I have to confess....

....that I do not like milk. How does one admit that when working with the Association of Dairy Producers in Achacachi, near Lake Titicaca?

I had a tough and simultaneously very rewarding week of work in this north western part of Bolivia. Achacachi is at 3,800 metres, the sun is really strong and the scenery of lake, river and snow capped mountains captivating... though also misleading, as the altiplano is one of the country´s poorest zones.

For 6 days our team of 4 worked ten hours a day first to build 27 biogas systems and then install them. In terms of getting around, since our boss sold his 4 x 4 car and went to study in Spain, we had to make do with local transport. And make do we did - during the week we travelled between the nine communities that make up Achacachi by taxi, by lorry, by boat, on the back of a motor bike and of course on foot. Those who know me well will no doubt find it hard to believe that I was getting up at 6.30am and tucked up in bed by 10pm. Evenings were very quiet, the town goes to sleep by 10pm and my craving for pizza could not be sated. We did push the boat out one night to treat ourself to the local brew and karaoke in the town´s one (half decent) drinking establishment.



The community is primarily Aymara speaking though most understand Spanish. Amusingly, one of my colleagues though born in Bolivia has lived nearly all his life in Argentina and has a gaucho accent to go with it... half the locals could not understand him and looked to me to translate into Spanish!

In all, there are over 200 families that could benefit from biogas, eco toilets and showers. We have funds to install 27 systems as demonstration projects with the long-term aim of continuing the project if there is demand form the community. One of the funders is the British Embassy in La Paz, and on Friday 16th a representative from the Embassy came to visit. She was very impressed by the tour, meeting and food (see right!) we organised, and while making no promises until she sees everything fully operational, has suggested that the Embassy´s support will not be a one-off.

This was my third and final project with the NGO, overall I have really enjoyed it, have no doubt about the quality and benefits of the projects and my only wish is that I would have liked to have done more. Now I have to get down to lots of report writing as I am not sure that the funders accept web blog entries as an official reporting mechanism....