Saving water the ‘Marshall Louw’ way

Even though Lucia Louw is permanently employed at the National Qualification Authority of Namibia (NQA) as a receptionist, she also has taken it upon herself to join the wagon and help save water, hence her voluntary work as a Water Marshal at the NQA.

Louw is pat of the Water marshals that were introduced to the public and like the others underwent basic training in this regard.

As a Water Marshal at the NQA, Louw is responsible for taking meter readings on a regular basis to determine water consumption, ensuring leaks are immediately isolated and repaired.

Also part of her responsibilities she communicates and engages with staff members on the objectives of the Water Awareness Campaign and how the authority can align itself to ensure that they are contribution their part towards saving water.

According to her, she enjoys the experiences she is gaining from engaging with other Water Marshals from other institutions on ways in which to save water and reduce wastage.

“My duty is to calculate how much water is being used by the NQA and so far the Water Quota calculated for NQA is 26 m3 for a total number of 56 employees using 20 litres per day and the actual water consumption calculated from January 2017 to date is as follows: January 2017- 40.193 m3, February 2017- 39.713 m3, March 2017- 33.54 m3 and April 2017- 32.33 m3,” she explained.

According to her this shows a decrease of 19.56% water consumption since January already. “This is evidence that all the efforts put up by the Water marshal to reduce water usage is working as most people are changing their approach and attitude towards saving water,” she said.

Like any other job, challenges are often encountered. Louw said the main difficulty she faces as a Water Marshal is identifying all the leakages in the restrooms and water tapes. “ I can not always pin point where the leakages are, so I have to she engage with staff members to assist me in such incidents as soon as possible so that they can be attended to,” she said.

Meanwhile, Louw has been part of the NQA team for three years and is a part time student at Southern Business School pursing a Higher Certificate in Health and Safety Management and is an ambitious student with the objective in life to maintain a positive attitude throughout life’s challenges.