More than 17,000 residents from Queenstown to Walton Hall on the Essequibo Coast are currently benefitting from improved quality and supply of potable water from the $450M treatment facility which was completed in October last year, the Government Information Agency (GINA) reported.
President Bharrat Jagdeo, along with Minister of Housing and Water Irfaan Ali, commissioned the water treatment plant last Friday evening.
The facility was funded under the Water Sector Consolidation Project which is a joint project with the World Bank and is designed to bring safe and clean water to residents of West Coast Berbice, East Coast Demerara and the Essequibo Coast.
The plant, which has the capacity to provide five million litres of water a day, was constructed by Trinidad-based construction firm UEM Inc. and supervised by a team of engineers from GWI.
Addressing a gathering of hundreds of residents, President Jagdeo said that Guyana now spends 40 percent of its budget on the social sectors. Notwithstanding World Bank indicators that put Guyana well on the way to achieving the goal of providing safe water for its citizens, President Jagdeo said that there is still a lot more to be done.
According to GINA, he gave as an example, a US$12M project, designed to improve the quality of water in Linden, Region Ten, as government’s commitment to consistently improve the lives of Guyanese everywhere.
Jagdeo said further that development doesn’t only stop there, pointing to the recently launched Education Television Broadcasting Station, through which Guyanese, even in the remotest areas in the nation, will be exposed to learning Mathematics, English, Science and Social Studies by the end of July 2011.
He spoke of plans to make the sessions interactive, noting that this is being considered as a course for the future.
And Minister Ali noted that the plant’s commissioning stands as testimony to government’s commitment to fulfill the promises made to Guyanese in 2006. The minister said that 40 percent of Guyana benefits from the delivery of treated water, with an estimated 65 percent to benefit in the next five years.
Meanwhile, PPP/C General Secretary and Presidential candidate Donald Ramotar recalled the days in Region Two when water had to be found and fetched far distances to be utilized.
He noted that it was through the commitment of a PPP/C government that a new thrust for potable water for all Guyanese was realized. Ramotar said that especially in Regions such as Two, such facilities are necessary infrastructure in the development of the processing industries and added that this investment assures happier and healthier lives for all Guyanese.
And Paul Dowlin, Operations Analyst at the local World Bank Office, noted that the absence of clean, safe water has resulted in the death of millions worldwide.
Dowlin said, however, that this is not the case for Guyana, which he described as being well on track to providing safe water.
In 2008, Dowlin said, 90 percent of the country had access to safe water, adding that the commissioning marks an important achievement for the Government of Guyana and GWI in their efforts to provide potable water to Essequibians.
