At the beginning of summer, I arrived in Nicaragua for a 2.5 week visit. I was traveling together with my colleagues Ed Maurer and Bill Sundstrom, and two fantastic 2017 ESS graduates: Linsay Tenes and Claire Smoker. Chris Bacon, our project’s lead, had already been in Nicaragua for a few weeks prior and greeted us at the Managua airport.
After a short night near the airport and an introductory meeting with representatives from the National Agricutural University in Managua, we headed to Esteli, in the north of Nicaragua. There we worked side by side with our community partners at Asdenic in Esteli on planning field visits, focus groups, and a workshop to prepare for a large household-level survey on food and water security. We also visited several coffee farming communities north of Esteli, in a landscape of rolling green hills, where the villages blend into the forest. Here we spoke to community leaders and members of water committees, and heard from farmers through focus groups and workshops. We gave presentations on our research progress to date and learned about their experiences on how the rains affect the planning cycle, and the management of the local water resources and water systems.
We also visited wells, springs, pipes, and water tanks and continued our mapping of the water systems and water resources in the area. Water systems in this region draw from springs and creeks in a higher-elevation protected forest region and are mostly gravity-based. The water is delivered in 4-inch pipes to concrete tanks that are about 15 feet on a side and supply several hundred people. The maintenance and management of the system, including such tasks as refilling the chlorination system or cleaning the storage tank are organized by the community. The water from these systems is in short supply, and it is not unusual that water is only available part of the day. All over the villages we visited, community members used streams and ‘ojos de agua’ (low springs) to bathe and wash their laundry. A lot of animals enjoy much freedom walking around the communities and near the streams. In spite of the fact that most of the families in the region have been affected by years of a brutal civil war, there is a strong spirit of community and desire to protect the land, the water, and way of life.