Kenya Archives

Water Scarcity in Kenya: A Dire Crisis

Water scarcity is something familiar to the African region. Many African countries lack access to clean water at their disposal. It is well-researched that 1 in 3 Africans face water scarcity. 400 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa lack access to clean drinking water.

Kenya is on the East African coast, yet it is facing one of the worst droughts of its time. Wajir county borders the Indian Ocean. Thus, the people of the Wajir Region struggle to survive without access to clean water.

Lack of water scarcity affecting people in Kenya:

Roughly 40 million people live in Kenya, and almost half don’t have clean water access. The population is large in proportion to the small country. This makes water access skewed. While there may be access to water, this water isn’t clean, and Kenyans don’t have the means to filter this water.

People are drinking dirty water out of desperation. Diseases like cholera, dysentery, typhoid, dehydration from diarrhea, etc., are rising. The risk to their health and well-being cannot be at stake. Access to clean water is their fundamental right to life.

Climate change is exacerbating the water crisis issue in Kenya. The country is facing a severe drought with 30% of its average rainfall. It is the worst short rain season in decades.

Lack of rainfall affects the citizen’s access to water. Pastures and agricultural livelihood are declining. So, families are drowning deep in poverty.

Story of Zenab Jule

Zenab Jule is an expecting mother with two other children in Africa. She is poverty-stricken due to the droughts. Zenab has only been feeding them maize. She says, “both toddlers are suffering from diarrhea. It is a common symptom of malnourishment among children below five.”

This water crisis affects not just the people, crops, and animals in Kenya but also the children. Children often have to drop out of school to help their families or follow them to other areas in search of water. The average length of a person fetching clean water is approximately 9 miles. Thus, they intend to pack up and move for better living conditions.

Water scarcity is a complex issue with no clear solution. However, many companies are formulating solutions to ensure clean water accessibility.

Adopt a Village Project (AVP)

Life in Kenya – Wajir County

48.5 Million population
35.6% of the population live on less than US $1.90 per day
Inhabitants concentrated in four villages (Bulla Elmi, Bulla Abdiaziz 1, Bulla Abdiaziz 2, and Bulla Hareri) are ethnic Somalis
Over 70% of the population derive their livelihood chiefly from livestock and livestock production.
2.9% rapid population growth – food insecure families live in rural areas and depend on daily agricutltual labour for income

UMR’s Intervention

To improve access to basic social, health, WASH, and educational services, as well as safe houses; expand economic opportunities, and enhance environmental management for communities in Wajir County.

UMR’s Stages of Rebuilding follows a 6-step process:

Education: Rehabilitate and restructure local schools
WASH: Build boreholes to make water more accessible
Housing: Construct mud houses
Primary Health Care: Build medical centers in schools
Environment: Build eco-friendly solar systems and eco-san toilets
Community Committee: Community engagement through committees

Adopt-a-Village Project (AVP) Approach

The Adopt-a-Village Project (AVP) implements a holistic approach toward the overall livelihood improvement in Wajir County through synchronous development efforts in health, water & sanitation, education, housing, energy and environmental management, and community participation.

AVP covers four villages in Wajir County:

Bulla Elmi
Bulla Abdiaziz 1
Bulla Abdiaziz 2
Bulla Hareri
Elmi Primary School (shared among the villages)

AVP is an effort to develop village-level capacity toward meeting the SDGs, as part of an integrated community-level development strategy to end extreme rural poverty. This strategy is in line with the recommendations of various U.N. sectoral monitoring commissions to eliminate inequalities (especially the urban-rural gaps) in service delivery, and to “leave no one behind”. As such, we aim to bring together the best parts of development thinking in terms of local knowledge and commitment to sustainability in order to apply a new approach to poverty alleviation.

UMR’s AVP First Steps:

Contract Surgeries Between the 25th – 27th of February 2020, an ophthalmologist from UMR led an eye team that screened 300 patients. Out of the tested patients, 134 qualified for and received free cataract surgeries (77 female & 57 male). The remaining patients received the necessary medication to treat their eye conditions. Another 300 patients were treated as outpatient cases and provided with eye medication, reading glasses, protective sunglasses, and health education. The 103 who were unable to receive surgery due to the limited time frame and resources were provided with interim treatment like eye drops, ointment, and eyeglasses, and were placed at the top of the registration list for the next eye clinic.
Water Wells UMR also built two shallow wells in two villages, Maygag and Star Wario. The shallow wells serve 300 households, ensure clean water, improve essential health, increase hygiene levels, and ultimately will develop alternative livelihood opportunities. The water wells will regenerate the arid lands of their environment, so they can produce alternative sources of food security and income that would result from an overall better health outcome.
Orphan Protection UMR distributes vouchers to orphans and their caretakers and will continue to do so quarterly. This sponsorship is a vital lifeline for the orphans, many of whom are in families where the assigned guardian earns very little. Our intention is to ease the financial burden for not just the child, but the entire family as well.
Education UMR will be distributing over 17,000 of children backpacks filled with school supplies and books.
HealthcareUMR delivered two 40ft. containers of assorted medical supplies valued at $2 million USD to Wajir County, Kenya. The medical shipment consisted of facial masks, gloves, pain relievers, diabetic and cardiovascular medications, wheelchairs, hospital beds, among other items.

Immediate improvements in holistic livelihood conditions will enable the community to regain self-reliance, improve their standard of living and continue to maintain such standard with locally-driven community efforts once the project is completed.

Cataract & Hearing Aid Mission

Treatment of preventable blindness, like cataract and low vision, and deafness is one of the most effective ways to lift people out of poverty, especially for vulnerable communities like refugees living in makeshift environments.

Cataract Missions – Life with Blindness

Cataract accounts for 30%-50% of blindness in most African and Asian countries. Every dollar spent towards eliminating blindness and correcting vision in developing countries returns a four-fold on investment in economic terms. This places eliminating avoidable blindness among the most effective interventions available. Cataract surgeries are some of the most impactful on a person’s quality of life and require no follow up visits to a doctor.

Life With Hearing Loss and Deafness

Loss in hearing may result from genetic causes, complications at birth, certain infectious diseases, chronic ear infections, the use of particular drugs, exposure to excessive noise, and aging.

Loss is hearing is defined as the ability to not hear as well as someone with normal hearing: hearting threshold of 25 dB or better in both ears. Hearing loss can affect one or both ears, causing difficulty to hear conversational speech or loud sounds.

Hard of hearing is defined as hearing loss ranging from mild to severe. Individuals who are hard of hearing communicate through spoken language and the use of hearing aids, cochlear implants, and other assistive devices.

Deafness is profound hearing loss, which implies very little or no hearing in an individual. They often use sign language for communication.

60% of hearing loss is attributable to preventable causes, in children under the age of 15
1.1 billion individuals are at risk of hearing loss due to exposure to high noise – high risk for ages between 12–35 years
Over one third of people over 65 years of age are affected by disabling hearing loss – greater prevalence in South Asia, Asia Pacific and sub-Saharan Africa
The current production of hearing aids meets less than 10% of the worldwide need

UMR Interventions

Since 2016, UMR has been sending medical missions to places like Kenya, Jordan, and Bangladesh to perform cataract surgeries on patients in need. UMR has helped to restore the gift of sight to curable blind cases by providing quality medical care services to some of the most underprivileged including the elderly, disabled, refugees and vulnerable people in the community, many of whom live without any support from their relatives and governments. Under this initiative, in coordination with partner NGOs and Ministries of Health, over 1,000 cataract surgeries have been successfully performed free of cost to date thanks to our generous donors. Our surgeries have been 100% successful with no recurring complications, and cost as little as $100 per eye.

Hearing Aid in Palestine/Jordan

UMR established a partnership with Community Rehabilitation Centre for the Disabled/ Gaza camp (CRCD) – UNRWA, which works to integrate persons with disabilities in their communities and to improve their living conditions. The center helped UMR by offering its local program team and through conducting the need assessment for the project. UMR also partnered with Phonak Jordan, which provided a generous discount on the hearing devices and performed all medical examinations, measurements, and modeling before the devices distribution. It offered 2 years of device maintenance and monitoring in Jordan.

UMR’s Hearing Aid project helps Palestinian refugees in Gaza/Jerash camp and Syrian refugees in random camps in Al-Mafraq who have no health benefits and social security number.

When thousands of people in a community suffer from health issues, it can be nearly impossible for a society to grow and become self-sustainable. At UMR, we believe that in order to improve the quality of life in a community, everyone must have access to primary healthcare. As we continue our mission to help beneficiaries, we will be providing free cataract surgeries and hearing aids to as many people as possible.

Pass The Plate

very year Muslims around the world observe the holy month of Ramadan by fasting from sunrise to sunset. Unfortunately for hundreds of thousands of families, they will not get the chance to spend this spiritual time in a warm home with nutritious food to break their fast. UMR has launched “Pass the Plate” campaign to support them.

“The number of people fleeing war, persecution and conflict exceeded 70 million globally last year – the highest number in the UN refugee agency’s almost 70 years of operations.” – UN

Refugees and displaced people are the most vulnerable people on the planet, suffering daily without sufficient housing, access to medicine, doctors, food, or clean water. As the crisis worsens, more and more people are depending on humanitarian agencies like UMR to fill the gaps.

Each year during Ramadan, UMR delivers food packages filled with nutritious items such as beans, rice, flour, oil, canned goods, and more to reach people that have absolutely nothing. We have spoken with families begging for help, telling our field staff that without these resources, they will die.

“Me and my children are fasting. What will we eat to break our fast? My children are begging me for food and water!”

This Ramadan, these families desperately need your help. Please #PassThePlate to a child in need!

Where We Are Working

Lebanon	Kenya
Jordan	Somalia
Yemen	Sudan
Palestine	Pakistan
Bangladesh	USA

What We Are Providing

We are providing many necessary items to the helpless families. Here are some of them-

Food Baskets

UMR delivers food packages containing items such as rice, flour, sugar, oil, beans, lentils, tomato paste, pasta, bread, and canned goods.

Water & Sanitation

In addition, we will be building water wells in Pakistan, Somalia and Kenya to ensure that some of the poorest communities are able to find clean drinking water, and prevent the spread of diseases.

Orphan Protection

Children are some of the most vulnerable among these already struggling communities. That is why UMR prioritizes the safety and well-being of children and orphans by providing them with healthcare, education, nutrition and a chance at a future.

Iftars

Each year UMR hosts iftar dinners throughout the month of Ramadan. Last year we were able to serve thousands of people in Yemen and Gaza with warm, nutritious meals.

Click Donate Now to See the different programs that you can donate to:

Cataract Missions: Vision 2020

UMR successfully conducted over 1,000 cataract surgeries. Help us reach 5,000 new patients by the end of 2020

Key Facts & Figures:

Cataract accounts for 30%-50% of blindness in most African and Asian countries.
Every dollar spent towards eliminating blindness and correcting vision in developing countries returns a four-fold on investment in economic terms. This places eliminating avoidable blindness among the most effective interventions available.
Cataract surgeries are some of the most impactful on a person’s quality of life and require no follow up visits to a doctor.

Overview:

According to the World Health Organization (WHO) cataract is the leading cause of blindness and visual impairment worldwide, accounting for nearly 20 million cases with nearly 5 million new cases each year. The majority of people with cataracts are found in the developing world due to a lack of access to adequate healthcare facilities or, more often, a lack of ability to afford this low-cost surgery. Most treated cases need as little as 15 minutes, and even though cataract operations have virtually no recovery time, the number of people with preventable blindness continues to grow.

UMR is putting extraordinary effort to reverse this alarming trend through its Vision 2020 campaign

I want to thank all of you for donating to this campaign as I have been blind for 6 years. My right eye was damaged by a rock when I was digging a well and now my only eye that was working has been slowly losing sight from cataracts… Soloman (70 years old)

Project Objective:

To restore eyesight to 5,000 people in Jordan and Kenya with cataract by the end of 2020. In addition to cataract surgery, UMR will provide eye exams, glasses and other rehabilitation needed for refugees and others who cannot afford the cost of these medical care services and procedures.

Our Impact:

Treatment of preventable blindness, like cataract and low vision, is one of the most effective ways to lift people out of poverty, especially for vulnerable communities like refugees living in makeshift environments. They regain their independence and confidence to approach economic opportunities and education. UMR and partners have restored eyesight to people who thought they would never be able to see again. We need to continue this work. There are thousands of people out there in great need of hope, and a chance to see again.

Kenya Water Wells

The importance of clean and safe water in rural areas cannot be emphasized. Having access to clean water ensures that families avoid water-borne illnesses, can keep up with hygiene, and the overall public health of a community is strengthened.

UMR Kenya has been working for years bringing shallow wells and boreholes to areas in need.

In September 2019, UMR completed the construction of 4 water wells in Garissa County, Kenya. Prior to this construction, women and children had to walk for miles, oftentimes though unsafe areas, to reach water that was not even clean.

In Wajir County, Kenya is a water-deficient county with no perennial rivers. Only 7% of residents use improved sanitation. In February 2020, UMR completed the construction of 2 shallow water wells in two villages in Kenya. Now that construction is complete, approximately 300 families will benefit from the clean water brought from the wells. Of these households, 6 families have orphans and 13 families have persons living with disabilities.

Back to School

What Would Your Children Do IF THEY WERE NOT IN SCHOOL?

Whether it be due to poverty, war, or displacement, thousands of children in Jordan, Kenya, & Lebanon are unable to attend to school. What most people don’t realize is that when children are deprived of education, oftentimes they are forced into child labor or child marriage. The UN says 180,000 refugee children living in Lebanon are forgoing an education to work long hours for as little as $2/day.

Many children in the refugee camps lack even the most basic school supplies. Parents, having limited funds, are faced with a predicament- putting food on the table or supplying pencils to write with. Hunger, almost always, takes precedence.

UMR’s annual Back to School Campaign aims to reduce the chances that children are left out of schools.

How You Can Help

When the opportunity of education is taken away, usually the chance of a successful future disappears along with it. It is time that we start recognizing education as a right, not a privilege.

With your generous donations, UMR provides children in Jordan, Kenya, & Lebanon with a backpack filled with school supplies such as pencils, crayons, rulers, and erasers.

Give a child a chance to hope, learn, and dream. One backpack can bring a child closer to achieving their goals, regardless of where life has taken them.

Don’t let another child get left behind.

UMR Partners with SAAB RDS to launch holistic “Adopt A Village Project (AVP)” in Wajir County, Kenya

AVP is aimed at providing a multi-faceted approach to developing village-level means of meeting the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals

For Immediate Release : February 23,2021 Contact : info@umrelief.org | Phone: (202) 370-6963

[WASHINGTON, D.C.] — UMR aims to bring together the best parts of development thinking on local knowledge and sustainability to create a new approach to poverty alleviation. Partnering with SAAB RDS, a leading international business development, program management and technology company, UMR is launching the Adopt A Village Project (AVP) in Wajir County, Kenya focusing on six components that reflect the needs of this underdeveloped area: education, water and sanitation, housing, healthcare, energy, and community engagement. The project is in coordination with the local authorities, community leadership, as well as local private construction companies.

The new project will begin immediately, and have several phases beginning with the rehabilitation of Elmi Primary School, which will include the remodeling and furnishing of classrooms, fencing of the school, and building dining facilities. Later phases will include the construction of Wajir County’s first ever MRI imaging center, a medical clinic to provide services to the surrounding 4 villages, boreholes for water provision, solar panels, and the construction of a community center that will include a public library, psychosocial support programming, and a soccer field. Procurement of supplies will be done locally in Wajir to support the economy and create over 250 direct jobs.

UMR has been working in Kenya for several years, sending multiple medical missions for hearing aids and cataract surgeries annually, providing nutritious food parcels year-round, constructing water wells to ensure equitable access to clean drinking water, and supplying local hospitals with medical supplies and equipment. “Our commitment to reaching rural areas of Africa begins with Wajir County, Kenya, but will not end there. We plan on replicating this holistic approach in other communities across the region,” says UMR’s East Africa Regional Representative, Abdul Ghani Ismail.

SAAB RDS simplifies complex needs and delivers cutting-edge sustainable programs and solutions that boost industrial productivity, academic and research performance, and provides tailored programs that upskill and reskill the digital economy workforce of the Middle East and Africa.

UMR is an international relief and development organization focused on providing disaster relief and recovery services to the underserved both domestically in the U.S. and internationally across the globe. Since 2013, UMR has helped over 10 million beneficiaries living underserved and marganlized communities build their capacity toward resilience.

Kenya

Water Scarcity in Kenya: A Dire Crisis

Lack of water scarcity affecting people in Kenya:

Story of Zenab Jule