Stories from the Field

Barrel Chiquito: Dealing with financial matters - from loans to water fees

Barrel Chiquito, Guatemala, is a small community that covers four square kilometres. It belongs to the village of La Barranca, part of the municipality of San Cristóbal Chucho in the department of San Marcos. It is a small town with 29 houses and 250 people.

Close to the ravine, four families have ten cuerdas of property where they cultivate coffee, maxan, pacaya and tomato. The rest of the families only have a cuerda or a cuerda and a half close to their houses. Around their houses, they grow coffee plants. They also have pacaya, tomato, güisquil, avocado and lime, which they sell in small quantities.

Tortillas are, of course, the principal component of any meal. For this reason, some families rent land in far away places to plant corn. What little corn is planted does not satisfy the food needs. This situation obligates the men to go off to work on the plantations in the southern lowlands for the planting, harvesting and cleaning of coffee. The women, therefore, have to assume the responsibility of directing and doing the work of the community. From November through January, the children do not go to school and the whole family goes to the plantation.

Before the water project

Before the construction of the water project, water was hauled to the houses of Barrel Chiquito from waterfalls or from small springs. It was then used for food preparation, drinking and bathing the young children, as well as for the family gardens close to the house and for the domestic animals – horses, cows, chickens and pigs. To wash the clothes, one had to go to the river. The older children, adolescents and adults would go to the river to bathe, or else use the waterfalls.

During the rainy season, the residents of Barrel Chiquito took advantage of rain water and stored it in barrels, buckets or jugs, thereby reducing the need to haul water.

The hauling of water was done by women and children. It was difficult and took a great deal of time. They would walk up to an hour and a half back and forth to bring back one jug or bucket per person. One had to make four trips to get the family's water for the day.

The families of Barrel had suffered many years on account of not having water in the house. In 1988, a group of six people from Belén (another community), thinking about constructing a water project in the near future, proposed to the community the purchase of a spring.

The people accepted the idea, as doña Eugenia Velásquez explained: “It's about time we do something to not go on hauling water! Going to get water is difficult for us – we're tired of it. What's more, the water serves us everyday. I agree with helping to buy the spring; later, we'll see how we will go about building the water project.”

Thanks to the motivation of doña Eugenia, the others agreed to help buy the spring and, afterward, to build the water project. That same year, the community of Barrel bought a spring close by, paying the amount of Q 2800.

Trying to get support

The same group of people that pushed for the purchase of the spring began taking steps with the municipality of San Cristóbal Chucho, San Marcos. The group from Barrel explained to the municipality the community's need for the water project and solicited financial aid to build it. After a year, however, they had still not received a firm answer.

It was necessary to take steps with other institutions, a community assembly was held in 1989 and a committee was elected that would follow up on the procurement of water. In the election, the persons forming the group that motivated the purchase of the spring were taken into account because the people saw their ability to deal with institutions and represent the community.

This committee was formed by five women and one man: President, Eugenia Velásquez; Secretary, Teodora Fuentes; Treasurer, Francisco Cabrera; Committee Member I, Martina Orozco; Committee Member II, Jacinta Orozco; Committee Member III, Romelia Dionicio.

The departmental government of San Marcos legalized the committee, which began to fulfil its functions and look for other institutions in the department of San Marcos to solicit financial support for the construction of the water project. Eventually, they arrived at the institution Agua del Pueblo (ADP), which after receiving the committee's application, indicated the possibility of supporting the Barrel community in the construction of its water system.

Building the water project

Agua del Pueblo made its first visit that same year (1989) to get to know the Barrel community and propose its form of working to everyone that lived in the community. The people indicated that they agreed with the work conditions that ADP proposed.

These conditions included: the community had to contribute manpower for transporting materials, ditch-digging and building of the structures that the project required, as well as storing of materials brought into the community. In addition, they had to make an initial economic contribution of 5% of the value of the project investment. Also, they had to contribute local materials such as rocks and accept the commitment of paying a loan that the institution made to finance the construction of the water system.

The work began in 1990 with the project feasibility studies. These studies included the topographic survey, project design, calculation of budgets for materials, parts, manpower and technical services. This helped the community to know how much the water system would cost in total.

Afterwards, the technicians from ADP explained to the committee the results of the studies. They presented the general budget, the contribution the community had to make (both in local materials and manpower), and, most important, the form of financing the system's construction.

The president of the committee, doña Eugenia Velásquez, explains: “The technicians of Agua del Pueblo explained to us that the institution can help us give financing for the construction of the project, part as a donation and part as a loan. We can pay off the loan in six years, but at the start of the construction, we have to give a down payment.”

They obtained a loan of Q 15,600 that was used to cover 25% of the total cost of the system's construction. This loan was to be paid back in six years. Another contribution that the community gave was its work and local materials. The rest that was needed to build the project was obtained through donations.

The community and ADP agreed on the construction of the water system. An agreement was signed between the committee (serving as the representative of the Barrel community) and ADP in order to formalize and guarantee the responsibility of the beneficiaries to pay back the loan.

Following this, the committee made the agreements with the owners of the property through which the project's general conduction lines would pass in order to legalize the right-of-way permits.

In May of 1991, the construction of the water project began. The goal was to build the project in seven months. The committee organized work commissions with the beneficiaries. It supervised and kept track of the completion of assigned tasks and the beneficiaries’ work shifts, both in ditch digging and hauling of materials.

In building the project, few men were observed working. As doña Calixta noted, “Our husbands are working on the plantations in the southern lowlands; that's why we have to do this work.” The committee organized the women to carry the local and non-local materials, such as rocks, gravel and plastic tubing. Doña Jacinta, a woman that supported the committee in the construction of the water project, testified: “The truth is that the local material that we needed for the construction of our water project didn't exist. The men weren't in the community. They go off to the plantations to work. So, the women took advantage of the fact that they were filling the potholes on the highway with big rocks. We would hide and when the truck went away, we'd bring back the rocks to the community. We women could do the work when the men were not around. They just sent the money to pay the hired hands. The heaviest work was done by the hired hands, such as the ditch-digging [and] the hauling of cement, iron tubes and block. We women were also given training for the handling of the water-cocks.”

The children also helped in the work of building the project. For example, the girls, besides preparing the food for the family, helped to take care of their siblings. They hauled water that was needed in the house. They did the food shopping in stores that were in the centre of the village that was a kilometre away from the community.

The committee held meetings with the community, wherein they informed the beneficiaries of the advances and problems that were occurring in the construction of the water system.

Health technicians and social promoters from ADP arrived and held training sessions with the committee on the roles they were to play in the project construction. The beneficiaries participated in workshops on health education and the appropriate use of water and the latrine.

In November of 1991, the water and latrine project was inaugurated. The work of the committee had an impact on the neighbouring communities since it was directed by women. These communities participated in the inauguration of the water project, declaring their admiration for the committee and bestowing upon them flower arrangements, fruit, regional alcoholic beverages and diplomas.

Managing the operation of the water project

After finishing the construction of the water system, the committee decided to formalize their legal status with the departmental government of San Marcos as the “Pro-Improvement Committee” in order to do community development projects. Regarding this, doña Calixta, a committee member, assured: “That does not mean that we're no longer going to see to the water. We still believe that what happens with the water project is still our responsibility.”

This same committee continued with administrating the operation of the water system. It was the women who directed the committee's work. They formed groups of beneficiaries to clean the distribution tank, and they later kept track of whether it was done or not. Some committee members made trips to San Marcos to buy cleaning materials such as brooms, bleach and soap. They also bought oil to lubricate the padlocks on the lids of the valve control boxes.

The treasurer collected the fees and, with the help of the president, kept track of them as well as the loan payments. They had a plain notebook with a list of all the beneficiaries and there they wrote down the amount of money each one gave. When the beneficiaries paid, they were given a receipt so that there would not be distrust regarding the collection of money. Also in this notebook, the treasurer wrote down the expenses made in the water project for the purchase of cleaning materials and parts that had to be replaced.

Every six months, the committee would visit the houses of the beneficiaries to monitor the use of the water and latrines. Doña Teodora recounts these visits: “When people found out that the committee was going to come, they'd get worried and clean all around their cisterns so as not to leave signs of water being spilled about. But we knew from what the neighbours told us that the water was spilled. They also sweep the latrine so that it's clean when we make the visit.”

For the maintenance of the water system, the water engineer, with the help of one or two members of the committee, did the inspections of all the elements of the system: they would look at the catchment, go over the entire conduction line, check out the stop-cock, as well as the air and cleaning valves. Unfortunately, this work was done only once a year. The water engineer also did the repairs for the taps in the houses and fixed breakdowns in the system when there were leaks.

The committee, because of being pro-improvement, had to attend to other community needs such as the procurement of a school, teachers, electricity and stoves. These responsibilities took up the time of the committee and it ended up neglecting the adequate administration of the water system.

Don Francisco, treasurer, lamented this situation: “We don't have any time left to collect the fee from everybody. It's hard for us to hold assemblies to keep the community up on what's happening in the water project. We had planned to check over and clean everything in the project every three months, but with the work we have to do with the electricity project, now we only do it every year. We haven't gone to give an accounting to the government, nor have we been punctual with paying back the loan that we have with Agua del Pueblo.”

What little money the committee collected was not enough to allow them to buy the parts that wore out from use, nor did it cover the purchase of cleaning materials. On occasion, the fee money was used for the committee's expenses when it went to San Marcos to take care of business with the other projects.

In spite of having managed to bring electric power to the community, to purchase land for a school, and to build 35 stoves, the committee recognized the need for close administration of the water project. They figured that it would be better to form special commissions for each of the projects underway in the community.

A school commission made up of parents came about, as did a group of ladies, supported by their husbands, to attend to the stove project. (The electricity project, meanwhile, did not require specific attention by the community.) As a result, the committee took on greater responsibility for water project matters. New steps were taken to attend to the wastewater that ran out of the houses, as this was one aspect of sanitation that had not received attention.

Usefulness of the fee in managing the water project

The fee was an economic contribution that the beneficiaries give for their water service. The committee used these funds for the purchase of cleaning materials, replacement of parts and repairs.

At the start of project construction in 1991, the committee, with the help of ADP, determined a fee of Q 0.25 per month for each beneficiary, which added up to Q 3.00 per year. According to the ADP technician, the fee was very low. “It is determined this way because the people from Barrel have limited economic resources. Besides, they have to pay off the loan to Agua del Pueblo. Each year, they have to pay Q 87 per beneficiary. For a total of six months, that's Q 522 each.”

The fee was quite low – only Q 87 was collected per year. Very little was accomplished with this amount. It allowed the committee to repair small problems in the water project, buy some cleaning materials and pay the water engineer.

Before collecting the fee, the president and treasurer would send out reminders about the payment due date, and afterwards, the beneficiaries arrived to the president's house to make the payment.

Community assessment: working towards management improvement

With the idea of supporting the work of the community, three investigators from ADP presented to the residents a participatory action research project for the improvement of the community's capacity for water management. First, it was necessary to make a work programme and make a study of the water and sanitation situation in the community with a group of local people. The local research team was made up of six people – four women and two men – and was trained in the techniques for the assessment of water and sanitation. Following this, guidelines were made for the investigation.

“During the water assessment, we used the technique of mapping with drawings, wherein a sketch was made of the community. People drew the houses and roads, as well as the site of the spring, the distribution tank and conduction line of the water project. To get familiarized with the state of the latrines, we took a walk with the committee members and beneficiaries, observing how the latrine was used and if it was clean or not. Afterward, the group met again and talked about what it saw in order to look at what problems were found and look for solutions to improve latrine use,” said one of the members of the research team.

After making the report of everything that was seen regarding water supply and sanitation, the problems discovered were presented to all the beneficiaries:

• The fee was too low and so did not cover administration and maintenance expenses;
• The committee neglected the water project because of attending to other community projects;
• There were no tools for project maintenance;
• It was not known how to make extensions for new connections;
• Waste water ran out of the houses and down the community's roads;
• The severe rainy season had swept away tubing.

The beneficiaries and the committee talked among themselves and they decided that the most urgent problem that had to be solved was the amount of the fee, and after that, the training of the committee and water engineer, both to familiarize them with their functions and how to make service extensions.

The water engineer and committee were trained in making extensions of water services and a map was made of the current number of serviced houses. Meanwhile, the committee was trained in administration and in keeping track of the financial resources collected through the fees. Also, the roles of the water engineer and committee members were stipulated.

With this knowledge, the committee observed: “Now that we know how to make the extensions, we're going to tell people that there is enough water, and more taps can be sold so that they won't be opposed. Also, we have to see to it that another water engineer gets trained, and if he resigns, have him teach the one who is going to stay on.”

Doña Eugenia, the president of the committee, adds: “I think that what we have to make is a document that can guide those of us in the committee to follow through on what we are deciding.” They posed the idea of making regulations to improve the control of all the matters that have to do with the water system.

In the same assembly, the committee decided to increase the price of the fee from Q3 to Q6. After one year, the committee realized once again that this increase did not cover the project's administration and maintenance costs.

With the backing of the PAR team, the committee discussed activities necessary to maintaining the operation of the water system in a good state. They recognized that the money collected with the fee was not sufficient to cover administration and maintenance costs, which included:

• Purchase of cleaning materials
• Salary of the water engineer
• Committee trips to San Marcos to give an accounting of income and expenses to the departmental government, as well as trips to Quetzaltenango for loan payments
• Paperwork, photocopies and communication
• Office supplies (file cabinet, stapler, hole punch)

A cost was assigned to all these activities, which added up to Q420 per year. In 1997 the committee posed this situation to an assembly of beneficiaries, making them see the necessity of increasing the fee. This assembly was held in December, as all the families were in the community and, moreover, because they had money from their work on the plantations and from their own coffee harvest.

The first reaction of the beneficiaries was rejection because only one year previous, the first increase had been made. Nevertheless, the committee explained and justified the need for the increase, noting that on several occasions the committee members had used their own money for managing the water project. In this way, they agreed to increase the fee to Q 15 per year for each beneficiary.

Application of regulations to control the water project

At the start of the construction of the water project, ADP left internal regulations with the community to control the project's operation. In practice, the committee did not apply these regulations.

Doña Eugenia, committee president, explained the situation: “The regulations got lost. We don't know who has them. We don't use them because we don't really know what they say. Agua del Pueblo just left us the regulations, but we didn't talk about it with them.”

Nevertheless, the committee used its own methods to regulate water use. It was the beneficiaries themselves who kept track of one another. They took charge of letting the community know if someone was making poor use of the water.

Because of it being a small community, there was greater ease of communication between the committee and beneficiaries. For that reason, they did not believe there was much need for regulations written on paper. Besides, the project did not give rise to many problems since there was sufficient water.

The committee thought that it was important to have regulations that would help them make decisions and guide the administration of the project.

Different agreements were made in the training sessions: functions of the committee and the water engineer; water uses; criteria for service extension; and fees. Faced with these developments, the committee saw the need to write them up in a document. As the members pointed out: “Words are carried off by the wind – it's better to write them down so they are respected by the beneficiaries and so that other people can use them when there is a change in the committee . . . Also, it is necessary to write down how often the committee should be changed, because we've been here for more than eight years.”

At that time the committee members were more conscious of the importance of the regulations. There were beneficiaries that did not see it as being so necessary because they had not experienced serious problems and had water all day. Meanwhile, those living on higher ground had gone without water during the hours of peak consumption (9 AM to 1 PM).

The principal reasons for making new regulations was that the previous ones were not well understood and, on top of that, they got lost. The committee simply did not have a document for the agreements that guaranteed good administration of the project.

To make new regulations, the committee members, water engineer and three beneficiaries met, with the support of the research team. First, a questionnaire was put together with three themes:

1. rights and obligations of the beneficiaries
2. functions of the committee
3. functions of the water engineer

The first theme had to do with sanctions and prohibitions of the beneficiaries related to the following:

• size of the cisterns (pilas)
• recommended uses of water
• use and maintenance of latrines
• workshifts for project maintenance and repair
• fee payment
• contributions in case of emergency

The second theme dealt with the functions or roles the committee ought to play within the water project, as well as its tenure. The third theme dealt with the functions, obligations and sanctions of the water engineer.

Once the questionnaire with the three themes was discussed, the research team proceeded to write out the regulations in accordance with the answers and suggestions the participants made.

The first draft of the regulations was presented in a committee meeting, its contents being discussed and clarified; other aspects that had not been considered in the questionnaire were also incorporated. After making the modifications to the document, the committee organized an assembly to present the regulations to the beneficiaries.

The contribution of the women in managing the project

The participation of women played an important role in the procurement, construction and administration of the water system.

In the procurement process, it was the women who took the initiative to buy the spring and get the paperwork going to get financing for the construction of the system. When the committee organized, there were four women and one man.

During the system's construction, they directed the organization of the community for the ditch-digging and hauling of materials. They also represented the community before ADP.

In the administration of the project, they worked together with the water engineer and immediately attended to the technical problems that affected the water system. In the entire time the system was up and running, the beneficiaries were left without water only one week. The fact that they were women, who had a stronger relationship with the water and who knew the consequences suffered if it was not to be had, made them keep firm control of the use of water by the beneficiaries.

The departure of the husbands in order to work outside the community gave the women a space in which to make decisions to maintain the water system. It also allowed them to get involved in other community development projects, something which guaranteed wider participation in the future.

The women demonstrated ability for the management and administration of community projects, as was the case with the directors that made the water project. The fact that they had more of a direct relationship with water use established active participation to maintain the adequate operation of water service in the communities.

Contact:

In Guatemala, the participatory action research was undertaken by SER (Servicios para el Desarrollo) in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. For questions and remarks, please contact Fabian Gonon of SER.