Kenya’s Water Women

In the western Kenyan town of Kakamega and the nearby village of Sisokhe, social worker Rose Atieno and nurse Catherine Ondele are using rainwater-harvesting technology to bring clean water to villages.

As Atieno says, the men in rural villages make the water policies, but it is the women who feel the “pinch”: collecting water is physically difficult, time-consuming, and can make them vulnerable to rape.

In 2011, Atieno was one of the women participating in the Global Women’s Water Initiative project which provides women with the skills to build, repair and maintain rainwater harvesting tanks.

Since then, the trained women masons have helped other women build new tanks and turn their water into a money-spinner by selling it to the water company.

We follow Atieno and Ondele to see how Kenya’s female water tank masons are empowering women in rural villages and bringing measurable benefits to their families, communities – and their country.

More about women and water around the world:

Water and women: we need to know more

Jordan’s Water Wise Women

Women’s Day: Access to water crucial to emancipating women – AWWASHNet

The women fighting a pipeline that could destroy precious wildlife

Saluting Women Water Warriors

More from the World Water Day video library:

Iran’s Water Crisis

Senegal’s Sinking Villages

China’s Underwater Hunt

The Colorado River: A Lifeline Running Dry

New Zealand: Polluted Paradise

Jordan’s Water Wise Women

Flood-Resilient Homes in Pakistan: A Traditional Future