Free Water Movement – Drought Resistant and Year Round Farming for Africa

In the name of the intelligent, truthful, and kind Lord of the universe -- Having free water policy for black Africa is easier than you may imagine, smarter than present selling of water, more caring beyond humans. 

African governments and caring folks around the world should seriously consider a different approach in helping ‘poor’ Africans. 

As the world spends billons in search for a planet with water, I want to show you how few millions of dollars can eradicate hunger beyond Africa. 

There is a continent on earth that helped and may help humans better than many planets may.  Helping Africa and the poor around the world is the most secure way to enter/discover heavenly planets. Beside Agricultural purpose, the boreholes I am suggesting can be used as fire hydrants to protect lives, wealth, and the environment from the effects of fire.

First, let us contrast the effects of selling water versus free water approach.  The average water bill for a compound of about ten people in The Gambia is around ten to twenty dollars per month – that is without gardening.  Presently, less than forty per cent of compounds in The Gambia have paid water access.

How is the over sixty per cent of Gambians using water? Mainly, free well water… which means the little profit government makes through selling water may go back to health subsidies for others. So a smart government that believes in free health care for its citizens should start with free water, then tax the healthy citizens who are well-fed through the free water policy. 

Using The Gambia as example, 11,000 strategic boreholes in this small country of only about 11,300 sq kms can be great start.  This translates to over 11,000 year round farms/gardens, 11,000 safer fire hydrants/’virtual fire stations’ , a drought resistant country, a better well-fed population,  more foreign currency and less inflation, more tourists, better democracy, etc.

Even the Gambia government can easily afford 11,000 boreholes if we understand it as viable investment, health need, security need, etc.

Using traditional mechanical machines, the cost of digging 11k boreholes in The Gambia can be around twenty million dollars. 

Later, I will explain a system of digging at a fraction of the cost and time. For now, let us ask why the governments and caring folks around the world refuse this investment?

You and I must raise their awareness. Although sometimes the people are the problem, government seems to be part of the problem in the world of agriculture, in Africa. 

Every summer, Lamin Daranka and many places in The Gambia have gardens due to free rain, but garden lot less in other seasons due to water cost. 

Some youths even go to the provinces but semi-drought of no rain for two to three weeks may ruin a season and discourage them from farming.

It’s about time for governments to dig enough boreholes, urge the people to farm, and then reasonably tax without fear of starving the people. 

One bad season reduces government foreign currency earnings in the millions – is it not smarter for governments to dig enough boreholes, resist drought, have year round farming, increase its foreign currency earnings through agriculture, tourism, and beyond? 

By having free water, we can easily demand over hundred types of herbs and vegetables be produced in The Gambia for balanced diet and to attract tourists. We can have food forests to attract better tourists than zoos. We can feed our animals much better, plant more trees and reduce pollution. Your house address or month of birth can determine which produce you must produce for your country to maintain variety and availability.

The so-called disadvantages of free water policy are shortsighted. The number and kind of jobs water companies provide are too minimal compared to the jobs free water will directly and indirectly provide in Africa.  

With regard to water wasting, cameras and meters can be used in some cases. It is much harder to waste water in Africa because there is hardly water recollection system, and no sane person will flood a compound.

Watering the unpaved streets means less dust and the sun will react on it to return as rain.

Swimming pools will improve our health and that water can be used to garden. More swimming pools and plumbing materials can easily earn the governments lot more than the about ten dollars per compound water bill, at the moment.

Again, the mild droughts in most of black Africa can be easily resisted if the Lord continues to bless us as of the present and the past. Such resistance is appreciation of new blessings by the Lord of the universe, the Lord of the water that comes from above and under the earth. He allowed us to have wells, now helping us with boreholes. They consume less space than wells and work better.

Offering free water must come with sensitization for the best outcome. Encourage the people to plant trees to pay for the cost. Plant trees to pay for your children school fees and AU water tax.

About $100 AU water tax per decade for every adult, or long term visitor, with less than ten thousand dollar verifiable tax paid receipts in Africa, one bag of cashew nuts, or xyz tons of hemp to be paid within three years after the free water policy is launched.

Otherwise, you may have lazy folks guaranteed free food, and that may anger the Lord, risking punishment.

Now, do the maths: how many millions can your country collect through free water policy? If you are unemployed by people, plant trees, bamboo for housing, garden for food, etc. Nature has unlimited employment for us in Africa.

Boreholes just make the employment easier and more assuring. Every African teenager, including girls, should be advised at school to plant three cashew trees, sour sop, sweet sop, baobab, avocado, breadfruit, or something similar to consume and help pay for school fees, not just depend on parents, asking others,  or government subsidies.

Eating and eating enough are two different things many Africans should learn about. We produce cashew nuts, under consume them, while others consume enough of it year round. Sharing one carrot or egg plant with a whole compound cannot be wise or eating enough.

Now, cost is partly to blame, but with free water policy, efforts and state of mind must be raised. Will the AU ministers please sign on on-time or very late?

Introducing new vegetables, herbs, and nuts is crucial and should not be compromised. The Koran hints us heaven is where you have variety of food, while hell has limited food. Like the rest of the world, Africa is seeing a surge of child obesity and we must smartly confront it. 

Rather than banning or keep introducing them to candies and fry food, every country must promote at least seven nutritious nuts for consumption, not just money -- Almond, chestnuts, pistachios, should not be for only rich folks and should be available year round. 

Rather than banning soda, introducing countless soda, or fighting with the kids, we must introduce vegetable juicing in variety, and it requires much more than what Africa produces at the moment. Also do not wait on the governments, buy the seeds, search on the net on how to plant them, visit farms, and pressure your family members in Africa to farm and garden more.  Free water policy should mean much higher health for Africa, especially our children.

This movement for free water policy will improve our democracy and reduce corruption.  As the population eats better, they will fear less, worry less, and think better. 

Our children can be introduced to more vegetables through a vegetarian school feeding program. Parents can pay with money or produce.

Beside humans, animals’ lives will improve as grateful guardians of the earth.  Imagine contributing to the improvement of billions or millions of lives? Help spread the message and see yourself as such.

Vote for only the political parties that publicly endorse this movement and approach. Do not for a minute underestimate the possible good through this initiative – free water translates to almost free food in Africa, which means less worries and more productive people. It means new inventions are around the corner and some research gets cheaper in Africa.  It means a prosperous Africa is ever more realistic and probable, not just possible. May the Lord bless Africa and the sincere friends of Africa!

A New Technique to drill boreholes:

Saving time and money is smart beyond boreholes. The bulky material the Western World sells to Africa and other poor countries to dig boreholes are outdated, unfit as gifts and deceptive as sales after this wisdom I am about to unveil. Technology and common sense demand evolution in every aspect of life…. A submersible electric blender with replaceable concrete nail types of blade can easily rotate to drill better than the outdated heavy and bulky material. 

Alongside the blender, we will need submersible mud pump and submersible camera to choose the preferred soil type for the submersible water pump. Submersible camera is much smarter, cheaper, and more efficient than the ‘electric logging’ many borehole drilling companies use.

This combination of materials can easily be made to retail under $500 and be operated with a car or pick-up truck and a trailer for the PVC pipes.

Almost every village has a smartphone, so every village will ultimately be able to have the full drilling set.  You will be able to drill a borehole under one hour with the right type of crew.  Meaning one team can drill over 1000 boreholes in a year – of course, we ultimately pray for most compounds to have a borehole as most compounds had wells.

Let smart business people and governments team up for this marijuana inspired invention. The water pipe drills and soften for the blender, the rotation of concrete nail blades dig, the mud pump sucks, the camera helps dictate the speed and type of drill options, etc. 

You call engineers with blender experience, submersible pump and any electronics water proof experience, fan, washing machine, or any rotating machine experience, drone experience, etc. 

Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa, Ghana, Ethiopia, Kenya, even The Gambia may have enough engineers to work on such a project. 

Asia, Russia, Arabia, and the Western world, you are also invited to take up this challenge as caring friends of Africa or pro-earth.

Asia reportedly dug boreholes with Bamboo sticks, Some Africans are using cheap metals to manually dig boreholes, and this much smarter approach will certainly work.

 The PVC piping is a bulk of the cost in boreholes – around $200 per borehole as of now with oil prices going down.

If we legalize hemp or marijuana, the hemp plastic piping will cost lot less. Again, we do not have to follow their commercial oriented standards, but use common sense and respect every needed standard. 

The submersible pumps are reasonably priced around hundred dollars and can go down as demand rises towards every compound and farm with a borehole. 

I prefer electric over solar pumps at the moment, then use solar or wind to power it up.  I also prefer wind turbine over solar due to ease of maintenance, plus air is available twenty four hours, especially with more trees.  Using an inverter through your vehicle’s DC outlet, you can dig a borehole. You can also use generators. Electric borehole drilling is realistic and much more efficient.

Let the governments offer water supply, but have your own borehole for security reasons. If there is war and they choose to cut water supply, you won’t be affected.

If they put fluoride or something you do not trust in the water, you have option. Trust yourself than the government on food, water, and sex -- please do not masturbate or buy their sex toys; garden where possible to avoid GMO.  Although I do not know of any scientific sign that frowns at concentrated water collection, I prefer distributed water drawing, as knowledge improves.

We will compromise with governments who want to charge water in the summer, because we should build our houses to collect rain water in the summer.

African builders must include boreholes, badafos green fence, and/or green houses in their proposals. African governments can demand about twenty-five per cent of all compounds be reserved for trees or gardening.

Land owners to farm or allow citizens to garden on unused land, pay reasonable commission through produce or money. 

People should not be allowed to abuse others through land ownership. We need land tax or free it up for potential taxpayers.  I believe in land leasing instead of land owning, and no land inheriting, but that is a different topic and needs some unlearning for some of you.

Why Gambia as example? It is the smallest country on mainland Africa, almost no minerals, considered poor in many ways. If we can transform this country through free water policy and other simple initiatives to improve African lives, other countries will have hope and no excuse to follow suit. Of course, let no country wait for The Gambia.

The author Jarga Kebba Gigo is an African Activist and Transformer