Self-Help & Innovation, Philippine-style

CEBU, Philippines - In the remote farming community of Sitio Tinumpagan in Manjuyod, Negros Oriental, the supply of clean running water used to be a major problem. Villagers had to bear the backbreaking burden of carrying heavy jugs, while spending not less than 40 minutes hiking up and down the hill just to fetch drinking water from the river. 

But things are much different now, many thanks to a wonder machine called the hydraulic ram pump system (ram pump, for short).

Employing no electricity nor fuel, but only the pressure produced by the river’s flow to propel water higher than its original source, the ram pump feeds four tap-stands found 100 meters uphill, and now takes care of the water needs of this community’s over 60 families.

The ram pump is the award-winning brainchild and flagship technology of the Bacolod-based NGO Alternative Indigenous Development Foundation, Inc. (AIDFI). In an awarding ceremony held last Nov. 27 (it was broadcast on BBC last Dec. 4) in a very historic building along the canals of Amsterdam, Netherlands, the ram pump was unveiled as the grand prize winner of this year’s BBC World Challenge 10 Series. It bested 12 finalists out of 800 nominees from all over the globe that showed remarkable enterprise and innovation at the grassroots level.

The first runner-up was the Peruvian initiative from Sierra Productiva, a federation of small–scale subsistence farmers teaching organic techniques to dramatically improve production from both livestock and crops, while the second runner-up was a project from Guatemala with the aim of building a school from recycled waste such as car tyres and bottles.

The BBC World Challenge victory, which was helped determined by online voting, however, was not the first. Other recognitions earned by AIDFI for its patented ram pump included the Energy Globe Awards in 2007 and the Community Initiative category of the Energy Institute Awards last November 2010.

To date, AIDFI has introduced the ram pump in 170 upland communities in the Philippines and serving over 50,000 beneficiaries. Installations have also been done in partnership with local government units and other not-for-profit organizations (like Global Giving for the above-mentioned Tinumpagan ram pump) to make water readily available, particularly to the impoverished communities in the Philippines. But its reach has expanded exponentially, as the technology has already been spread to other parts of Asia—including Afghanistan—and even as far as South America.

AIDFI was founded in 1991 by a Dutch national named Auke Idzenga, together with Leonidas Baterna, a Negrense community organizer since the 1970s. Auke came to the Philippines as a development worker, who at the age of 23, decided to stop his work as a Marine Engineer to dedicate his life to the poor in the Philippines. Auke is also married to an Ilongga, and jokingly refers to himself as FBI (“full-blooded Ilonggo) and speaks the language flawlessly.  

The AIDFI staff calls Auke as the visionary, and that they are his builders. In an email interview, Auke said, “It is team work and different people have different roles but nobody is more important than the other. This is reflected in our dealing with the technical people within AIDFI, even though the technicians come from the grassroots they receive relatively better salaries than the people within AIDFI who are on the management side. Also technicians have positions in our Board and in the day-to-day management of the organization.” 

According to Roy Innocencio, research and development supervisor, AIDF actually started by doing agriculture technology training, assessment and organic farming, but decided to branch out into agricultural tech support in 1997 having seen the serious need for such in the largely agricultural island of Negros. The ramp pump was the pioneering project. It went through three revisions, before it came to its present form.

The ram pump was actually first invented in the 1770s in Europe, though its potential was never fully harnessed after it got waylaid by the entry of the coal-powered steam engine and later on, by the diesel powered pumps.

AIDFI tapped into and redefined the use of this forgotten technology, dramatically.

Engr. Pio Tacdoro, Jr., head of the AIDFI-authorized ram pump installation team for Cebu, Bohol and Eastern Visayas, told The Freeman that the ram pump has a “total benefit, is specially designed to benefit rural areas, is low maintenance, and almost zero-cost, save for the initial cost of the installation.”

A ram pump can cost as low as P11,000 depending on the size.

Tacdoro said the ram pump literally goes to great lengths in servicing communities, because it can cover as much as 200 meters, such as the latest installation in Brgy. Butong in Argao, Cebu, where residents enjoy 12,500 liters of water in only one catchment, 24 hours a day. 

With the presence of the ramp pump in these far-off communities, lives and perspectives are thus changed.

In Murcia, a watershed town located within the North Negros Forest Reserve and Mt. Kanlaon Natural Park, Ferdie Marcelo of Seacology, which collaborated with AIDFI in the setting up of the ram pumps there, which are now benefiting 217 households, said in a testimonial: “The villages have set up their own Forest Guards who patrol the watershed regularly, mindful of its significance to the accessible water they now enjoy. About 3,000 seedlings (assorted indigenous species) were planted around the ram pump sites, and the no-take zone is being enforced.”

Because of such positive impact, there is no shortage of work for AIDFI, said Roy Innocencio.   

At the time of this writer’s visit to their office in Bacolod last Dec. 3, which houses a cafe serving organic food, a warehouse and Techno Park, staff just received word of the foundation’s big win. But it’s a regular working day for them, as more important work is expected in the days to come. 

What will they do with their 20,000USD cash prize from the BBC World Challenge? Auke said, “AIDFI is a near self reliant NGO, working very, very hard to meet both ends. The money we generate through many income generating projects is just enough to keep rolling. But there is never money extra to carry out further research or do or buy other important things.”

He further said, “We are planning to add another community organizer, and in our case, that will cost money since it’s investing in community work, without any return for us. We also want to finish our test tower for the hydraulic ram pump so that we can test and tune the pumps before they go to the communities. Then we have some long time wished as repairing our cars and buy a few things for the office. But we spend the money very careful and in a very transparent way.”

AIDFI is also such a stickler for transparency in its project dealings, and is known to turn down projects that insist on bribes.

Apart from the ram pump, AIDFI has promoted and developed 15 other innovations, all showcased at their Techno Park. There’s the Essential Oil Distiller for steam distillation of lemongrass, citronella, vitiver, eucalyptus, ginger, ylang-ylang, etc; the VIRYA windmill for electricity generation (it can produce up to 800 watts); the Treadle Pump, AKA “Tapak-tapak” pump, which can deliver water to an overhead tank with 10-15 meters height; the Biogas, which converts waste from pigs into methane gas that can be used for a cooking stove, electricity and bio-fertilizer, among other technologies that support agricultural production and help address the basic water, sanitation and energy needs of people. 

And they will continue aggressively doing so, even if admittedly there’s not much support.

“Developing new things takes years. We don’t get any subsidy from the government. In Holland, groups doing work like AIDFI would receive subsidy, here in the Philippines nothing. So we are on our own,” said Auke.

Nonetheless, they said that “in the future we will continue to work on bigger sizes of ram pumps for irrigation purpose. We will also concentrate on expanding our international works hitting two birds with one stone: earn for our group to expand the local works with technologies and at the same time, share the expertise with other poor countries like Nepal, Colombia, Cambodia, East Timor, et cetera. We also have a list of many other technologies we want to adapt to local manufacturing to create employment. We never run out of ideas.”