Our organisation & History
Practica started in 2001 as an initiative of a group of professionals working with affordable technologies for water supply, irrigation and renewable energy in low- and middle-income countries. The motivation to join forces and create an organisation came from a shared concern: we saw many missed opportunities for sustainable rural development due to a lack of adapted technologies and associated knowledge.
During more than 20 years, we have gained experience and transferred knowledge in over 25 countries. Our team, methods and impact have grown over time. In 2007 we opened our Madagascar office, which now plays a critical role in generating ideas and innovations. Currently, Practica is a team of 25 staff members and consultants based in multiple African countries, Madagascar and the Netherlands. Our working languages are English, French and Portuguese depending on the project's location.
Practica is registered as a non-profit organisation in the Netherlands, directed by a management team and supervised by a board of independent volunteers. By visiting this page, you can learn more about our organisational structure and check our financial results.
Our team
Netherlands Office
Berry van den Pol
Berry is the head of operations and a technical advisor involved in project formulation and implementation. He is interested in developing tools, approaches and business models that improve farmers’ access to water and (solar) irrigation technologies.
Marije Heurter
Marije has a background in international relations and public management and working experience in project coordination and event management. She is now head of administration and member of the management team.
Gert Jan Bom
Gert Jan is one of the founding members of Practica. He has over 50 years of practical experience in irrigation, water supply and sanitation. He now spends most of his time in the workshop developing, testing and perfecting innovations.
Judith de Bruijne
Judith is project manager WASH and irrigation at Practica focusing on financial sustainability. She brings more than 12 years of private and public sector experience as an international consultant in the water sector.
Robert Vuik
Robert has over 15 years of experience in the fields of WASH, irrigation and sanitation in Africa and Asia. After being the director of Practica, he is now leader of sanitation and groundwater projects.
Aldo Zamarroni
Aldo is a project leader in irrigation and WASH. He coordinates two solar irrigation projects in Mozambique and manages on a distance a team of local experts. He is also involved in technical assistance, capacity building and capitalisation activities.
Noortje Lensvelt
Noortje is project manager WASH and irrigation in Uganda. She coordinates a water system asset management project in Uganda and is involved in field research, R&D development, capacity building, the scaling of innovations, acquisition and marketing. She has a background in International Land & Water Management and International Development.
Thirza Hol
Thirza has a passion for frugal innovations, affordable and sustainable solutions developed with the local community. With her background in Biomechanical Engineering and Integrated Product Design, she develops and tests our innovations.
Jan Nederstigt
Jan has a long track record in testing and introducing water and energy innovations in rural Africa and Asia. Now mainly involved in small scale irrigation and innovations for climate-smart agriculture for smallholders.
Thies Timmermans
Thies is an industrial designer specialized in sustainable technologies and human-centered design. He has lived in Tanzania, India and Uganda and works mainly on innovative solutions for drinking water system.
Aart den Breejen
Aart spends most of his time in the workshop producing pumps for his own company and innovations for Practica. He also intervenes as a consultant for our sanitation and irrigation projects to provide trainings and technical assistance.
Job Neven
Job volunteers for Practica next to his job as Mechanical R&D Engineer. He supports the other engineers with designing, building and testing technical innovations. He has a broad interest in all kinds of technologies.
Madagascar Office
Davida Rason
Davida has a background in managing development projects funded by donors. He is our Director of Operations in Madagascar, where he eagerly takes on the challenge of expanding the organization's activities in the country.
Manitra Ramboaniaina
Manitra has a background in hydraulic engineering and experiences as engineer and manager in WASH projects. He is leading several urban sanitation projects and manages Practica's team in the Dio Sera project.
Haingo Harinantenaina
Before joining Practica, Haingo has worked in various international multi-donor projects. She is now the administrator of the office in Madagascar managing the administration, finances and human resources.
Xavier Gras
Xavier has more than 15 years of experience managing WASH projects. He focusses on the design, test, and improvement of solutions for faecal sludge management and the definition of marketing strategies and management systems for the services we are developing and implementing.
Jacquis Rabeasy
Jacquis is an industrial engineer, specialized in R&D projects for organic waste recovery procedures and innovative sludge emptying technologies. Before joining Practica he worked for 3 years in the water and sanitation sector.
Mihantra Raveloarison
Mihantra is our project administrative and accounting assistant. She has several years of experience with accounting. For our projects in Madagascar, she manages logistics does the accounting, and supports the administration on a daily basis.
Haja Serge Andriamaroandraina
Specialist in the installation, monitoring and evaluation of low cost technologies.
He is involved on the development and field testing of pumps, faecal sludge innovations and brings technical support to projects.
Hery Andrianandrasana
Hery is an hydraulic engineer who joined Practica in 2019. He is passionate about activities related to sanitation and hygiene. In his work, he also enjoys the relationship with institutions and other decentralized communities.
International experts
Youssouf Diallo
Youssouf is a groundwater and irrigation expert based in Mauritania. He has a lot of experience providing technical assistance and capacity building on irrigation systems, manual well drilling, and low-cost solar powered drinking water systems.
Stéphan Abric
Stéphan is an expert and project leader in irrigation, groundwater, and WASH. He worked for more than 20 years in West Africa to provide technical support in the development of appropriate water and sanitation technologies, solutions and services.
Sandrine Moyenga
Sandrine is a rural development engineer with a specialization in agronomy. She has experience in mechanisation for restoring degraded lands. Sandrine takes care of training, monitoring and learning in our soil restoration projects in Burkina Faso.
Frédéric Louvet
Frédéric is a mechanical engineer. He has worked for 30 years in Africa on private irrigation, rural finance and the development of services for farmers. Based in Ghana, he works as an 'irrigation solutions' expert and on Strategy and monitoring aspects.
Ali Hamadou
Ali is a civil and hydraulic engineer based in Niger, with a long experience in the construction of water supply infrastructures for drinking water and irrigation, and capacity building. He is part of the team bringing technical assistance to the PARIIS project.
Hans Schoolkate
Hans is based in Burkina Faso where he supports the implementation of our local projects. He is a water and soil conservation engineer and worked over 40 years in Africa mainly in the Sahel, in rural & urban drinking water supply, sanitation and soil conservation, including capacity building.
Supervisory Board
Jacqueline Barendse
Jacqueline is a finance expert with ample experience in supporting enterprises and finance institutions in developing countries. As Chair of the board she provides strategic advice to the management team on business models, risk management & innovation.
Fred Baas
As founder and owner of an international company for more than 40 years, Fred has vast experience in operations, technics and finance. He was educated as a mechanical engineer and is now treasurer of the board.
Mark Westra
Mark is an Information Technology specialist with a PhD in Physics. He is a member of the Board at Practica, and he is also responsible for creating web and mobile apps for data capture for groundwater development.