Wringing Out Water Aid for Bolivia

Terra director Zack Guido digs a trench for a water pipe with members of the Chaquiri community near La Paz, Bolivia. Photo by Justin Bastein

A childhood spent tromping around the hills, beaches and canyons of Laguna Beach with his geologist father contoured the path Max Borella, 34, chose to follow as an adult. It is this path that led him to co-found the non-profit organization Terra Resource Development International, a group now working on aiding 30 villages in the Altiplano region of the Bolivian Andes to obtain clean water.

President and executive director of Terra is not the only hat Borella wears these days. Last October, Borella left his home in Laguna Beach to serve as field programs coordinator at Stanford University's School of Earth Sciences. Tapping Stanford's state of the art labs and equipment, Borella estimates that Terra will be able to analyze village water systems within a year and thus accelerate development of clean water programs.

Borella is working closely with Kate Maher, an assistant professor in geological and environmental science at Stanford, to understand Bolivian hydrology and its affect on water contamination.

Borella expects to travel to Bolivia four times in the next year, collecting water samples during two-week visits while leading the team in analyzing water samples from wells and springs that communities rely on for drinking, washing and irrigating. He expects to find contamination from pathogens, such as the type that cause dysentery, as well as high levels of arsenic, which is deadly.

Nearly 80 percent of rural Bolivian communities lack access to potable water, Borella estimated.

"It's a fascinating place to work," he said, "There is enough work for us in Bolivia for a lifetime."

Like most of the staffers at Terra, Borella was a Peace Corps volunteer, stationed in the Bolivian Andes for four years.

"When I heard the story from Max I was very compelled to help in whatever way I could," said Maher, eager to add her scientific and analytical expertise. "Because the project has an educational component, I felt it was very important to support it. It is a great opportunity to educate students while providing important information to communities."

Like Maher, Borella believes assessing water quality and contamination is a seminal step towards developing a more sustainable village economy. From information gathered in the study, they hope to develop strategies for improving the overall quality of the water.

Terra will also lean on the support of Water for People, an international humanitarian organization that finances drinkable water systems.

Water for People estimates 884 million people worldwide also lack access to safe drinking water. That statistic will only worsen, according to Zack Guido, Terra's other co-founder and chief financial officer. "It is abundantly clear in the literature that global climate change will likely disproportionately hit most dramatically the people most ill equipped to be able to survive change."

"We hope to protect them against climate change by developing their water resources," Guido said.

Concentrating efforts in Bolivia allows the Terra team to tackle the individual needs of the area. "What works in Bolivia is not necessarily going to work somewhere else and vice versa," Borella said.

The Bolivian people seem to share Borella's enthusiasm. "They are definitely keen on developing water systems. The question is money. They just don't have it and don't have the expertise needed to evaluate current systems," he said.

"We are shifting from project to program based development," Borella said. "We are partnering with local NGOs (non-governmental organizations) we feel are doing a good job."

While Terra can provide information and technology, NGOs have the power to build relationships that can be maintained over time. "This model is really proving successful," said Borella.

Terra's work in Bolivia is sustained by countless volunteer hours and by small donations, where $20 funds testing for heavy metals for an entire community. The average Bolivian family in these rural communities makes less than $2 a day.

Grant money provides 10 percent of Terra's overall budget. Additional funding comes donors, most of whom are Orange County residents.