By Nana Achia Aboagye
Goal six of the sustainable development goals is, in part, about clean water. And as the deadline to meet the goals inches closer, Grundfos Industry, a company from Denmark, is supporting Ghana with a plan to ensure that 40 percent of people living in the country’s rural and peri-urban areas have access to safe and clean water.
As the project progresses, the Vice President and Chief Executive of Grundfos, Mr. Stephane Simonitta, and his team have inspected the Abomosu Municipal Water System, located at Abomosu in the Atiwa West District in Ghana’s Eastern Region. The community is predominantly a cocoa-growing and mining area, with a population of about 8,000.
The Abomosu Grundfos water system took over non-functioning water systems from the Community Water and Sanitation Agency (CWSA), retrofitted them with Grundfos equipment, and is being managed under a public-private partnership agreement with the Community Water and Sanitation Agency (CWSA).
Prior to Grundfos’ intervention, the community relied on untreated water from streams and private wells. Surrounding illegal mining activities have badly polluted surface water sources. The system’s capacity provides 120 m3 of drinking water daily to Municipal Water. The first smart and sustainable water system was installed by Grundfos Ghana Water Initiative and has two boreholes run by Grundfos SP7-31 pumps. Borehole 1 is solar-powered and connected to the grid using Grundfos RSI and Power Adapt. The utility plant has water treatment and storage, 7AQ Tap and 300 smart prepaid water meters and more than 19 km of distribution pipe infrastructure.
The Vice President and CEO of Grundfos, Mr. Stephane Simonitta, said the company, which originates from Denmark and has 83 subsidiaries worldwide, has been actively providing water solutions in Ghana.
He intimated that he is looking forward to more public-private partnerships and local partnerships with the Community Water and Sanitation Agency to scale up their businesses in order to provide water services to rural communities across Ghana.
Emphasising that their learnings and successes in their current partnership is a testament to what is possible. He commended his team for the fantastic job they’ve delivered for the past 4 to 5 years.
The Technical Manager for the Grundfos project in Ghana, Mr. Francis Tayor, is upbeat that this project will help solve the world’s climate and water challenges, placing sustainability at its core.
He said their company is yet to start the bottling system in Abomosu to produce 20 liter recyclable jars of water which will be sold in Accra and surrounding communities.
He said currently they are delivering water to households, and they’ve employed smart household meters to ensure transparency in their revenue collections to sustain the running of the water system in the community.
Without a doubt, the beneficiaries were happy with the water project initiative in their community.
The Ghana Water Initiative (GWI), which is a project by SafeWater, a strategic business unit within Grundfos, seeks to reach one million people in underserved communities in Ghana by 2026 with potable water that is easily accessible, reliable, sustainable, and efficiently run. Their target is to reach 300 million people with good water and reach net zero emissions by 2050.
