We’re So Close! Help us Meet Our Match Goal and Do Twice the Good
Dear *|Fname|*,
March is coming to an end and so is our Match Campaign. We are so close to reaching our goal! To all of you who have already helped to make this happen by contributing to our campaign, we cannot thank you enough. Our work simply is not possible without your dedication and commitment. We also want to thank our sponsors – Chip and Lucy Swab and Bob and Peggy Krist. They are matching any gift you make this month, no matter the size, up to USD $10,000. That means any donation you give is automatically doubled, allowing you to Do Twice the Good. So, Please consider making a gift today, and also sharing this email within your personal circle.
Today, we hope you will take just a few minutes to read on and learn about a critical cornerstone of our work: collaboration. The water quality and scarcity problems we’re facing in our watershed are far beyond the reach of one small organization, even one that works as hard and as effectively as we do. Because of that, we at Caminos strongly believe that a collaborative approach is paramount to creating sustainable and systemic change in our region and beyond. Over the years, we have leveraged partnerships with municipal and state governments, national networks and coalitions, Mexican and international NGOs, regional grassroots organizations, academic institutions and leading researchers as well as key stakeholders and individuals, like our growing base of donors, to create awareness and assertive action to improve the health, economy, and future of so many thousands in our community and well beyond.
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With Our Partners, We Can Rise to this Immense Challenge
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Water scarcity and contamination are considerable challenges in the Upper Rió Laja Aquifer – the main water source for 680,000 people throughout Northern Guanajuato. The water table is declining by 2-3 meters (~6-7 feet) per year, some of the most overexploited groundwater across the globe. This forces wells to be drilled much deeper, and the deeper we go in order to reach this vital resource, the more our water is contaminated with increasingly toxic levels of arsenic and fluoride – two incredibly dangerous chemicals that are naturally found in the deeper parts of our aquifer. Arsenic and fluoride, if consumed regularly, are linked to irreversible conditions like skeletal and dental fluorosis, cognitive and developmental impairments in children, chronic kidney disease, and different types of cancers.
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Photo: Luz Villafuerte, leader of CUVAPAS, taking a water sample.
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Over a decade ago, when Caminos de Agua was just beginning to collaborate to understand these issues, with several Mexican and international universities, and in partnership with local grassroots organizations, we began our Water Quality Monitoring Program – our first program that continues to this day with the goal of documenting and mapping the changing arsenic and fluoride contamination conditions plaguing our region. In 2013, dozens of communities, organizations, and hundreds of people came together in a massive collaborative effort to present the results of those first studies, along with the testimonies of those most impacted, in front of the Permanent People’s Tribunal – an international human rights ethical body, which stated:
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"Given the seriousness of the cases reported regarding overexploitation and contamination of surface and groundwater, and its impact on people and ecosystems, it is recommended that the Mexican government...declare [the entire Upper Río Laja Watershed region] an emergency zone due to the environmental and health risks."
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Photo: Permanent People's Tribunal in 2013 general meeting.
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Today, we continue to monitor the increasingly worsening water quality situation in our region with diverse partners like municipal governments, universities like Texas A&M and the University of Guanajuato, and community partners. We have also expanded beyond the boundaries of our watershed to better understand the growing water contamination throughout the country. INCA (the National Water Quality Inventory for its acronym in Spanish) is a national network of academics and other organizations collaborating to uncover the arsenic and fluoride throughout the country. Together, we have helped make federal water quality data public, which has shown us that upwards of 21 million people throughout Mexico are exposed to excessive levels of arsenic and/or fluoride in their water supply, with few appropriate solutions available.
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Photo: This interactive map is the culmination of years of water quality testing regional and water advocacy nationally. We are extremely thankful for our collaborators including Texas A&M University, University of Guanajuato, Kansas State University, Northern Illinois University, as well as the work of the National Water Quality Inventory (INCA) who helped make the Federal water quality data available. (Click on it to open in a new browser).
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To make an impact on those most affected by these issues, for years we have partnered with grassroots organizations like CUVAPAS, SECOPA, and the San Cayetano Community Center – three of our longest and most important collaborators – to implement extensive education, rainwater harvesting, water treatment,and sanitation projects throughout the region. This collaboration was highlighted, through the lens of our partner Father Juan Carlos Zesati, in 2016, which brought international attention to these issues that were, up to that point, largely ignored by many local and national authorities (read the article here).
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Photos: Community partners come together to work on, and celebrate, the construction of new rainwater harvesting systems.
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A lot has changed since 2016, and the success of these collaborative programs has leveraged the interest of new important institutional stakeholders and brought them to the table. Today, we are working directly with large Foundations like Gonzalo Río Arronte, Alstom, and PlanetBuyback, private corporations, particularly Rotoplas, and even governments like the municipality San Diego de la Unión, to substantially increase the scope of these programs – together expanding clean water and sanitation solutions to more than 35 additional communities over the next two years.
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Photo: Caminos, SECOPA, Rotoplas, and the Mayor of San Diego de la Union developing a large-scale rainwater harvesting program.
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The complexity of our regional water problems have also required the development of new technologies. For more than 10 years, we have regularly partnered with international NGOs like Engineers Without Borders and leading researchers, innovators, and universities like NC State, Imperial College of London, UNAM San Luis Potosi, and many more. Together, our in house Tech Team and satellite network of world-class technical advisors, have been partnering to develop pioneering technologies – like our Groundwater Treatment System, which removes arsenic and fluoride at the community level – to help us vastly increase our scope and reach in the fight for clean water in communities disproportionately affected by the new water quality and scarcity challenges we face today.
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You are One of Our Most Important Collaborators, Don’t Let this Match Opportunity Pass You By
As our current Match Campaign is coming to an end, we want to make sure to thank you, our loyal supporters, for all you do. It’s because of you that we are able to continue building our capacity, which in turn allows us to leverage this continuously growing world of collaborators, enabling important and impactful change in the lives of so many. Unfortunately, our crisis keeps on increasing in complexity and depth, reaching further into the urban and rural areas of our watershed as well as throughout Mexico. We’re at a crucial point in our organization’s growth where we’re on the cusp of having much greater impact and influence. To do that, we are turning once more to you. Please consider making a donation today; this is the last time to have your gift doubled! Thank you!
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Copyright © 2022 Caminos de Agua, All rights reserved.
You are receiving this email because of your interest in Caminos de Agua.
Our mailing address is:
Caminos de Agua
José María Correa 23A
Colonia Santa Cecilia
San Miguel de Allende, Guanajuato 37727
Mexico
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