Posted by Susheela Narayanan on Sep 06, 2019
On 9/6/2019 Zubaire Bakubye, a Rotarian from East Riverside Rotary Club in District 5330 and CEO of ISEAC (Integrated Science & Education for African Communities), gave an interesting presentation to DMSB Rotary on the urgent topic of “Toilets for Life in Uganda”.
 
 
Born and raised in rural Africa during a time of social strife and civil war in Uganda, Zubaire witnessed firsthand the social and economic challenges faced by people in developing communities without access to clean water and health care. After moving to the US to get his BA and MA in California he uses his education and access to resources to support his passion of empowering native communities to achieve literacy and education that would create further economic opportunities. He has worked with the Center for Nonprofit Advancement to develop program models and systems that would be able to access resources for further economic and infrastructure development in Uganda.

In a graphic PPT Zubaire pointed out that the United Nations had a goal in place that promised adequate, equitable access to water, sanitation and hygiene to all people everywhere by 2030. It promised a world in which extreme poverty would be eliminated and no matter where you lived you would have enough food to eat, clean water to drink, a safe, private place to relieve yourself and soap and water to wash with. The biggest problem facing the world today is lack of access to water and sanitation. These were some of the staggering statistics he presented: over 650 million people have no access to clean water /over 2.3 billion don’t have access to a safe private toilet/ diarrhea is 1 of the 3 most common killers of children and young women globally/ 58% of childhood deaths could be prevented by clean water, sanitation and good hygiene.
 
 
80.9% of the population in Uganda has no access to safe toilet systems – they defecate in bushes or plastic polythene bags, empty buildings and structures, in rivers and other water ways, or in pit-latrines. Unmonitored fecal disposal causes health hazards to the population through contamination of food and water. There is an urgent need to transform these primitive systems to safe, septic toilet systems. Zubaire is actively seeking help and collaboration from Rotary groups and other non-profit organizations to help him achieve these goals.
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