They said because of the pollution of the water bodies in the area, they had to rely on sachet water for drinking and cooking and then use dettol or other detergents to treat the dirty water from the Birim River before bathing and washing as the tap water hardly flows.

This, the women said, was exerting a huge toll on them as on a daily basis, they had to buy a bag of sachet water to provide drinking water for their families and dettol for purification of the water for bathing.

The women, who made the appeal in an interview with GNA and spoke on condition of anonymity, said they also have to walk for several kilometers before having access to the polluted water as the illegal mining activities has diverted the course of the Birim River whose streams run through several communities in the district.

Some of the women who work at the Crop Research Institute at Bunso, said unlike the past, the Birim River has been heavily polluted, such that when used to water crop seedlings they easily wither.

A middle aged woman who has worked with the Bunso Cocoa College for the past 25 years, recalled that in those days, they fetched water from the Birim which passes through the centre of the cocoa college and drink without any difficulty, but “today the water is so brownish that you will not even think of using it even for watering the seedlings”.