Blog - Synergy Heals

Why Every Gift Matters, and Where It Goes

People sometimes ask whether a single donation really makes a difference. In the villages we serve, the answer is yes — and the people there will tell you so themselves. When word reached one village that a borehole might be coming, they didn’t wait quietly. They threw a party.

“The whole village is happy today, because we heard we're going to have clean water. We started a party to show our joy — and to let people know to help us put wells in our village.” — Moussa Keita, Kinienkoura

That is what hope looks like here. Now here is exactly where your gift goes.

We drill one complete well at a time. A deep, solar-powered, tested well for a village costs about $20,000. We drill deep through rock to reach clean water, install a solar pump, test the water to confirm it’s safe, and work with the community so the well keeps running for years. We don’t drill and leave.

And we bring the land back, too. As we drill, we train people in the village to restore the soil and greenery around the well, so the water and the land recover together.

One well moves many of the United Nations’ Global Goals at once:

Clean water (SDG 6), health (SDG 3), education (SDG 4), gender equality (SDG 5), less poverty (SDG 1), and healthier land (SDG 15). Solve the water, and you move all of them — because every one of those problems, the families of Kinienkoura traced back to a single cause: no clean water.

No gift is too small. Whether you fund a whole well or a few feet of it, you become part of the village that finally has water. [Link: Donate]

When Children Fetch Water Instead of Learning

In Kinienkoura, the school day doesn’t start with a lesson. For many children, it starts before sunrise, with a long walk to find water.

“Sometimes we wake the children at 4 or 5 in the morning and spend all day fetching water. They get to school late, and the teachers send them away for being late.” — A parent in Kinienkoura

The children feel it most. One student put it simply: it’s too hard to get water, and they’re punished for the time it takes.

“It's too hard to get water. We travel every time to fetch water a kilometer away. Often when we go, we're late for school, and the teachers chase us out of class because we're late.” — A student, Kinienkoura

The school itself is caught in the same crisis. The principal of Kinienkoura Elementary described what it means to run a school with no water:

“I have 430 students, 127 of them girls. The children drink so much water that the need spills over into neighboring families' supplies, and they come and shout at us. Now I tell every child to bring an old juice bottle from home, fill it, bring it to school, and take it back home to refill for the next day.” — Principal, Kinienkoura Elementary School

Six teachers work at that school. Every one of them goes home to a family facing the same water problem. When a child spends the morning carrying water instead of sitting in class, the cost isn’t just one missed lesson — it’s a future narrowed, one day at a time. And it falls hardest on girls, who carry the most water and lose the most school.

A well at or near a school gives that time back. Children get to stay children, and students. [Link: Donate]

Why the Kankan Region Needs Clean Water

In the Kankan region of eastern Guinea, clean water is not something most families can count on. The rivers run low for months. The few wells that still work can be kilometers away. And the water people can reach is often dirty enough to make them sick.

We asked a woman in Djoma Kinienkoura what daily life is like. She didn’t soften it:

“If we say we're getting clean water, we'd be lying to you. To get clean water, you have to pay a lot of money. Look at the color of our water — it's the color of a toad's urine.” — Kanko Kouyate, Djoma Kinienkoura

That is the daily reality for thousands of families here. The data behind it is just as stark. According to UNICEF, 190 million children across ten African countries face a combined threat of unsafe water, poor sanitation, and disease. Worldwide, more than 1,000 children under five die every day from illnesses tied to dirty water and poor sanitation — and a large share of those deaths are concentrated in West and Central Africa.

In one study in Ebolowa, Cameroon, 97% of children under five had suffered from a waterborne disease. The pattern across the region is the same: when the water is dirty, children pay the highest price. Families in Kinienkoura told us they have watched it happen.

“A lot of people have died from dirty water. Old people, children, babies — because children don't know the difference between clean and dirty water. When our old people get sick here, we're always told it's because of the worms from the dirty water.” — A resident of Kinienkoura

This is why we start where the need is greatest. Our first well is going into a village in this region — drilled deep, through solid rock, to reach water that is clean and stays clean. We test it before anyone drinks it. One well changes a village’s health from the very first day.

You can help fund that first well. Every gift goes straight into the ground. [Link: Donate]

BLOGS

Why Every Gift Matters, and Where It Goes

When Children Fetch Water Instead of Learning

Why the Kankan Region Needs Clean Water