A WATER project initiated in 2014 was inaugurated yesterday, catering for villages in Mwanga and Same districts in Kilimanjaro Region and the nearby Korogwe District in Tanga Region.

President Samia Suluhu Hassan yesterday formally inaugurated the project, acknowledging that the targeted zone does not have many water sources. “It is therefore good to hear that the project can yield more than 51.6m litres per day, providing the essential commodity to thousands of residents,” the president affirmed.

Laying the foundation stone for the triple district water project expected to provide 103m litres of water at highest capacity, he said that usually it is women and girls who suffer when water becomes scarce. ”We are now sure that school girls can now have ample time to study instead of trekking long distances for water,” she told the audience.

With former prime minister Cleopa Msuya in attendance, Regional Commissioner Nurdin Babu said the project initiated in 2014 had stalled for years until President Samia ordered its resumption and completion.

The facility includes processing systems to supply clean and safe water to around 450,000 people in the semi-arid areas on the southerly reaches of Mount Kilimanjaro, with only its slopes having substantial amounts of rainfall and partially the Pare and Usambara mountain ranges.

Officials say the 4.6bn/- water project will enable local communities to increase farm production and boost food security from increased crop yields, with the water being pumped from the Kisangara booster station in Mwanga District.

The water is derived from ‘Nyumba ya Mungu’ dam, catering for nearly 40 villages in the bear and extended vicinities, where Mwanga and Same districts have 38 beneficiary villages and five villages mapped in Korogwe District.

The windswept Mwanga District plains and vast stretches of the leeward side of Same District have for years faced inadequate water supplies, with officials saying that the project capacity exceeds the 6m litres the two districts need at present.

So far over 150 kilometers of pipe network for water distribution have been laid out across Mwanga District, with an additional 35 kilometers of pipeline extended to the adjoining Same District, officials noted

Mwajuma Waziri, the Water permanent secretary, in the Ministry of Water stated earlier that the project solves the water supply problem in semi-arid low lands located in the western part of Pare Mountains, with the water project covering 37 villages and two small towns with a total population of 450,000.

Phase 1 of the project covered the construction of an intake, treatment, raw water pumping station, along with a clear water pumping station and storage tank at Kisangara station.

The Kisangara gravity main is the service reservoir to nine villages of Ruvu Mferejini, Ruvu, Jiungeni, Handeni, Lang’ata Bora, Lang’ata Kagongo, Nyabinda, Kirya and two others.

The second phase entails the construction of a water pumping station at Kisangara, storage tank at Kiverenge gravity main, and service reservoirs to 28 villages and two small towns.

The Kuwait Fund, the Saudi Fund for Development (SFD) and the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) assisted the project, he added.