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Anne Makumi, a project coordinator with The Salvation Army in Nairobi, Kenya, visited Alaska Divisional Headquarters (DHQ) August 27. She was in Anchorage for the 2014 International Epidemiological Association World Congress of Epidemiology, and quickly discovered DHQ was right next to her hotel.
“I had to visit,” Makumi said.
Makumi is monitoring and evaluations coordinator with the Kenya Integrated School and Community Water, Sanitation Hygiene Project, which aims to improve access to clean water for rural residents in Kenya’s Eastern Province (Kitui, Machakos and Makueni counties).
Rural residents currently must walk more than an hour to get to clean water. The project’s goal is to reduce that distance to 500 meters. Other goals include reducing childhood disease and by extension improving children’s educational prospects by reducing absenteeism from school (especially girls).
“Despite many differences between Alaska and Kenya, we share similar challenges in the need to provide adequate clean water facilities for rural areas,” Makumi said.
