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Majeed Keerio is a small village in the outskirts of Nawabshah, where local residents for the last 700 years have mainly worked as farmers or livestock herders.
A few years ago, through the prime minister's programme, a drainage system was constructed in the village. Suddenly the village's narrow streets were lined with open drains that were meant to take away dirty waste water from homes into proper waste water treatment plants. This never happened. Due to mismanagement and corruption, these open drains soon became clogged with plastic bags, over flowing every time it rained and pooling up outside homes.
Fed-up of these pools of stagnant water, a site for countless diseases and dangers, a local NGO decided to take action. Ameen Keryo, is the CEO of Sindhica Reforms Society, and with help from UN Habitat and WWF-Pakistan he set up Pakistan's first biological waste water treatment plant. A low energy, completely natural water treatment plant, which is in wide use in Australia and Europe, has finally been introduced in Pakistan.
Although, hoping to do good with this treatment plant, Keryo and his teams still face the ire of villagers who complain that drains still get blocked and overflow into their homes. Keryo's response is that it is not his NGO's responsibility to clean up the drainage system rather the local government must step in.
Although water is being treated, there is a need for communication with local government and villagers to fix a drainage system that was constructed and left to decay in Majeed Keerio.
In the meantime, Keryo and his team, continue to treat as much waste water as they can from the village into clean water enough to water two acres of farming fields. They have also set the groundwork for 14 more biological treatment plants across Pakistan and hope to have them competed by 2013.
In this video, Keryo explains how the entire system works. – Sara Faruqi/Dawn.com
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Comments (7) Closed
Nov 29, 2011 03:44pm
This is excellent!! I hope the government of Pakistan will consider supporting this initiative and more importantly an awareness campaign is must so people will take the ownership. Please consider building/strengthening local institutions for a successful management of these plants. Congratulations for such development
Dawood
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Nov 29, 2011 07:50pm
Good. Every body must do his bid for improvement of the country. Roosevelt, although i hate him, once said,"Do what ever you can, with what you have, wherever you are".
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Nov 30, 2011 10:25am
Excellent, i really appreciate such efforts and encourage others to do some thing good for the country instead of complaining always.
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Nov 30, 2011 12:02pm
Very impressive!
This methodology needs patronage from government agencies as well as non-governmental organizations. This suits our environment perfectly - it's not very expensive, it doesn't require energy and it's decentralized.
Great work by Sindhica, WWF and UNHABITAT!
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Dec 01, 2011 10:59pm
Sindhica welcome all friends and invite them to come forward visit this and replicate in at your end.
Contact:
Ameen keryo- 923003233687
sindhica@gmail.com
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Dec 01, 2011 11:21pm
It's always great to get to know of such efforts being undertaken. Very impressive.
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Dec 02, 2011 10:43am
An excellent work accomplished by Sindhica Reforms Society under the leadership of Mr. Ameen Keeryo and assistance of HABITAT and WWF. This initiative shall be replicated in other villages who are confronted with similar drainage problems. By adopting this initiative and technology the health problems could be solved on the one hand and the use of treated water will enhance the productivity and will provide livelihood to communities on the other. i appreciate Ameen and his team.
Dr. G. R. Keerio
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