Kabale District Community Water Points increase by 1070 in Five years

Report by Naboth, Daphine & Janet (Interns in Communication office)

The latest Water Atlas for Kabale District, has revealed that Community Water sources have increased by 38.8 % in the last five years, with 1070 new water points created.

The revelation was on Thursday, during a stakeholder engagement meeting to disseminate data on water sources, collected in November last year, by Wells of Life a Non Governmental organization operating in Kabale District in partnership with Ugandan Water Project and Ministry of Water and Environment.
Speaking during the meeting held at Kabale District Rukiiko Hall, the Ugandan Water Project Officer in charge of Monitoring and Evaluation, Vencia Naigga explained that they used the mWater APP to collect Kabale District’s data on water sources and water points, with the intention to feed the information to the Ministry of Water and Environment National Water Atlas.

She also explained that the Water Atlas for Kabale District, which was last updated in 2018, indicated that community water points have since increased from 1,685 to 2,755, as of November 2023. The water points include protected and non-protected springs, bore holes, gravity water schemes, rain water harvesting tanks, among others.
Naigga however noted that out of the 2755 community water points, 654 were non-functional, and 17 had been recommended for decommissioning.

In his remarks, the Acting Kabale Deputy Chief Administrative officer, Gordon Manzi thanked the NGOs and the Ministry of Water and Environment for updating the water data, adding that they had already identified places that needed priority planning such as Butanda Sub County where there was scarcity of water.

The Kabale District Vice Chairperson, Miria Akankwasa said that the data collected will be heavily relied upon during budgeting process, to identify priority areas, that need intervention.
The Kabale District Water officer, Patience Aharinta, noted that the water was not having enough funds to map out the entire district to come up with a complete Water Atlas.

Eng. Jane Achom, the Deputy Manager at the Ministry of Water and Environment Rural water Regional Centre, Mbarara Office, talked Kabale District Authorities to properly use the data for strategic planning.
While Closing the stakeholders’ meeting, the Kabale Deputy Resident Commissioner, Ronald Bakak, noted that the issue of water has been challenging and expressed optimism after the mapping exercise, the residents in the district will be able to get clean water for home consumption.

Kabale is one one of the 10 Districts to benefit from the water mapping exercise across the country by February 2024. The others are, Lira, Apac, Luwero, Padel, Soroti, Kwania, Sembabule, Lamwo and Nakapiripiriti.
The water mapping helps District Local Governments and the Ministry of Water and Environment to locate water sources, identify places with water scarcity and allocate resources according to the needs of affected communities.
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