To fill you in so far...

Hola everyone! Before heading out on Thursday, we figured it would be proper to outline the project so far and detail our plans.

The community of Asanquiri is located in the highlands of the Potosi department of Bolivia. Young adults from this village and others are educated at a school called the Capacitation Center. At the Center, students live and take classes to teach them responsible agricultural practices and other skills to improve their livelihood.

Due to the seasonal cycle of rainfall that occurs in this region, the Center often runs dangerously low on water during the dry season. The only source of water is a spring, which is also seasonal in nature. The spring box is open and unguarded, which allows animals to trample and defecate near the spring, resulting in very poor quality water.

EWB-NCSU has sent two teams to the region. An assessment team traveled in 2007 and surveyed the region and selected the Capacitation Center as the site for further development. In 2009, an implementation team was sent to help install a rainwater catchment system at the center. In addition to providing another source of water, the system also added 5,000 liters of water storage capacity.

In a few days, our team will head to Asanquiri with a variety of goals. Our primary goals are to monitor the use of the catchment system, get a better understanding of community water usage, and assess the feasibility of future projects. We'll talk more about these in future posts, but we've certainly got our work cut out for us!

To hold you over until next time, here's a picture of children playing near the Capacitation Center: