The 40,000 residents at Jeffesi, a community in Sissala West District in Upper West Region, would soon benefit from a $350,000 water treatment plant donated by a Korean company.

The plant, which is expected to pump 100 tonnes of water daily for the beneficiary residents, would be inaugurated on Wednesday, April 25.

Nii Nortey Dua, Deputy Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, who disclosed this in Accra on Tuesday when the five-member Korean delegation called on him, expressed gratitude on behalf of the people in Jeffesi for the assistance.

He called on the delegation to carry out a proposed Integrated Water Management programme earmarked for the Western Region and expressed confidence it would have a positive rippling socio-economic impact.

Nii Dua said “Given the number of water bodies in the Region, the pilot project will serve a good purpose as it will identify the challenges and address them accordingly before it is replicated in other Regions.”

Mr Park Pan-Kyu, Deputy Director at the Environmental Industry Division of Korean Ministry of Environment, disclosed that Ghana was the first country in West Africa to have benefited from the Korean water treatment programme.

He said the rationale behind the project was to provide easy access to clean and safe-drinking water to residents at Jeffesi, whose source of water supply was heavily polluted with nitrogen and other chemicals.

Mr Pan-Kyu said the community faced the daily threat of drought and limited water infrastructure.

The water treatment project, which was started in April 2011 would be completed and handed over at a short ceremony to be organised by Woongin Company, the Korean project-implementing company at Jeffesi.**