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Marketing and University Communication UW-Green Bay, CL 815 2420 Nicolet Drive Green Bay, WI 54311-7001 (920) 465-2626 E-mail: hildebrs@uwgb.edu Last update: 10/3/06 |
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In
the News Archive - Year:
April 3, 2006 Peruvian talks about safe-water project By Andy Behrendt
Julio Alegria, director of the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Services Project in Cusco, Peru, received a standing ovation from the City Council. Alegria toured the facilities of the Green Bay Water Utility last week. He's on a monthlong visit to Green Bay through St. Norbert College and the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay's joint International Visiting Scholars Program.
"I am very happy to get to know this community of Green Bay," Alegria told the council. "I am happy to contribute a little bit to enhance the view of the world, to enhance the community awareness of other cultures, another people, another part of the world. I think Cusco, Peru, and Green Bay, Wisconsin, are much closer than they were before."
Alegria's Swiss-funded project involves more than 12,000 families in 240 peasant communities in remote mountain areas and aims to reduce the rates of water-related diseases by combining community ownership with sustainable water supply and sanitation practices. Key to the program is a new design for a flush latrine to replace the traditional outhouse.
The approach and low-cost technologies being used in Cusco are being adopted for rural water supply and sanitation projects in other areas.
During Tuesday's City Council meeting, Alderman Guy Zima began a conversation in Spanish with Alegria in which, having visited Cusco, Zima complimented its beer.5
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