Rural Water Development Programme of Church of Christ (RWDP-COC) is committed to fostering a healthy developed community through the provision of WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene) Services; Food Security; and Community Empowerment. These services, we believe are instrumental in accelerating the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Rural Water and Development Programme Ghana (RWDP Ghana) is a local Christian nonprofit committed to providing clean water, decent toilets, and good hygiene for everyone, everywhere, within a generation. Established in 1989 during a guinea worm epidemic in the Northern Region, RWDP Ghana addresses issues such as lack of clean drinking water and widespread open defecation.
We believe in the power of partnerships to help communities unlock their potential, break free from poverty, and transform their lives.
RWDP Ghana’s work aligns with international agreements like the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the African Union’s Agenda 2063. Our mission is to act on our faith by empowering rural communities to achieve self-reliance and create wealth.
RWDP Ghana focuses on the following program domains to meet its strategic objectives:
The programme implementation strategy is based on the principle that development is for the people who seek them and therefore their involvement is “sine quo non” to the success of those developments. Our work in rural communities ensures that through our social intermediation, community members especially youth are able to co-exist peacefully.
Through this initiative, religious extremism is reduced by creating opportunities for the communities through our empowerment projects.
Provision of potable water within a reasonable reach for use by communities, especially women and children involves the drilling of a borehole in the selected community. The provision of sustainable water services is to facilitate the adoption of improved hygiene practices, which in turn will result in improved social and economic conditions of beneficiaries. The boreholes drilled are fitted with hand pumps to facilitate the easy drawing of the water from underground. Borehole sites are selected based on hydrogeological investigations (Geophysics). The water from wells drilled by the organization is subjected to laboratory investigations to certify its quality (chemical and bacteriological test) for human consumption.
Hygiene promotion constitutes an integral part of RWDP Ghana’s work and seen not as an end in itself but a means to create for improved sanitation facilities. Hygiene promotion begins at the same time as the community social intermediation process where communities’ awareness is raised about the links between improved water supply, hygiene promotion, and improved sanitation facilities. Our hygiene promotion projects and activities are geared towards changing the behaviours of households in communities in embracing healthy lifestyles.
RWDP Ghana does not only drill wells and install pumps on them but also ensures there is enough water to meet the needs of the community members. Consequently, RWDP Ghana conducts a yield test to assess the quantum of water in the well per minute. By this RWDP Ghana can confidently state that each well can serve a reasonable population within a community.
Under its Small Town Water Supply projects, RWDP Ghana has the capacity and the experience in building mechanize systems and pump into the overhead tank for distribution under gravity through a network of piped systems to pipe stands at the community level. RWDP Ghana has constructed a number of limited mechanized systems for rural communities. RWDP Ghana also uses solar as a renewable energy source to mechanize wells.
RWDP Ghana has a Team is adequately resourced and is responsible for rehabilitating broken down boreholes abandoned in the communities. The organization in partnership with International Organizations, Government through the District Assemblies, other development organizations and individuals in and outside of Ghana has been able to rehabilitate broken down boreholes in rural communities
Adequate and timely supply of spare parts at an affordable price is critical to the sustainability of any water supply and sanitation project. Consequently, RWDP Ghana has established spare parts depot at its base in Yendi and other areas with the objective of supporting communities have easy access to these parts to facilitate both preventive maintenance and repairs of facilities at the community level.
RWDP Ghana believes the success of its projects and activities has been the results of effective and efficient performance of the human capital. This has been made possible through continuous skill development through both on-the-job and other forms of training programmes. Based on the needs of the staff and objectives of the organization, staffs are provided with the needed training to enhance their performance. Through various projects implemented, institutional level training is also provided to (Metropolitan Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) and women and men at the community level to be able to effectively and efficiently manage facilities provided.
In addressing the challenges of food insecurity in the Eastern Corridors of the Northern Region, Rural Water Development Programme of Church of Christ is implementing a development initiative aimed at contributing to household resilient and coping strategies of tackling food insecurity in the Eastern Corridors of the Northern Region dubbed “Integrated Livelihood Development (I-LED) Project”.
The Integrated Livelihood Empowerment Development (I-LED) Project is a social intervention that seeks to enhance sustainable food and nutrition security in the Eastern Corridors of the Northern Region through innovative and resilient farming systems and local diet. The I-LED Project among other things seeks to improve agricultural production and economic empowerment of smallholder women farmers through skills acquisition. By this, RWDP Ghana trains women on healthy food preparation using locally available crops and microenterprise development.
The Agro development project empowers rural communities especially to venture into vegetable farming all year-round through irrigation. RWDP Ghana trains and provides beneficiary farmers with irrigation kits and improved seeds. Farmers are trained on climate-smart agronomic practices to improve yields of crops cultivated.
RWDP Ghana provides medical outreach services in deprived rural communities where health care delivery is usually non-existent. Through this intervention, community members are medically screened and provided with the basic medication. This intervention is implemented in partnership with the Ghana Health Service and other health care facilities in the Northern Regions of Ghana. Through this intervention, health screening is carried out in schools and communities and education given on preventive health issues.