Solving Schistosomiasis and Food, Water, and Energy Shortages in Africa

100&Change:2021
University of Notre Dame du Lac

University of Notre Dame du Lac will increase access to food, water, and energy, and reduce schistosomiasis—caused by infection with parasitic worms—by removing aquatic vegetation and converting it to compost, livestock feed, and cooking gas.

Last Updated: September 2024

Executive Summary

Infectious diseases and food, water, and energy shortages torment marginalized populations in the developing world. By removing aquatic vegetation from water access points, this University of Notre Dame du Lac project can increase open water access needed by villagers and reduce schistosomiasis, caused by parasites that live in snails.

Converting this vegetation to compost or livestock feed significantly increases food production, and it can be used to fuel biodigesters that produce fertilizer and gas for cooking or electricity production. Thus, a single intervention has enormous potential to sustainably address food, water, and energy shortages and a rampant infectious disease at the same time. To scale up this solution in West and East Africa, we use satellite imagery, machine learning, and cell phone alert systems. We have the potential to mechanize vegetation removal and expand our operations throughout Africa, Southeast Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean.

Organization Details
Lead Organization

University of Notre Dame du Lac

website: http://www.nd.edu
Organization Headquarters
Indiana, United States of America
Organization ID
35-0868188
Number of Full-time Employees
< 10
Annual Operating Budget
< $1 Million
Type
Nonprofit

Charity, fund, non-governmental organization, religious institution, school, or other entity

Organizations may provide budget and employee data based on this proposal or the organization as a whole. For more information on this proposal or organization, please email us.

Accomplishments

This University of Notre Dame du Lac project has achieved several recent milestones, such as demonstrating that quarterly removal of aquatic vegetation reduces snails and schistosoma reinfections in children; showing that converting the vegetation to compost increases crop production independent of tilling and fertilizer; revealing that the vegetation is readily consumed by cattle and sheep, but not goats; illustrating that the benefits of harvesting aquatic vegetation for crop production greatly exceed the costs; and establishing that we can use remote sensing to identify snail and Schistosoma habitat to scale our intervention.

We anticipate reaching other milestones, including finalizing research on the effects of vegetation removal on livestock and energy production; determining the most cost-effective use of the removed vegetation; generating maps of schistosomiasis risk; developing materials to facilitate teaching villagers to implement the intervention; scaling up the intervention training locally in collaboration with the Ministry of Health; and assessing intervention compliance and sustainability without foreign assistance.

**Please see the story about our most recent publication in Science!**

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