Sustainability
Water & sanitation
It is easy in countries like Australia to take our ability to turn on a tap and have clean water for granted, but in Sierra Leone one is always aware that — water is life. So says co-founder of Hakeem Schools, Sarjoh Bah who dreams of providing the Hakeem Schools community with safe water, putting the schools on the path to self-sustainability and good health.
The sad state of our water access today
Sierra Leone may be a lush tropical country, yet people here struggle to have access to safe drinking water. In poor neighbourhoods, it can be dangerous fetching water, which is often the job of young members of underprivileged families. In our schools’ neighbourhoods, on early morning water runs done before school, some young women have been attacked and raped. Sarjoh says it is sad that this happens, but it does. However he has a plan to minimise these risks.
“We easily forget how great we have it in places like Australia,” Sarjoh says.
“I don’t have to worry about my children getting up and fetching water and this for me is a privilege for which I am very grateful. I hope to assist Hakeem Schools and the community to obtain access to clean water.”
With a proper water supply on tap, food can grow, diseases can be eradicated and people can thrive.
Please join us to make this dream a reality.
Learn how you can make a difference
Our proposed steps towards a water-safe community
We are committed to developing innovative, long-term and cost-effective solutions that are tailored to each community’s unique needs and can reduce levels of poverty and disease.
We aim to:
- Build a handwashing station to help meet children’s hygiene needs.
- Provide water purifying treatment packages to our students and their families to help reduce the risk of water-born infectious such as malaria and cholera.
- Install boreholes for the community. This can help the water become accessible and also clean enough for drinking, washing and cooking.
- Please join us to make this dream a reality.
Water stats today
According to the WHO and UNICEF, almost 900 million people in the world do not have access to clean water – or one in eight people.
Lack of access to clean water, poor sanitation and unsafe hygiene practices have claimed many lives and this is very real for Sierra Leone, being one of the poorest countries in the world.
In emergencies, many more lives are put at risk by inadequate water supplies and poor sanitation. It’s estimated that, at the bare minimum, a person needs 15 litres of water per day for drinking, cooking, and washing.
This makes providing clean water a massive task requiring the sort of specialist skills and equipment that these large organisations have.
See how you can help
The Water Project
The people at the water project are fighting to help the people of Sierra Leone’s have better water conditions, as are we.
The say: “Sierra Leoneans collect most of their drinking water from polluted sources. Pollutants and poor sanitation are attributed to some of the health problems in the country. Sierra Leone is one of the toughest countries to survive in.
“The average life expectancy for a Sierra Leonean is only 56 years. One of the lowest in the world, much of this statistic can be blamed on poor living conditions. Almost half of the population is not using a protected water source for drinking.