History:
Our first facility:
PureMadi’s first filter facility was in collaboration with an existing pottery facility called Mukondeni. Mukondeni is located in Ha-Mashamba, Limpopo Province, South Africa. Like much of rural South Africa, Limpopo Province faces “quadruple” health challenges related to the crippling burden of HIV/AIDS; other infectious and nutritional diseases; non-communicable diseases; and injury-related conditions. It is a predominantly agricultural province, which suffers from the highest rates of poverty (34%) in the Republic of South Africa and reports the lowest rates of accessible drinking water (44%).
This confluence contributes to unacceptably high rates of diarrheal disease and associated mortality. The age-standardized death rates from diarrhea are 1.5 times higher than the national average and 3 times higher than the neighboring Gauteng Province, where Johannesburg and Pretoria are located. Diarrheal disease is second only to HIV disease in terms of life years lost. While the death rates from diarrheal disease are appalling, they fail to measure another important effect of diarrheal disease: the tragic loss of human potential due to the negative impacts of repeated bouts of diarrhea on children’s physical and cognitive development.
In order to help tackle such waterborne diseases, the Mukondeni Filter Factory was developed by PureMadi in partnership with the University of Virginia, the University of Venda, Rotary International, and the 45 women potters of the Mukondeni Pottery Cooperative.
International partners have reached out to help the factory succeed. A European company (Howells Railway Products Ltd.) had fabricated and shipped us a new filter press. Rotary had provided a significant grant to support continued factory development.
In addition to helping the women create ceramic water filters, the University collaboration has assisted in marketing and sales efforts for the factory. To start with, the filters are currently being evaluated by the South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) to confirm that the filter technology is effective and appropriate for the country. Additionally, the factory now has uniforms and informational pamphlets, and a large sign and website are in the making. These resources were developed by the Small Enterprise Development Agency (SEDA), a local stakeholder committed to helping the Pottery. Ceramic water filter sales have been initiated in Ha-Mashamba through local schools and health clinics. The goal is to continue sales by providing water filters to local general stores and hardware stores to sell as household water filtration devices. Finally, the Mukondeni potters each have a filter in their homes to use and share the knowledge with family and friends.
Given the community's interests and demands for the ceramic water filters, PureMadi opened a second ceramic water filter facility called Dertig. This new location provided a more central and accessible location.
Our second facility
The Dertig Facility, near the larger city of Hammanskraal was PureMadi’s second Filter Facility. This new location provided a more central and accessible facility to meet the community’s interests and demands for ceramic water filters.
The Dertig Facility had become a community fixture over the years and many people from the area were excited to be involved in filter production as well as tending to the garden that was planted. We worked closely with our community partner Khulisa Social Solutions to successfully build this location up.
Khulisa Social Solutions, a South African NGO which addresses social vulnerabilities and helps build up grass-root projects, was PureMadi’s community partner in this second facility. Khulisa has worked on various projects which emphasize poverty alleviation, crime reduction, victim empowerment, enterprise development and community support. Over the course of a year, Khulisa project manager Zain Halle and PureMadi President Rebecca Kelly negotiated and entered into a Memorandum of Understanding for the two organizations to work under as they developed the second facility. Khulisa initiated marketing efforts in the Hammanskraal area once the facility opened.
In the summer of 2014, Board Member Jim Smith along with Officers Rebecca Kelly, Theresa Hackett, and Sydney Schrider selected a site location for the second facility in the North West province in the city of Dertig. Permission to build a facility from the Tribal Offices of Hammanskraal was obtained and a land survey was conducted. Rebecca, Theresa and Sydney were also able to meet with two future filter facility employees, Grace and Paulina. Grace and Paulina continue to be enthusiastic about the project and have high hopes for what it will bring to the community.
In the summer of 2015 a UVA Jefferson Public Citizens team comprised of Matthew Smith, Alice Burgess, Max Barab and Anna Wallace spent a month in Hammanskraal. They helped to initiate and oversee the start of construction the filter facility as well as further develop community ties. Grace and Paulina were at the facility every day and got family and friends of theirs excited about the project as well. Construction is being done by a local company as well volunteers in the community who are very much committed to the project.
On one side of the facility there is an elementary school and on the other a church is being built so we anticipate a lot of great educational opportunities with these two neighbors.
