Oi! (Hi)
Gabriela Teixeira, Partnership Account Manager, welcomes you to Brazil to meet some of the people you’ve helped empower with lasting access to safe water or sanitation.
Welcome to Brazil
In Brazil, 27 million people lack access to safe water and 108 million people lack access to a safe toilet. The people we serve in Brazil are solving their water and sanitation crises with small, affordable loans that enable them to establish lasting, region-appropriate safe water and sanitation solutions on their properties.
Journey with us to the state of Bahia where many of the families in communities we serve have replaced their unreliable and often unsafe sources of water for sustainable safe water solutions that bring health and hope to their families.
Meet the people we serve
To start our tour, we’ll take an hour-long journey from the big city of Vitória da Conquista in South Bahia to the rural communities the people we serve call home. The roads start to take on more curves and eventually transition from pavement to dirt as we wind our way up into the beautiful green hills of our first stop, Barro do Choca.
Thankful her water crisis is over, Elivane exclaimed, “Water is truly everything!”
Elivane gave her young family safe water, health, and hope for a bright future
Nestled atop one of the hills of Barro do Choca sits Elivane and Dario’s home. The simple, white home is surrounded by a blanket of colorful flowers that Elivane and her daughter enjoy watering. For Elivane, water for her garden and more importantly, for her family, is everything.
There was a time when Elivane spent hours of her day walking to a river to collect the water her family needed. Then, Elivane and Dario financed a water storage tank through our local partner, Agroamigo, which is the Rural Microfinance Program of Banco do Nordeste aiming to improve the lives of family farmers in Brazil. The loan included funds for piping and a pump to bring safe water into the family’s home.
For Nailton and Lucimar, good mornings start with coffee and safe water
From Elivane and Dario’s home we’ll take a short trip back west. As we drive to the home of Nailton and Lucimar, we gain elevation to finally arrive at an altitude ideal for coffee growing. Nailton is a coffee farmer and his wife, Lucimar, cares for their home and children. For their family and their coffee farm, water is essential.
To end his family’s walks to get water downhill at a distant river, Nailton tapped into his local agricultural farming and banking resource. This is our local partner that also provided Elivane and Dario a loan. Nailton was able to affordably finance a water storage tank, pipes, and pump to bring water to his property too. In expressing just how invaluable safe water is to his family, Nailton shared, “Water is a precious resource, isn’t it?”
Describing the difference the solution has made for her family, Fabiana said, “Our lives changed one hundred percent! I used to carry water on my head. I washed dishes and clothes in the river.”
Fabiana and Jose overcame the obstacle that stood between their family and safe water
Heading back down the hillside from Nailton and Lucimar’s home to a region south of Barro do Choca, we make our way to Fabiana and Jose’s home. Their home is situated in the farming hills of Sossego. Like Nailton, Jose is a coffee farmer. Like the other families we’ve met, Fabiana and Jose also got affordable access to a safe water solution for their home. They financed a new water storage tank and piping to store and supply water into their house and about their property. Now Fabiana, Jose, and their children have access to safe water and the time, health, and hope it brings.
Our partners are changing lives in their own communities
From Sossego we will make our way northwest to end our tour at the office of our local partners in Vitoria da Conquista. Here the team works to implement the solutions we created to help empower families in need with affordable access to safe water and sanitation solutions. We work with them by providing expert training and technical assistance to develop programs that scale impact.
Thank you for helping change lives in Brazil
Thank you for traveling with us and thank you for supporting our work in Brazil. With your continued support, together we can reach more families in need of life’s most critical resources across the country of Brazil and around the world.
