Aptech Africa recently designed, supplied, installed and commissioned a water improvement project in Boroma, Somaliland in a project financed by SDF (Somaliland Development Fund)
The system is composed of three AFRAGA boreholes, Serarka pumping station and Al Hayat 500m3 reservoirs. The AFRAGA Boreholes have 45KW Grundfos pumps installed and Grundfos CUE 55KW control panel. The three wells supply water to 100m3 surge tanks located at Serarka station. The Serarka station has three 350KVA diesel generators that powers the two 132KW surface pumps and the 315KVA step up transformers that supplies power to three 100KVA step down transformers at 3 AFRAGA boreholes while one is at standby. The operation of the two surface pumps is duty standby that pumps water direct to two 500m3 Al-Hayat reservoirs.
Abdirahman Abdisalam Jowhar, the General Manager of SHABA, a local agency that is tasked with management and supply of water to Boroma, said that previously so many tankers had to bring in the town water from outside – losing nearly half of it on the way. With this project, they have now managed to make more extensions and connections and at least can supply about 95 percent of households in Boroma with over 60 kilometers of pipe network. They have also established over 100 water kiosks to serve the remaining people that could not afford private household connection, including the displaced, with clean water, he explained. “Within the establishment of SHABA, water tankers have become a thing of the past.
The population of Borama town is estimated to be 103,000. Taking an average annual growth rate of 3.2%, the population will be 214,000 persons by 2038. All the population of the many men, women and children are all expected to benefit from this project, including those from neighboring villages.
The Borama water supply depends on ground water supply from three aquifers; current records show that the water table in these aquifers is steadily decreasing and in a period of four to five years, there would not be any water available to supply to the system. (UNHabitat, 2014) Therefore, this project was chosen and intended to contribute to aliminating a potential water shortage in Borama.
The Borama Master Plan estimated that by 2038, the total daily domestic water demand will be 8,550 cubic meters and the industrial/commercial demand will be 850 cubic meters, totaling 9,400 cubic meters per day. At present, six (three majorly contributing and the other three having a meagre contribution) out of nine wells are functioning, with a total production of 3,000 m³/day. To meet the present water demand, the boreholes had to be pumped continuously with some boreholes working for 23 hours and others for 16 hours. This had two consequences: the continuous pumping of the boreholes was not allowing them to recharge and there were no sufficient storage tanks that exist in the system to store water. With the limited storage available, in case of any system malfunction such as a transmission main damage or generators malfunction, the town would have no water. These figures are indicative of the potential of the aquifer and to that end; the Master Plan recommends further detailed geophysical surveys. Responding to these challenges, UNICEF and the MoWRD have committed to carrying out further detailed groundwater surveys, drilling, and equipping the three boreholes in AFRAGA area, located in the western part of Borama.
However, due to financial constraints, the boreholes were not connected to the town. Therefore, SDF committed to bridge the above-mentioned gap by bringing available water from these sources to the town and engaging Aptech Africa as the project implementers to execute this project
This project now supplies enough water that the storage tanks take 1000m3 compared to the existing storage of 600m3.This project has solved the water crisis that Boroma has had for long especially during the months of April-June when so many people from Djibouti come to Boroma during this period since in their home country it’s always extremely very hot.
With water crisis in Boroma town and Awdal region at large, thanks to Somaliland development Fund (SDF) and Ministry of water resources development (MWORD) that responded to the crisis to address the scarcity of clean drinking water in Boroma town by implementing this Boroma water supply improvement project. This was constructed with support from funding by SDF.
In addition, we as Aptech Africa implemented the project did our best and are excited that all the stakeholders are happy for this achievement right from the president of Somaliland to the people of Boroma are now able to access clean and safe drinking water from the facility.
Boroma town in western Somaliland have been suffering from a perpetual water shortage, with people relying on trucks to bring supplies from unprotected surface water source locally known as water pans. But today because of this project nearly 13,000 households in Boroma have been connected directly to the water supply scheme and only need to turn on a tap. Additionally, the sanitation and hygiene of the Boroma shall be improved.
At a water point on the outskirt of Borama, Serarka in one of the existing well, men, women and children are busy filling their jerry cans. Many have come with their herds of camels, cows and goats so that the animals can also relieve their thirst. The project will benefit all people of Boroma and those that come from Djibouti during driest months in their country they usually come to Boroma and this calls for more water and with this expansion of this water supply improvement project has solved this issue
