Amistad Canada & Caminos de Agua
Creating Clean Water Access Together
Caminos de Agua has been named as a new partner organization by Amistad Canada. Amistad Canada is a Canadian/Mexican collaboration and non-for-profit organization connecting and uniting people to promote giving to deserving health and education projects in Mexico. Caminos de Agua has been working for over a decade in water scarcity and contamination issues and the health issues they create in the Northern part of Guanajuato State (including San Miguel de Allende), and we are very proud to be selected by this prestigious organization. If you're a Canadian citizen, now you can help us in expanding the access to clean water for the 2,800 communities facing health and economic risks and get a Canadian tax deduction at the same time. This is an important step for us since it allows our Canadian friends to deepen their support for our work.
*Be sure to select the "Caminos de Agua" Project from the drop down menu!
Are you a US citizen? For US citizens, your donation is already tax-deductible by donating directly to Caminos de Agua, a US-registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Learn more by clicking the button below.
About Amistad Canada
Amistad Canada is a CRA-registered Canadian charity allowing for Canadian/Mexican collaboration on projects to improve the quality of life for Mexicans in need. Amistad Canada is an all-volunteer organization, developed and managed by Canadians who have a special interest in Mexico, usually because they regularly spend time there. Projects are established when Amistad enters into agreements with the non-governmental organizations (NGOs) that provide the charitable services involved. Because these projects are funded by tax-deductible donations, Amistad Canada is responsible for seeing that they comply with regulations defined by Canada’s Income Tax Act. It reports on its activities to the Canada Revenue Agency, which is responsible for monitoring compliance with the Act.
About Caminos
Caminos de Agua is a non-governmental organization working to provide open-source water solutions for communities at-risk on our aquifer in Central Mexico and leverage those solutions for others confronting similar water challenges around the globe. Our team is made up of a full and part time staff, plus graduate-level interns, and senior directors and advisers. We’re a mix of Mexicans and international residents, technologists and community organizers, researchers and educators — united by our dedication to public health and welfare. Caminos de Agua is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit in the U.S. as well as a Mexican Asociación Civil (A.C.).
What We Do?
We work in partnership with local communities, leading research institutions, and other diverse actors to innovate and implement water solutions that create adequate access to safe, healthy drinking water supplies. We also act as a “finishing school” for aspiring, socially-responsible engineers, scientists, and other young professionals and interns looking to make social and environmental impacts in their work.
The Problem
The Upper Rio Laja Watershed (pictured above) – where San Miguel de Allende is located – is the main water reservoir for more than 680,000 people throughout northern Guanajuato State. We are experiencing an acute water crisis in this region due to the overexploitation of the aquifer, our shared water resource, mostly due to export-agricultural producers, which consume up to 85% of the total water available.
According to the State Water Commission, the water table is dropping by 2 to 3 meters (~7 to 10 feet) a year – some of the most over-extracted water on the planet, making water more scarce and even causing wells to go dry.
These increasingly severe water scarcity conditions are forcing us to dig wells deeper and deeper in order to reach the water table.
In both rural and urban areas alike, we are now extracting water highly contaminated with arsenic and fluoride, naturally-occuring chemicals, which are more prevalent at these depths. The health threats related to the consumption of arsenic and fluoride are well documented, leading to dental and crippling skeletal fluorosis (browning of the teeth and bones become brittle and deformed), cognitive development and learning disabilities in children, chronic kidney disease, and several types of cancers. To illustrate, chronic kidney disease went from being the 15th cause of death for all ages in 1990 to being the second cause of death in 2013.
The crisis is increasingly affecting cities like San Miguel de Allende and much of Mexico, but our region is being hit especially hard.
Our Programs
Education
BRINGING KNOWLEDGE & AWARENESS
We raise the awareness of people and communities regarding local and global water challenges through the development of educational materials and programs as well as through other forums and events. Our education programs are not limited to our region. We collaborate with other stakeholders throughout the country, from Chihuahua to Chiapas, to help understand and address our national water crisis.
Community Implementation
CREATING ACCESS TO CLEAN WATER
We create access to clean water with communities at risk, namely through the installation of rainwater harvesting systems, water filters, water treatment plants, and sanitation solutions. As of 2021, we have created more than 3.2 million liters of rainwater storage, and distributed more than 5,000 water filters, in 78 communities and 30 schools throughout our region as well as greater Mexico.
Technology Development
DEVELOPING CLEAN WATER SOLUTIONS
We develop innovative low-cost solutions to technical water quality & scarcity challenges like our Groundwater Treatment System (GTS) to remove arsenic and fluoride from contaminated community water supplies and, Aguadapt – our award-winning ceramic water filter for biological contaminants with the ability to adapt to a wide variety of other water quality challenges as well as be easily utilized for emergency response, water supplies and Aguadapt – our certified ceramic water filter for biological contaminants, which won the Innovation Showcase Award from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers in 2019.
Water Quality Monitoring
IDENTIFYING THE PROBLEMS
Since 2012, we have continuously sampled and tested water quality from rural wells and urban taps throughout the watershed in order to understand the trends and support open data sharing. As of 2021, we have tested nearly 600 sites throughout the watershed and made all of our data publicly available on our online interactive water quality maps.
Collaboration & Policy
WORKING FOR CHANGE
We partner with local communities, NGOs, grassroots organizations as well as municipal and state governments to address severe water quality and scarcity issues as well as participate in national coalitions and networks to try and affect coherent public water policies and management. We collaborate closely with national and international academic institutions to create replicable solutions, based on real-world conditions, for communities most at risk.
Join Us To Create Critically Needed Clean Water Access
As you can see, our water issues are complex and require a lot of collaboration and goodwill to mitigate the negative impacts in the short term and solve them in the long term.
Thanks to our new partnership with Amistad Canada it is now possible for concerned Canadians to join us in the fight against water scarcity and contamination. Your gift, regardless of size, will mean a great deal here in Mexico. Please consider making a donation today or sharing this message with your Canadian friends! Remember that every donation you make is now tax deductible in Canada (and in the U.S, too where we are organized as a 501(c)3 organization)
*Be sure to select the "Caminos de Agua" Project from the drop down menu!