Young people of Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria established a project to reduce water contamination. The project is known as Grassroots Participation and Management of Rural Water-Related Environmental Problems.
The project aims to reduce infectious diseases and death from the consumption of polluted water. It involves networking among women’s associations found in the area. So far, the project has helped to abolish the dumping of refuse into streams, and educated families about the importance of boiling drinking water and constructing ventilated improved pit latrines in primary schools.
In addition, it researched and encouraged the re-use of pig manure to restore farmland that was polluted through crude oil contamination. As a result, dramatic reductions in diseases have been achieved in the area. Incidences of hepatitis, cholera, typhoid fever, dysentery, and polio were reduced by half in one year. In the following two years, another reduction by half of the outstanding cases was realized.