Location: Nueva Libertad, District of Chirinos, Province of San Ignacio, Cajamarca region, Peru.
Don Zabaleta as he is called in his community, is an exemplary parent, one of the founders, and thus greatly respected by all its neighbors. He has become the liaison for the project and has led the coordination of different tasks. About the project being implemented he says:
Look, I’ve lived in this community for 30 years, I am one of the founders, since that time, our community never had help from the mayors and other authorities in the region, so isolated as you can see, we do not have access, we have to walk hours to reach the place where we can catch a ride in a car to go to town, we have no water service, and we never thought we’d have energy. In recent years we began to negotiate with the municipality of Chirinos to support something, at least water, just recently the current mayor has paid attention and is working.
In January last year Mr. Villanueva of ITDG visited the community, indicating that through agreement with the mayor of Chirinos, the construction of hydro for the community had been proposed, if water and height conditions are favorable. The engineer made the measurements with good results, then talked with a group of neighbors who were there that day to make agreements on the implementation. To me it is important to have energy, I have a small wood shop where I work with my children, to move the engines I use a small gasoline generator, as you could understand the cost is very high and so it doesn’t work out. The energy of the hydro falls as a blessing from God, not only for me but for the rest of the community, the truth is it’s a dream that we hope will become reality soon, thanks to ITDG and the people who are donating their money, also the mayor of Chirinos and my neighbors, all working with enthusiasm to finish as soon as possible.
To date we have completed all the works, such as intake, channel, forebay, piping and the house where the equipment will go, we’ve also installed most of the grid, we’re just waiting for the mayor to pay the invoice to the company of the equipment, so that the equipment can come, install it and conduct the tests. The mayor has said it would be any day now, we hope he complies. Thank you
