% of the funds required for each new well; the families provide the balance via the savings programme. Janne Ritskes, the founder and director of the Tabitha Foundation, calls having clean water "the gift of life."
Tabitha is currently providing 200 to 300 new water sources per month throughout Cambodia and wishes to increase this number as much as possible. In the year ended August 2013 we were able to install 2,843 new sources of water which directly impacted 6,766 families. Direct impact refers to the families as they must be able to earn an income from the water - but - families families in the community who do not have their own water source do have free access to the water for family use - uses like taking baths, washing clothes, water for cooking and cleaning.
The impact on our families is immense - their spendable income changes dramatically from less than 50 cents a day to an average of $6000 USD per year ($16.00 per day). How is this done? For families who have land suitable for growing rice: the change is from growing rice just once a year to growing rice year round. Families have an average of 2 hectares of land but the land if often broken into various plots of differing sizes. They now grow rice and vegetables at different stages - some plots are being harvested, other plots the produce is half grown and in others the it is beginning to be planted. The effect is amazing as our families are constantly harvesting and earning income every month from they are growing.
14,180 of our families began growing rice or vegetables year round this past program year.
We hope to install 3,433 new sources of water during the coming year.