Megan Campbell in Malawi
Living in Canada makes it all too easy to take water for granted. After all, we are one of the world’s most water-rich nations, home to an estimated 20 per cent of the world’s fresh water supply.
In Malawi, however, the situation is much different. Just ask Engineers Without Borders (EWB) volunteer Megan Campbell, a self-proclaimed “possibilitarian.”
During her overseas placement, Megan has partnered with Concern Universal (CU), an international development and emergency relief organization. CU is in the middle of a five-year project to develop appropriate water and sanitation systems in two Malawian districts.
Water points – that is, designated areas with potable water – are vital to human health. And while roughly 75 per cent of Malawi’s rural areas have access to water points, a staggering 30 per cent of them are out of service at any given time.
In response, CU is working with the health and water committees in 500 villages. The goal is to train the committees to oversee a number of health-related activities. They include sustaining a water point, raising funds from villagers for water point maintenance; building hand-washing facilities; and improving the sanitation of latrines. Equally important, CU is educating villagers about the critical need for sanitary facilities and the adoption of healthy hygiene practices, such as hand washing.
Within this setting, Megan’s main role has involved working on a new monitoring system. The initiative was developed by Megan in conjunction with CU staff and previous EWB volunteers Brett Stevenson and Luke Brown. The system streamlines the important process of collecting villagers’ feedback and turning it into knowledge that can be acted upon in the future. The result: a tangible and meaningful method of measuring the water project’s impact.
For Megan, though, the biggest reward has been helping people. “A lot of the effects of the monitoring system will be realized in the longer-term, so my interactions with field staff are often what gives me little day-to-day ‘wins,’” she says. “The training officers have come a long way. It’s really cool when you see someone take something you said or did and do so much more with it than you could have done yourself.”
So what’s next for Megan? An extension of her EWB placement, during which she will help conduct an in-depth assessment of a previously completed CU water project. The Toronto-based Harbinger Foundation has provided funding to perform the evaluation.
