Pumping fresh water is child's play

Bangladeshi schoolchildren have fun and pump water on the play pump.

Today on World Water Day, the children of South Garpara Primary School in Bangladesh will be doing what they do every school lunch time - pumping 1000 litres of clean drinking water from the ground to a tank on the roof of their school.

For these children, it is not hard labour. It is playtime and, literally, a tonne of fun. The children use a pump known as a play pump that operates as a see-saw. When the children push off, the see-saw arms pump the clean water from underground to a distribution system that delivers fresh water to the school toilets and a drinking water fountain.

Although 100 per cent of homes in 49 municipalities of Bangladesh have been declared “sanitised” by local government, a school sanitation and household hygiene education survey by Plan International has revealed that 50 per cent of schools do not have safe drinking water, sanitised water for toilets or clean hand-washing facilities.

As a result, many students, especially girls, drop out of school. Those that stay in school run the risk of getting diarrhoea and other waterborne diseases. Diarrhoea remains the second leading cause of death among children under five. Nearly one in five child deaths – about 1.5 million each year – are due to diarrhoea. According to the World Health Organisation and UNICEF, it kills more young children than AIDS, malaria and measles combined.

Plan International refined an African model of play pump to be more effective, child-friendly and robust, introducing it as the first of its kind in Bangladesh. These primary school students are now no longer part of the 1.1 billion people in the world who access their drinking water from unsafe sources.

Before the installation of the play pump, the primary school had a ‘No. 6 hand pump’ that was too big for the children to operate, and their playground had no play equipment. Since it has been installed, attendance rates at the school have improved dramatically.

“The play pump has responded to children’s rights to a quality education and good health, whilst providing a lot of fun,” said Plan Bangladesh Country Director Ned Espey. “About 150 students have access to clean water and toilets throughout the school year. Now the empty chairs in the classrooms are filled with energetic, happy students who have discovered the importance of sanitation and hygiene.”

In his World Water Day 2010 message, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said: “Safe drinking water and adequate sanitation are crucial for poverty reduction, crucial for sustainable development and crucial for achieving any and every one of the Millennium Development Goals.”

Bangladesh has a complex and increasingly difficult relationship with water. Among the factors contributing to this are climate change, catastrophic flooding, rural-urban migration, coastal erosion and the pollution of drinking wells by natural arsenic.

As part of its World Water Day 2010 message ‘Clean Water for a Healthy World’, the UN has warned climate change will exacerbate the current water quality crisis.

Find out more about World Water Day

Find out more about Plan’s water and sanitation work

Learn more about Plan’s Community-Led Total Sanitation program

Find out more about our water and sanitation work in East Timor, Vietnam, Laos and Tanzania.