Digging a well 18m deep still has no water to use

(Baonghean.vn) - For the past 8 years, 113 Thai households in Hua Na village (Chau Hanh commune, Quy Chau district) have been waiting for every rain because it is almost the only source of clean water for the people here.

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The 14-meter-deep self-dug well in Ms. Lu Thi Hue's garden in Hua Na village, Chau Hanh commune (Quy Chau) has run dry this year. In previous years, although the water source in the well was never higher than 1 meter, if she saved, her family of 5 still had enough to use. Now it has completely dried up, forcing her family to borrow nearly 4 million VND to hire someone to dig another well. But the well is 12 meters deep and still has not found any underground water source.

One of the eight completely damaged self-draining water tanks in Hua Na village (Chau Hanh, Quy Chau). Photo: Thanh Quynh.

That is the common situation of 113 households in Hua Na village when the village's self-flowing water system has been damaged by nearly 90%. Specifically, the system has 9 self-flowing tanks, 8 of which have stopped working for nearly 10 years. Only one tank is still operating at a low capacity, causing great misery to the people.

Faced with the damaged water system, villagers twice raised money to repair it, but it only worked for a short time, then it went back to the way it was.

On the other hand, the water in Den stream - the source of water for the gravity tank system - is also gradually drying up and is much lower than the pipeline and reservoir system. Therefore, to repair it requires a large amount of money. While this is a 100% Thai ethnic village, the people's lives are still very difficult.

The 14-meter deep but still dry water tank of Ms. Lu Thi Hue's family (Hua Na village, Chau Hanh, Quy Chau). This is a common situation of many households in the village. Photo: Thanh Quynh.

Ms. Luong Thi Xuan - Secretary of Hua Na village Party Cell said: “In the past, when there was no self-flowing water system, people still used water from Hieu River and the stream system flowing from upstream. However, in recent years, the river water source has been heavily polluted so it can no longer be used for daily activities. To have water, people had to dig wells and build rainwater tanks, but it was ineffective because nearly 60% of the dug wells had no water, even though the depth was up to 17, 18 m. Rainwater is not always available, especially in the dry season.”

Sharing the same situation, Khe Lan, Na Xen, Dong Minh, Minh Tien villages... of Chau Hanh commune are also miserable because of "thirst" for clean water.

To bring water from the only reservoir in the village, Mrs. Luong Thi Xuan, Secretary of the Hua Na village Party Cell (Chau Hanh, Quy Chau) had to run a pipeline nearly 400 meters long. However, the water source in the reservoir was too weak, so each day she could only bring about 5 liters of water. Photo: Thanh Quynh

Ms. Le Thi Ngoc, Head of the Ethnic Affairs Department of Quy Chau district, said: Currently, the district has 9 self-flowing water works for villages in 6 communes according to Decision 134/QD-TTg, including Chau Tien, Chau Binh, Chau Hoi, Chau Hanh, Chau Phong and Chau Nga communes. Initially, the self-flowing water works were effective in providing domestic water for the people in the area. However, up to now, more than 80% of the works have been damaged and are no longer usable.

According to Ms. Ngoc, in the coming time, the district will have a plan to maintain and repair damaged locations and establish Management Boards while assigning responsibility to the people to benefit. In 2017, the district will implement an investment project to build 2 self-flowing water works from the support fund for the implementation of Decision 755/QD-TTg for Thanh Tan and Thanh Son villages in Chau Nga commune and Cuom village in Dien Lam commune./.

Thanh Quynh