World Water Week: saving water thanks to vocational training

24.08.2015 – Jordan is training new plumbers in order to reduce water loss from damaged pipes in private households.

Jordan is one of the driest nations on the planet. On average, the country receives 111 millimetres of rainfall per year – about the same amount as in a wet July in Germany. And these scarce water resources have to meet the needs of over six million inhabitants. What's more, there are currently around 650,000 Syrian refugees living in Jordan.

While all directly available water resources are already being tapped, they are not always used efficiently. As a result of poorly maintained and inexpertly laid pipes, about 40 per cent of water goes to waste nationwide, and there aren't enough people with the expert training needed to install and repair pipes, in particular in private households.

On behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH is providing support in training plumbers. The aim is to address the skills shortage, reduce the pressure on scare water resources and offer people new employment prospects.

The courses are open to everyone and are designed to meet labour market needs. Just under 40 per cent of participants are refugees. Thomas Schneider is responsible for the training, and GIZ is cooperating with five vocational schools in the governorates of Amman and Irbid. Schneider explains: 'Half of our trainees are women. Special curricula have been developed for them that mainly focus on maintenance, repair and customer relations.' The men are first and foremost trained in installing new pipes. The next course starts in the autumn.

Women plumbers in an Islamic society like Jordan? It makes sense: they can maintain and repair water pipes in the apartments and houses of people they don't know – even during the day when no male family members are around. And while they work they can give advice to housewives on saving water and how to avoid damaging the pipes.

Worldwide, GIZ is working in around 70 projects and programmes in the water sector for the German Government, the EU and other commissioning parties. An estimated 100 million people in 22 countries are benefiting from German support.