The President of the Republic of Niger today laid the foundation stone for the construction of the fourth drinking water treatment channel at the Goudel plant in Niamey. This plant is part of the project to strengthen Niamey's drinking water supply system, financed by the Agence Française de Développement (AFD), the European Investment Bank (EIB), FINEXPO and the Netherlands for a total of EUR 74.46m. The EIB is providing EUR 21m in financing for this project.
The production capacities of Niamey's plants currently cover just 80% of the requirements of the capital's residents. This project will make it possible to increase drinking water production capacity by 40 000 m3 a day (+30%) and to build three 2 000 m3 reservoirs. It will extend the supply and distribution network (277 km of pipes), subsidise 17 700 connections for vulnerable segments of the population, and enable the construction of 180 standpipes.
The main goal of the project is to improve drinking water service quality for 1 million people already connected to the Niamey network, while also providing 200 000 additional people with access to the service by 2020.
Among those attending the ceremony were the ambassadors of the Netherlands (Jolke Oppewal), France (Marcel Lescure) and the European Union (Mateus Paula Raul), together with the Head of the EIB Regional Office for West Africa (Isabelle van Grunderbeeck).