An assessment of Compone’s irrigation network in August 2010 found evidence of soil seepage losses greater than 200,000 liters per day. Additional losses occurred through the inefficient breakout system, which involved removing and replacing dirt to control the flow of water from the main channel. The project team designed a solution to better conserve the community’s water by improving the efficiency of the irrigation network. The proposed solution involved a soil-cement channel lining and improved breakout gates.
In June 2011, an implementation team from UMD traveled to Compone to help the community construct the designed improvements for a 30-meter portion of the 1.3-kilometer irrigation channel. The community was expected to continue construction on the remainder of the channel but there has been little to no signs of this in subsequent trips. Ultimately, EWB-UMD realized that the project scope had been to large to complete, and the optimistic expectation that the community would finish the project proved incorrect for Compone’s lack of organizational capacity.
Peru Summer 2011 Implementation Trip
