The Club was honored to have John Smarge of the Rotary Club of Naples speak about the Rotary sponsored HANWASH program in Haiti (along with others shown above). John explained that the problem with donation-based single water programs is that it only distracts from building a sustainable clean water system for the whole country. 
 
Instead, Rotary and a number of other organizations have created the Haiti National Clean Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Strategy with the acronym HANWASH. The objective is to create a sustainable system of water and sanitation which is administered by the government and paid for by the Haitian populations. 
 
The way they are attacking the problem is to use cell phones and case workers who go out and test water wells already in existence. Once they get the data on all the wells in a given area, they can more easily and cost effectively go out and build a sustainable water and sanitation correctional program. Slowly, the corrections will cover the entire country, but it will take billions of dollars and a few decades to reach the goal.
And, here is a photo of John receiving an award from the Haitian government for the work he and many others are doing to create the historic program that, for the first time, has a chance to create a permanent solution to water and sanitation in the country.
John’s last slide shows what each Rotary Club can do to support this gigantic problem that has a Rotary solution.