Two amigos working together to bring pure water to the poor in Peru with biosand water filters

Dear Friends,

Arcadio Apestugui Florentino, pictured above, attended training in Lima, Peru earlier this month, on how to manufacture biosand water filters. To be with us, he traveled most of an entire day by bus from his home city of Nuevo-Chimbote, where he oversees several churches. Arcadio loves the Lord and His church and has a great sense of humor. He was keenly interested in our biosand training, and he was always willing to do whatever was needed to help us manufacture our pilot filters. As he was learning very quickly, it became obvious to me that he would be an excellent person to develop another biosand water filter manufacturing project in his own city. So I granted him $1,100 from our Safe Water Fund to get started under the watchful eye of Ruben Cano, our biosand water filter team leader in Lima.

With our grant, Arcadio will be able to manufacture 20 filters. He will then find 20 families who will each purchase 1 of the biosand water filters, agreeing to make 10, $5 monthly payments. Arcadio will follow up and collect the payments while making sure each family is correctly using their biosand water filters. After just 13 months, Arcadio will be able to manufacture 60 more filters from their payments. This process will enable Arcadio to continue making these safe biosand filters indefinitely. This is the vision that we have for all of our biosand teams, of which we currently have nine, in Kenya, India, Rwanda and Peru.

Plastic Biosand Water Filters

Notice the difference after the water filters through the biosand process!

Above is the first of the plastic biosand water filters we built in Peru. Notice how dirty the water is going in and how clean the water is coming out! Biosand water filters are a cost-efficient and practical way to make unsafe water safe to drink!

I was able to have our Lima team build three of these biosand filters during our three-day training, and we installed two of the three filters in people’s homes while I was there. Ideally, I need about five days to train teams thoroughly in hygiene, sanitation, and biosand technology, but our time was limited. Praise God for people whom God has given us around the world like Arcadio, who is now our second biosand water filter team leader in Peru. I will be traveling to the Peruvian jungle city of Iquitos in January to train a third biosand team. Both Africa and India are on my schedule for the Fall to train additional teams.

Thanks to you, we are able to continue to provide this simple, effective technology to those who are suffering from unsafe water. And while we do so, we provide these teams with a vital ministry to the poor that will continue indefinitely without further financial investment from us! God bless you as you continue to love and serve His people around the world!

In Service to the King,

Chuck King
Director of the Safe Water Fund