Excellent Development
Strengthening community resilience in Zimbabwe
We are raising funds to build two sand dams and implement a range of environmental protection measures in southern Zimbabwe, in an area experiencing severe land degradation and water scarcity, to strengthen the resilience of a community and in turn reduce rural poverty.
It ran from 12:00 PM, 1 December 2020 to 12:00 PM, 8 December 2020
Registered Charity in England and Wales (1094478)
Match funded Campaign target
£75,000
Amount raised
£77,144
Donations
206
Championed by The EQ Foundation
Location
Zimbabwe
Campaign overview
Aims
Where's the money going?
Impact & reporting
Children in this area used to miss school as they needed to walk long distances to water livestock, and this negatively affected their pass rates. So we are so thankful to the Nathi sand dam.
— Admas Ndlovu, community member in southern Zimbabwe
We used to travel approximately 4 km in search of water. This was very hard and time consuming especially for women who had various household chores to also undertake. But people in this area now refer to this dam as the biblical Canaan because of the positive tangible benefits it has brought.
— Playmore Ndlovu, community member in southern Zimbabwe
I cultivate a small portion of land and yet the yields are more when compared to the large area I used to cultivate before. I managed to sell surplus to pay fees for my children and buy material to improve my home, including for my sweet potato project.
— Obert Dube, farmer in southern Zimbabwe
Situation
Water scarcity and polluted water sources are increasingly threatening people’s livelihoods and valuable ecosystems in southern Zimbabwe. Severe environmental challenges (including deforestation, climate change and land degradation) are further compounding the problem, leading to a decline in soil fertility and food availability, with chronic food shortages. In turn, vulnerable rural communities who rely on agriculture and keeping livestock are increasingly experiencing high levels of poverty.
Solution
A community in southern Zimbabwe will construct two sand dams, providing them with year-round access to clean, safe water (a sand dam can store up to 40 million litres of water which meets WHO standards for drinking, trapping water at the point it falls). The community will also be trained in environmental conservation techniques, and will be supported to establish community-managed woodlots, helping to restore degraded land and improve soil fertility for farming.
