This is a simple sheet-metal product that creates clean drinking water for rural Ugandan communities. It utilises the steam energy being produced during the process of cooking food for a family. It costs $1.50 to make.
The Problem
What if the very thing that was supposed to give you life was killing you? For almost one third of the worlds population, a crucial choice has to be made everyday, 'do i die now from not drinking water or do I die later from the water I drink?' These people who live in areas without access to clean drinking water are set-up for failure from the beginning and I believe it is up to the rest of us to help them. Those that choose to fight the illnesses associated with unsafe drinking water end up spending nearly 50% of their income on medicine and medical bills.
My Story
My story starts in 2009 when I first travelled to Uganda on a High School trip during School Holidays to help build a teacher’s house in a rural Ugandan orphanage. Little did I know then that this would be be the start of an unshakeable bond with a place that quickly captured my heart and soul. Now, after five further visits I have combined my desire to help the Ugandan people who so touched me and my own profession to design a product that can boil water at the same time as cooking food in rural communities.
I studied Product Design at the University of Technology, Sydney, and for my Honours year, I decided to dedicate my 'Major Project' to solving one of the biggest issues facing people in rural communities across Uganda, the lack of access to clean drinking water. I spent time in the villages before my Honours year began to learn about day to day life in these communities and this allowed me to build a deep understanding and connection with these people. My goal was to not only design a product that was made 'for the people', but also made 'with the people'.
I graduated from my Honours year in 2016 and the product I designed is called 'Okuchumba Amaizi' which translates to 'something that boils water' in the Batoro language of Western Uganda. It can be made by the people in the village and incorporated into their daily cooking ritual, therefore not requiring the user to learn new processes or take any extra time or source more fuel to provide their family with clean drinking water. Best of all, it only costs $1.50 to create!
My Project
'Okuchumba Amaizi' was born out of my sheer pain that these people had to face this adversity on a daily basis just to have something I and all of us take as a basic human right. It is a simple sheet metal product that enables rural Ugandan families to boil water at the same time as cooking food. Since graduating, I have started a movement called '663toZERO' which is born from the recently released statistics from the World Health Organisation that state that 663 million people in this world still do not have access to clean drinking water. This movement has been used to raise awareness for the product I designed and for our direction in the future.
We want to raise $50,000 to take back to Uganda, build a workshop, start employing locals to make the product and provide rural communities with a method to create clean drinking water and take away that terrible daily choice they currently face.
How does it work?
The product 'Okuchumba Amaizi', is a simple sheet metal product that utilises the steam generated from the process of cooking food to heat a pot of water to 95 degrees within half an hour. Once the water reaches 90 degrees, all bacteria and viruses have been destroyed, making the water potable (clean enough to drink), allowing mothers to give their children clean water each day after cooking a meal for her family.
An explanation of how this simple process works is below:
The idea for the simple design of the product is that it is hand-cut in the workshop, which we build with the funds raised, and then taken to the village flat-packed to be folded and finished in the communities by the mothers that will be using them. By involving them in the process the hope is the mothers develop a true sense of ownership over the product and it’s role.
It is made from one piece of sheet metal and steel wire, requiring only a hammer and tin-snips to build, meaning that there is no industrial processes or expertise that need to be learnt to create a product that gives families in rural communities clean drinking water.
Background
Uganda has been in my blood ever since I first travelled there 9 years ago. I grew to love the country and more importantly the beautiful people of Uganda and have always wanted to help them, so when the opportunity arose to design a product for my Honours year in Product Design, I knew I had to design a product to help the poorest communities in Uganda.
Late 2015, I travelled to Uganda and spent time in 4 different villages across the country. during this time I learnt that the biggest problem affecting these communities was the lack of clean water. The 'Cycle of Sickness' is a phrase I created to explain why mothers end up not boiling water for their children and how that keeps them in this vicious cycle of poverty, explained below.
Once I returned from my first Research trip to Uganda, I began my first semester in the Honours program. The first semester consisted of carrying out further research to look into similar products on the market and how they have been successful/unsuccessful. It was also the time when I began thinking of how I could incorporate a product into a ritual or process that these people already carry out everyday and hence, do not have to learn a new technique or skill to use the product.
During the break between the first and second semester, I returned to Uganda to test some prototypes I had designed and to analyse further the process of cooking food, which can take up to four hours a day for the mothers in these villages. This 6-week period allowed me to focus my time on talking to the mothers and developing a deep understanding of their routines and techniques they use. I was able to create the first prototype of the product 'Okuchumba Amaizi' and test it in the village to be able to get some first-hand feedback from the mothers about whether it could work as a daily part of their lives. I had an overwhelmingly positive response and incredible feedback to take into the second semester to assist me in refining the product to where it is now.
What is our goal?
Our goal is to reduce the amount of people around the world that do not have access to clean drinking water and we are starting in Uganda. The product that I have designed can be replicated all over the world in developing communities that use a '3-stone' fire to cook food. We want to be able to provide 100,000 people with access to clean drinking water within the first year. If we reach $50,000, we can make 10,000 of the 'Okuchumba Amaizi' and with the average household containing 10 people in rural communities, that means we can reach 100,000 people!
How can you help?
We believe in changing the World and we want you to be part of it! To reach our goals of being able to directly affect 100 000 people within a year and supply them with clean drinking water, we need your financial support in the form of donations on this page and spreading the word via your social media platforms.
With each different level of 'donations', you receive more and more rewards as a way to say thank you for your support. We will be giving a shout-out on our social media pages to thank you for your contribution and contacting you directly to discuss how we can continue to partner with you for years to come and to chat about the timeline for receiving your rewards.
I hope you all have been encouraged by my vision and want to jump on board as well! Donate on the page, post on your social medias and tell your family and friends about our vision and dream, to reduce the amount of people around the world without access to clean drinking water, a human right, from 663 Million people to ZERO!!!
Thanks for reading,
Mitch Horrocks
663toZERO
