APP, a member of the Honduran water treatment network

Agua Para el Pueblo has confirmed its active participation in the Honduran Water Treatment Network (RAS-HON), formerly known as the Honduran Collaborative Group of Water Treatment. Through its participation, APP collaborates with the country’s sub-sector of potable water and treatment, contributing with its experience to setting the legal, methodological, and procedural bases to improve the access and use of water services.

RAS-HON is a dialogue organization. Its consulting services and interchanges of information look to improve the inter-institutional coordination among public agencies’ representatives, civil organizations, the private sector, and external cooperation agencies. This partnership contributes to the structured development of the water treatment sub-sectors, placing emphasis on the rural and semi-urban zones in Honduras .

APP develops Project AGUA SI in the department of Olancho

APP executes the project AGUA SI (Acceso y Gestión Unificada para el Agua y el Saneamiento Integral) in the department of Olancho. To achieve this, APP has received financial support from Iniciativas Locales de Desarrollo del Programa Regional de Reconstrucción para América Central (PRRACC) of the European Union.

AGUA SI will be implemented through the execution of 4 interrelated axes: a) monitoring of water quality and identification of pollution factors, b) implementation of a mobile institute for environmental education, c) improvement of communal water and treatment services provision, d) development of operational plans to improve water quality.

AGUA SI mobilizes local groups as well as the municipal authorities, sensibilizes and educates the inhabitants of the affected communities, promotes an environmental culture committed to hydraulic resources, and fortifies the sustainability capacity of the Water Boards. 

APP desarrolla en el Departamento de Copan el proyecto COMAL

APP has received financial support from the Interamerican Foundation (Fundación Interamericana, FIA) to develop systems in communities around the Copan River . These communities belong to the counties of Santa Rita, Cabañas and Copan Ruinas. The Project has been named “Municipality-Organized Communities for Clean Water” (Comunidades Organizadas por Municipio para el Agua Limpia, COMAL).

This is a community initiative to improve the local organizational model of natural resources administration. It places an emphasis on the human consumption of water, basic water treatment in the rural areas, and the protection of river basins.

COMAL’s fundamental objective is to develop a program to encompass environmental education and improvement of water and treatment services. This program is to be used by the Río Copan basin community groups in order to better comprehend the importance of clean water, identify the causes of its deterioration, and develop community skills when searching for options and actions to improve the water sources and basins.

APP manages Project PREMIAS in the department of Olancho

APP has presented its Project of Water Treatment Reconstruction and Integral Improvement ( Proyecto de Reconstrucción y Mejoras Integrales en Agua y Saneamiento, PREMIAS) phases I and II to PRRACAGUA – HIGIENE RURAL, of the European Union. This project will develop the reconstruction and improvement activities for the potable water infrastructure, basic water treatment (elimination of untreated water, solid waste, and control of domestic animals), and environmental cleaning (protection of river basins). The project will engage the communities, Water Boards, sector institutions, and municipalities involved with the technical constructive management, provision of services, and project sustainability.

Project PREMIAS will be implemented in the north counties of the department of Olancho and will develop educational campaigns based on gender equity to create a conscious attitude toward integral protection and rational use of the available hydraulic resources. PREMIAS will also reduce the vulnerability of the communities’ infrastructures and increment their knowledge level to take precautions and pertinent measures in case of natural disasters or emergencies.

APP develops a project in Yoro and Gracias A Dios with the support of GOAL ( Ireland )

Agua Para el Pueblo has developed project Mitigation of “Organized and Prepared” Disasters (Mitigación de Desastres “Organizados y Preparados”) with the financial support of GOAL. This project covers the municipalities of Morazán and Victoria in the departments of Yoro, and in Puerto Lempira and Ramón Villeda Morales in the department of Gracias A Dios. The project includes the construction of potable water systems, wells equipped with manual pumps, sustainability training, organizing of citizens to teach them about preparation and response to disasters, and the delivery of first aid kits.

Missions – Visitors

Throughout the course of the year, we’ve received visits from many partners and friends, especially :

- Personnel from the VOSH Medical Mission, who held ophthalmologic care and primary health care campaigns in the community of Río Negro and the municipal capital of Cabañas, (both in the department of Copan). A second mission has been planned for next year, and it will include the distribution of medicines and eyeglasses as well as the performance of cataract surgery. For this, the necessary coordinating efforts have been undertaken through the health personnel of the zone of Cabañas, department of Copan .

- Faculty and students from Cornell University, members of Engineers for a Sustainable World (ESW), visited communities in the municipalities of Victoria (department of Yoro), Copan Ruinas and Santa Anita (department of Copan) with the purpose of field-testing the performance of a computerized program for the design of small potable water projects for rural communities.

- Personnel of the Caixa Barcelona Foundation (Fundación La Caixa de Barcelona, España) visited the communities of La Hermosura, El Prado, and Pinalito, all in the Cabañas municipality, to learn more about the communities’ problems and to field-test the water treatment projects that were built the previous year with funds from FUNDESO and Resource Foundation.

- The Mission of the Sisters of Charity (La Misión de las Hermanas de La Caridad) and Georgian Court University visited Copan for the seventh time and provided financial support for the potable water system of Comunidad de Vara de Cohete, municipality of Santa Rita de Copan through a Resource Foundation grant. This water system will be complemented by latrines and sustainability training, to be supported by project COMAL funds. Project COMAL is managed by APP through FIA financing.

Robin McNamara, an engineer accompanied by a member of the Church of Saint Thomas in Philadelphia , Pennsylvania , visits the Copan area with the purpose of supervising the construction of the water system in El Guarumal, municipality of Cabañas . This project is being built with funds managed by the community, through a Resource Foundation grant. The funds will be complemented with financial support project COMAL, an APP-managed and FIA-financed project.