Zaare women grateful for support
Residents of Zaare, a community in the Bolgatanga Municipality in the Upper East Region, are predominantly farmers and basket weavers, with a significant number of women in the area engaged in those vocations.
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The lack of potable water has been a major source of worry to the women as they often spend long hours walking for long distances to search for water, usually from contaminated sources which tend to have serious health implications for the entire community. The effect of that situation is that the women spend less of their time weaving baskets to improve on their income levels.
To address the problem, the Water Access Now (WAN), based in Seattle in the United States of America and the Catholic Relief Services, Ghana (CRS), have provided the Zaare community with a borehole.
The facility, valued at $7,000, is one of 13 provided for beneficiary communities in the Upper East and Northern regions. It will ultimately help improve on the socio-economic conditions of the people, particularly women in the area.
The beneficiary communities include Nangode and Dasabologo in the Nabdam District, Gbani and Tarkwa in the Talensi District and Wuro in the Kassena Nankana West District in the Upper East Region.
Genesis of the project
In 2002, the TradeAid Integrated, a non-governmental organisation based in the Upper East Region, started mobilising and supporting women in Zaare to go into large-scale basket weaving. That effort paid off and eventually gave birth to the formation of the Amisuure Basket Weavers Group.
According to the group leader, Madam Evelyn Baaba, the lack of potable water was affecting their productivity.
The CRS staff took the donor partners round the Zaare community to see the beautiful baskets that the women were producing.
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The women appealed to the donors to help address the issue of lack of potable water in the community, hence the provision of the facility.
Inauguration
At a short ceremony at Zaare to inaugurate the project, the leader of a nine-member delegation from WAN, Mr Bob Maher, noted that anytime they came to the community to buy wares from the women, they realised that they always complained about the lack of potable water, hence their decision to grant their request.
According to him, the CRS had been working with WAN to integrate water into community programmes to promote maternal and child health, particularly in the Upper East and Northern regions.
The Programme Manager of TradeAid, Madam Vida Boyubie, expressed optimism that the provision of the facility would ultimately increase productivity among the women, and promised that TradeAid would continue to roll out more interventions aimed at improving the socio-economic conditions of the people.
The Chief of Zaare, Paul Asaana Agoo, expressed his gratitude to the donors, saying "our women have been crying for water and we are happy you have met that need; you have solved a huge problem for them as they will no longer walk for long distances in search of water".
The Assembly member for Zaare West, Mr Ayoroko Sulemana, stressed the need for the provision of a computer laboratory and a junior high school in the area.
The WAN delegation later provided education materials such as reading books, notebooks, and markers as well as sporting kits to the community.