Water project by NGO
By Tosin Kolade
Technoserve, an NGO, is to provide clean water for communities and to empower local women to become entrepreneurs under its Sunlight Water Centre (SWC) project.
Oluwapelumi Adeleke, the Project Manager, SWC TechnoServe Nigeria, told a News Media a News Media correspondent in Abuja that the move became necessary because of the need to increase access to clean water in Nigeria.
As stated by her, the burden of limited access to clean water falls mostly on women, who have to travel long distances to fetch water, purify it and make it clean enough for domestic use.
She stated the SWC campaign would be implemented with support from Unilever, in its innovative approach to providing clean water in Nigerian communities.
“The Sunlight Water Center (SWC) is a ready-to-operate business that sells water and other services and products under a commercial business model.
“Providing safe water at affordable rates reduces the time and money women spend on collecting and treating water, enabling them to instead, pursue other income-generating activities and save and invest resources in their families and communities.
“The SWC model is designed to be fully sustainable as each site generates profits, to cover on-going costs and repay the initial capital investment, which can then be reinvested in growing the network.
“The system includes the brand, the facility design, access to ficing, access to products, construction support, the operating procedures, marketing programs and support, training, and other support that may be provided,” she stated.
Adeleke stated the group was working to support a pilot network of eight water centres around Abuja spanning Niger, Kaduna, and Nasarawa states as well as parts of FCT.
As stated by her, the group has secured funding to build eight more centres.
The project manager stated the long-term vision was to create a franchise a network of 1,000 centres across Nigeria and other parts of Africa, thereby reaching hundreds of thousands of water consumers.
She added that women entrepreneurs, who had been consistently running the centres for more than 10 months, contributed immensely to the success of the centres.
She stated they underwent a rigorous assessment and interview process before they were selected to own and manage every aspect of the business.
Adeleke stated communities interested in benefiting from the project should be well-populated, have acute water shortage and be willing to contribute an accessible land to the benefit of all and should apply on or before Jan. 13.
She maintained that forms for the next round of the project had been distributed to concerned Local Government Areas, adding that interested persons could also access the form through its website.
She said, “In terms of criteria for consideration of a Sunlight Water Center franchise, communities must be located in a well-populated area and should have quality women entrepreneurs to run and operate the centre.”