Murky Waters

Other than the technical aspect of this water project, there is the whole administrative
side that I also have to work on. If you thought that the technical and material side of
things seemed like a clusterf*ck, just wait…

We just found out that the water system for the farms won’t actually be going through
the existing water treatment facility. The system has been set up to run in parallel to the
villages’ existing systems and will be bypassing the somewhat important part of cleaning
the water. We knew this for farms 1 through 6, but for farms 7 through 14, we were under
the impression that the water would be treated before getting to the farms. Apparently
not. Great.

The geography of the area makes it more viable for farms 1 through 6 to get their water
from the Rio Hondo, which runs through the community of Cecilia. Farms 7 through
14 are situated closer to the community of Paraguay, which gets its water from the Rio
Guaso. Both rivers originate from a large man-made reservoir and run through various
villages, past cane plantations and beside porc farms. By the time the water gets to
the communities, it is of poor quality in terms of sediment, harmful micro biota and
pollution. Having spoken to various personnel from different Water Ministries, this is
a known fact. Of course, there was no plan to treat the water before sending it to the
farmers. According to one water expert I interviewed: “guajiros (country folk) are used to
the bacteria and parasites in the water and aren’t harmed by poor water quality.”

On the material and technical side of things, nothing has changed. The empresa that
supplies cement remains at a standstill because the head boss is in a psychiatric ward and
no one dares make a move without his approval. I’m getting to the point of dressing up as
a doctor and sneaking into the psych ward to talk to him. I think I could pull it off. This
situation seems like a hilarious scene from a movie.

Since there is still no cement, the cement plinths have yet to be built and the tanks are not
set up on the majority of the farms. The few cement plinths that have been made crumble
to the touch and I have my doubts about their ability to support over two tonnes. I’m no
physics major, but I’m pretty sure that four crooked cement columns that are filled with
holes and aren’t supported at their base won’t last very long under weight, in the baking
sun.

As for the water pipes that need to be installed and buried, they are still lying on the
ground, cooking and cracking in the Cuban sun. The man with the trench-digging-
machine was supposed to go to the farms on Monday. This being Cuba, there is of course
only one of these machines available for use in the province. Apparently the machine was
being used somewhere else on Monday. Then somewhere different on Tuesday. Then
another place on Wednesday. Now, Thursday it might be dropped off at the farm while
gas is found from somewhere in town and brought to the machine. The only thing that
was supposedly slowing down the digging for the past few weeks was the wet ground. It
hasn’t rained in quite some time and the ground has been dry for at least two weeks. So at

this point, with the materials and technical aspects, it’s just a waiting game.

On the administrative side of things, it’s been somewhat nightmarish. I spent most
days last week biking all over town, going from ministry to ministry, looking for the
appropriate one to get what I need. Basically, what I need is some baseline information
about water quality in the two rivers, information about Cuban parameters for human
water consumption and I need to arrange some contracts for system maintenance and
continued water quality testing. This is to ensure that someone is watching out for the
farmers after we withdraw.

Today was the first time that something actually worked out. Monday, we were supposed
to meet with the empresa to push for an alternate solution to the cement problem. It
turned out that the head of the empresa is in Havana so that didn’t work. Yesterday, I was
supposed to meet with someone from a Water Ministry. He was out of the office with a
delegation from Baracoa. Today, I finally managed to link up with someone.

Like everything else in Cuba, water management is broken up into at least four different
ministries, each with a different mission and function. For what I need, I was referred
to a ministry called Acueducto. I met with a very friendly gentleman who proceeded
to explain that what I need is only found at a different ministry. According to him,
Acueducto is only responsible for chlorinating water for human consumption. On top
of that, this specific branch of Acueducto only oversees municipal water systems. The
provincial branch of this empresa manages any system outside of Gtmo city.

My contact explained that there is some room in the municipal budget for non-municipal
water treatment, but special requests need to be made through the Unidad that we work
with and this takes a long time. The conversation was starting to go down the same
path as all my other conversations with ministry officials; either they don’t have the
information, they do but they can’t give it to me, they might have it but have to look for
it, they aren’t the right ministry and don’t know what ministry would be useful… etc.
Somewhat of a dead end, but after some good old fashioned Canadian charm and flattery,
he supplied me with some very helpful documents about Cuban parameters for human
water consumption and lent me some booklets about water treatment. He was also kind
enough to link us with the appropriate ministry and had the director arrange to meet us.

For anything related to water quality, we have to go through the INRH (Instituto
Nacional de Recursos Hidraulicos). RH isn’t as simple as this though. It is divided into
several other sub-ministries that all have different tasks and focuses. The sub-ministry
that I was referred to is the Laboratorio, which actually only tests water on demand. I
hopped on my trusty bike and peddled over to the big blue building where the INRH
offices are. The director of the lab met me at reception and directed me into her office,
where the water quality expert joined us. As it turns out, there is no recent data on river
quality for either the Rio Hondo or the Rio Guaso. When I mentioned “water quality of
these rivers”, the Expert visibly winced. I asked her about her reaction and she carefully
explained that those rivers are known to have extremely poor quality water.

I explained what I needed for my part of the project and they explained that they only
test water after an official demand is made through a state ministry. Luckily, the Unidad
Silvicola that I work with qualifies as such. That was the first good news I had heard
in a long time. On the one hand, it almost seems like a waste of time and energy to go
through the motions, but this will be extremely valuable in the long run. This baseline
assessment should have been done a long time ago. Part of the sustainability plan for
the project is to reforest the banks of the rivers with plants that can restore and maintain
water quality. Getting a baseline assessment of current water characteristics will be useful
to determine changes over time and to bring attention to the poor quality of water that is
being supplied to Cuban citizens.

The conversation with the two women from the lab resulted in determining that drawing
up a contract between the Unidad / finqueros and the lab to get consistent water testing
wouldn’t be too complicated or take too long (by Cuban standards). Of course, I still have
to go through my Cuban jefe to get this contract written up.

After this conversation, I returned to my office and attempted to explain this whole thing
to my jefe. In the middle of my story, he interrupted me to ask if I had the phone number
of the lab and when I said no, he picked up the phone in the middle of my sentence.
Fifteen minutes later, he was still calling around to find the number, calling various
empresas to get the number for the lab. Once he was finally connected with the lab, he
spent another 15 minutes going through the exact same conversation that I had just had
with the two women. UGH. In the end, he sent one of his staff members to pick up the
contract so that the water testing process could be expedited. I’m not sure what purpose I
actually served in this process.

If this situation is like the fable of the turtle and the hare, Cuba is the turtle, my
organization is the hare and I feel like I’m the tree that the hare sleeps under while the
turtle passes by it. I’m sure that I fulfil some function, but I’m not quite sure what.
Everything here goes at a very different pace and through so many needless, mind-
numbing steps.

This Saturday I’ll be running my first full water-themed workshop. I’ve started planning
it and I’ll be running it old-school; no PowerPoint, just paper, markers and me! The
workshop will be held in the community of Paraguay and will involve the farmers and
some members of the community. I’ll be discussing water quality indicators, water-borne
illnesses and then I plan on demystifying the different water treatment methods.

I also have to talk about Moringa oleifera because now Fidel and Raul have mandated
forestry ministries to produce a certain amount of Moringa. Farm 14 will be planting
10Ha of monoculture. So much for Analog Forestry!

If I have time, I’ll be starting a discussion about water management and conservation
methods. The farmers have been living with very little water for years so they already
know how to reduce their water consumption. I’m trying to get the water comity involved
in running the workshop, but they have been scared off by the jefe. Time will tell!