Life was a struggle in Enchoro, the Maasai village where Kampus and his large family live in rural Kenya. Recurring drought made it impossible to earn a living. Livestock died. Crops failed. Kampus’s wife walked long distances in punishing heat to collect water. And his children were chronically sick with water-borne diseases.
Kampus and his family had to fight to survive. They fought extreme weather. They fought debilitating poverty. They fought hunger and thirst. They fought hopelessness.
Winning the Battle of Survival
Then Kampus’s village of Enchoro partnered with World Concern in our OVT (One Village Transformed) program. And that’s when things began to change.
“When World Concern first came, I was very happy because that is when we first saw true help and felt that someone cared,” Kampus said. “Shortly after that is when light came to this village. We started seeing opportunities and things started looking up for us.”
Relief for Kampus and his family came in the form of safe, disease-free water!
World Concern and villagers dug wells that provided safe, disease-free water to Kampus’s village. Clean water meant his children were healthy. His livestock had enough water to drink and could produce milk. His family had water to irrigate crops. And his wife could use her energy to take care of their children.
Kampus’s family began to rise out of extreme poverty.
The Multiplying Impact of Clean Water
Kampus and his family are an example of the multiplying impact that clean water brings to families. Not only did they benefit from the blessing of safe drinking water, they have increased in wealth because Kampus was trained to maintain and repair pumps for wells.
“World Concern took me for water technician training,” he said. “We got protected wells that are very clean and Typhoid has almost ended. After they trained me, they gave me contracts to install pumps on water wells. Because of the experience that I was able to gain, I was employed by the government to repair all the wells in my village.”
But there’s even more! Because of safe water sources and a livestock upgrade program, Kampus has been able to grow his herd of sheep to 100. That gives him plenty to provide for his children’s future.
“I now have enough to pay school fees for my kids, and now my family cannot lack in terms of food,” Kampus said.
