Rotary Club

Economic impact

• Income is no longer spent on medical bills for preventable diseases.
• The filter pays for itself within a year with money that would have been spent on medical bills or fuel/wood to boil water.
• Men and women are healthy enough to work and earn a living.
• Parents don’t have to stay home from work and tend to their sick children.
• Children can attend school and get an education.

Environmental impact

Sawyer water filters completely eliminate the need to clean water by boiling. The average family of four who cleans their water by boiling burns the equivalent of 10 to 40 trees, 39 gallons of oil, or 211 pounds of natural gas. The only energy source required by Sawyer filters is gravity.

Job Creation

Not only are Sawyer filters being distributed for humanitarian aid, they are also creating sustainable economic opportunities in several countries around the globe. Sawyer has assembly facilities in Haiti, Rwanda, Ghana and Guatemala.

Disaster Response

Sawyer filters offer a fast, efficient, and sustainable solution to clean water in the event of a natural disaster. No electricity, chemicals or technical training is required. Not only will these filters provide immediate relief after the disaster, the filters will still be functioning years and years down the road.

North Shore and Duluth Harbortown Rotary Clubs

Village of Lougou, Haiti

The North Shore and Harbortown Rotary Clubs are working in Lougou on several long-term projects including an electrical upgrade and new classroom for the local school, a new health care clinic, a day care center, and a clean water solution.

In June 2011, North Shore and Harbortown Rotarians hand carried 100 filter kits into Lougou,Haiti–a village of 1600 people in 130 households located 6 hours from Port-Au-Prince. The people live in small, primitive huts and shelters scattered over 3-4 square miles of hilly terrain near a river. No one has clean water. While water is readily available from the nearby river, lagoon and springs, all sources were found to be contaminated upon testing. Dirty water is the source of many of the villagers’ chronic medical conditions, as well as the countrywide cholera outbreak.

According to the North Shore and Harbortown Rotary’s final report, the project was a “big success.” Lougou had suffered 2 deaths and 22 villagers were hospitalized from cholera before the Rotary visit. The Sawyer water filters “allowed a quick response to a serious medical emergency.” There has not been a case of cholera or typhoid since the pure water systems were put in service. Also the community nurse reports that the children appear healthier and happier, since being on good water for the first time in their lives.

While communal filter stations were explored, they were deemed not practical as the households are scattered around very hilly terrain, and the villagers were keeping the systems inside their houses to protect them from being stolen. They considered the filter systems “too precious to leave outside.” The Lougou Water Committee reports that each family wants its own filter system, and folks from other villages are asking about how to obtain the filters.

The North Shore and Harbortown Rotary Clubs are currently working on an “urgent request” from the Lougou Water Committee for 80 additional Sawyer filter systems to allow each family in the village to have their own system, and cover all Lougou Academy students and teachers who live outside the village, and the COHFED workers.

To learn more about this project, please contact Steve Sherner with the North Shore and Duluth Harbortown Rotary Clubs.

Rotary Final Report