UNHCR provides clean water to refugees in SW Uganda

ANKARA (AA) - The UN Refugee Agency on Tuesday announced it is serving some 500 households with clean water at the Bidibidi refugee settlement in northwest Uganda.

“A solar-powered borehole set up by UNHCR with investment from partners and the private sector pumps groundwater to points closer to almost 500 households,” the UNHCR said in a statement on Tuesday.

“The minimum water requirement for a person is 20 liters per day. Three years ago, the supply in Bidibidi refugee settlement averaged just 2.3 liters a day,” the UNHCR noted.

“From morning to noon, refugees could not cook, many didn’t even have water to drink or take a bath,” Richard Ochaya, senior water and sanitation and health associate for UNHCR in Bidibidi, was quoted as saying in the report.

“We have the capacity to pump 85,000 liters of water per hour, but we are only extracting 45,000 liters because we do not want to deplete the aquifers. We need to manage the resource and take care of the environment,” Ochaya added.