acciona.org, ACCIONA's corporate foundation, and the non-profit organization Centro Arcoíris have launched a project that will improve access to water and sanitation in the province of San Cristóbal (Dominican Republic), which will benefit more than 4,500 people in the neighborhoods of Bella Vista and Villa Penca in the Bajos De Haina municipality. This project is co-financed by the Spanish Agency for Development Cooperation (AECID). 

The project combines community and household solutions to support the Dominican government's efforts to improve the municipality's water and sanitation infrastructure. At the community level, six wastewater treatment facilities will be built to provide sanitation to 100 households, while an urban redevelopment program will provide drainage infrastructure and will reorganize spaces to minimize problems such as flooding and water pollution. At the household level, drinking water pipes will be improved for 100 houses and 30 homes will be equipped with flushing toilets.

A participatory management model will ensure the service’s long-term maintenance. A technical committee made up of local residents will be created and trained to carry out monitoring tasks for water efficiency and water quality analysis. The local community, the Haina Municipal Council and the National Institute of Drinking Water and Sewerage (INAPA) will collaborate on the project.

Before launching the project, 69% of the households surveyed in Villa Penca said they needed drinking water and 20% lacked sanitation, while in Bella Vista 28% lacked drinking water and 19% required sanitation. 

acciona.org and Arcoíris’s project complements INAPA’s current investments in this municipality, while also seeking to prepare the area for future measures to tackle drinking water distribution and wastewater treatment issues, with the possibility of connecting new water supply and sanitation networks to more homes or future public infrastructure. 

acciona.org began its activity in the Dominican Republic earlier this year with the Light at Home rural electrification program in the province of Elías Piña, which benefits 90 households in the municipalities of Hondo Valle and El Llano. The program brings electricity through residential photovoltaic systems to 360 people in the communities of Rosa Las Piedras, Los Guayabos, Palo Blanco and El Valle, which are hard-to-access areas without reliable conventional electricity coverage.

Centro Arcoíris is a nationwide non-profit organization with more than 70 executed projects. Since its creation, it has been working on comprehensive development projects in the municipality of Haina, especially in the neighborhoods that benefit from its current joint project with acciona.org. Arcoíris has helped more than 200 families in Villa Penca and Bella Vista through basic sanitation and flood risk reduction measures, while carrying out research and studies on collaborative and sustainable solutions for related issues.