Monitoring Sustainable WASH Service Delivery Symposium

In recent years many more people have gained access to an improved water supply; unfortunately access to sanitary facilities is still lagging behind. One of the biggest challenges is how to sustain these newly built water facilities and make sure that people have continuous and reliable access to a supply of good quality water in sufficient quantities.

Much is needed to sustain water and sanitation services—from support to communities after construction of facilities; to improved regulation; to financing of all costs including those for support and replacement; to strengthening the capacities of local authorities; to activating supply chains; and to monitoring.

Monitoring is a critical building block for sustaining water and sanitation services. Which water and sanitation system are exactly out there? What is the status of these systems? Are they functional? Do they provide safe quality water? Are the cues and waiting times not too long? Knowing is necessary for correcting, adapting, and planning for sustainable WASH service delivery.

There is momentum to improve monitoring systems. Momentum because sustaining services is now more important than ever. Momentum because the international community is preparing indicators for the post-2015 development goals including those for water, sanitation and hygiene. Momentum because new Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) offer opportunities for faster and more efficient monitoring.

The Monitoring Sustainable WASH Service Delivery Symposium builds on this momentum and provides a platform for gaining knowledge and discussing the challenges for improved monitoring. It presents the latest thinking and experiences in monitoring from all over the world. It discusses how country-led monitoring could be strengthened. It discusses the need and possibilities for alignment of national and global monitoring systems and of project and country led monitoring systems. It provides an opportunity to sector experts to engage with new technologies for data collection and with examples of how monitoring resulted in sustainable water and sanitation service delivery.

The symposium will be attended by some 380 WASH sector experts from all over the world.

The symposium is hosted by the Ministry of Water and Energy and the Ministry of Health of the Government of Ethiopia; it is organised by IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre in partnership with: the African Ministers’ Council on Water (AMCOW), WaterAid, Water and Sanitation for Africa (WSA), the Rural Water Supply Network (RWSN), the Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC) and Water For People.

The symposium will be preceded by a seminar on Monday 8 April, “National WASH Inventory in Ethiopia: lessons learned and maximising value”. 150 Ethiopia water and sanitation experts will attend the seminar.

For more:

• Visit our website: www.irc.nl/symposium2013
• Like us on Facebook
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• Converse with us on Twitter – mention and/or follow @IRCWASH, and use the hashtag: #WASHmon
• Contribute to our blog: washmonitoring.wordpress.com – please contact Petra Brussee (brussee@irc.nl), Angelica de Jesus (dejesus@irc.nl), or Cor Dietvorst (dietvorst@irc.nl)
• For more information about the seminar on the Ethiopia National WASH Inventory please contact Inge Klaassen (klaassen@irc.nl)

 

HSBC launches US$ 100 million water partnership with WaterAid, WWF and Earthwatch

British multinational bank HSBC has launched a new US$ 100 million, five year partnership with WaterAid, WWF and the Earthwatch Institute. The HSBC Water Programme will bring safe water and improved sanitation to over a million people; tackle water risks in river basins; and raise awareness about the global water challenge.

The programme is backed-up by report [1] commissioned by HSBC, which warns that the predicted high-growth rate in several of the world’s most populous river basins may not materialise because of  their unsustainable water consumption . The report also highlights “the powerful economic rationale for improving access to freshwater and sanitation, at a time when total aid for water access and sanitation has actually declined”.

Help shape the future of global water monitoring

Water sector stakeholders are invited to express their views on how to shape the future of global water monitoring after 2015.

The JMP Post 2015 Water Monitoring Working Group has launched an e-survey to let all stakeholders express their thoughts on:

1. the Group’s draft goal, targets and indicators and,
2. the best way to monitor the data.

The survey closes on the 18th June 2012.

The Water Working Group is one of four expert groups established in January 2012 by the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme (JMP) to develop alternative goal, target(s) and indicator options for post-2015 monitoring. The other three groups are on sanitation, hygiene and equity and non-discrimination. The outputs of all these groups will inform the various ongoing political processes led by the UN Secretary General and are expected to culminate in a post-MDG summit at the UN General Assembly in September 2013.

The Post 2015 Water Monitoring Working Group is comprised of a core group and resource group of experts, led jointly by WaterAid and the IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre.

For more information go to the Water Working Group website where you will find a description of the proposed draft goal, target and indicators and a link to the e-survey.

Related news:

• Stef Smits, Is the glass half full or half empty?, E-Source, 31 Mar 2012
• Monitoring: new tools meet demand for more transparency in the water sector, E-Source, 05 Dec 2011
• First consultation on developing post-2015 monitoring indicators, Berlin: Refocusing the monitoring approach, E-Source, 26 Oct 2011

Slum dwellers should be a priority for water and sanitation investment, WaterAid manifesto

Investment in water and sanitation in the rapidly urbanising cities of the developing world is key if we are to avoid uncontrollable poverty and ever worsening slums, says WaterAid in a manifesto released on 3 October 2011.

The manifesto’s author Timeyin Uwejamomere of WaterAid said:

“Water and sanitation have proved time and time again to be a critical factor in health and economic development. We only need to look at the development of the ‘Asian Tigers’ to see that long-term, reliable funding into urban water and sanitation infrastructure has a powerful impact on economic productivity, as well as driving down poverty.”

64th World Health Assembly approves three WASH resolutions

The 64th World Health Assembly (WHA) has adopted a resolution on drinking-water, sanitation and health, and two other related resolutions on cholera and Guinea worm (dracunculiasis).

Yael Velleman at the WHA in Geneva with a copy of the WaterAid report "The sanitation problem - What can and should the health sector do". Photo: WaterAid

WaterAid had issued a call to leaders participating in the WHA in Geneva to prioritise sanitation and water in the fight against diseases including cholera and dracunculiasis. In support of their campaign, WaterAid published a new report
The sanitation problem: What can and should the health sector do?. WaterAid’s Senior Health Policy Analyst Yael Velleman wrote an opinion piece in the Guardian and posted daily updates from the WHA.

UN Human Rights Council affirms that right to water and sanitation is legally binding

The UN Human Rights Council has finally recognised the right to water and sanitation as legally binding in international law, in a landmark decision adopted on 30 September 2010.

[T]he UN affirmed [...] by consensus that the right to water and sanitation is derived from the right to an adequate standard of living, which is contained in several international human rights treaties. While experts working with the UN human rights system have long acknowledged this, it was the first time that the Human Rights Council has declared itself on the issue.

According to the UN Independent Expert on human rights obligations related to access to safe drinking water and sanitation, Catarina de Albuquerque, “this means that for the UN, the right to water and sanitation, is contained in existing human rights treaties and is therefore legally binding”. She added that “this landmark decision has the potential to change the lives of the billions of human beings who still lack access to water and sanitation.”

World Health Assembly: WaterAid puts WASH on the agenda

WaterAid was able to get WASH issues on the agenda at the 2010 World Health Assembly, reports policy researcher Yael Velleman.

A text drafted by WaterAid on the role of access to WASH in preventing child under-nutrition was inserted word-for-word into the WHO resolution on Infant and Young Child Nutrition. Prior to this, neither the resolution nor the WHO Secretariat report which informed it contained any reference to WASH, Velleman says.

WaterAid was participating in the 63rd World Health Assembly as part of the NGO delegation, comprised of World Vision, Save the Children, Oxfam, Action for Global Health and VSO.

The NGO delegation hosted a side event addressing equity in access to healthcare services. WaterAid presented a flyer on their forthcoming report “The sanitation problem: what can and should the health sector do?”

WaterAid hopes that discussions on sanitation and water will be included, for the first time, on the official agenda of the next World Health Assembly.

Source: Serena O’Sullivan, End Water Poverty blog, 27 May 2010

Donors urged to tackle leading killer of under-fives – reports by WaterAid and PATH

Two major aid agency reports published this week say millions of children’s lives are being put at risk because governments and the international aid community are not responding appropriately to diseases such as diarrhoea.

“Diarrhoea kills more children than HIV/AIDS, malaria and TB combined, yet compared to these diseases receives little financing and is not prioritised by governments in donor and developing country governments alike,” said Oliver Cumming, co-author of a report by Water Aid, “Fatal neglect: How health systems are failing to comprehensively address child mortality” [Read the WaterAid press release , 12 May 2009, here]‘.

The report shows that between 2004 and 2006 only $1.5 billion was spent globally on improving sanitation. In the same period, $10.8 billion was spent on interventions for HIV/AIDS – responsible for 315,000 child deaths in that period, and $3.5 billion on interventions for malaria – responsible for 840,000 child deaths.

A health worker in the only government-run clinic in Kibera said diarrhoea was a major problem in the slum, which is home to over one million of Kenya’s poor. [...] “There are a lot of cases of children dying of diarrhoea because the health service in a slum setting such as this is not so well distributed,” added the health worker who asked to remain anonymous.

[...] Another report “Diarrheal Disease: Solutions to Defeat a Global Killer” by health advocacy group PATH, speculates that in the 1970s and 1980s awareness-raising and fund-raising for tackling the problem were so successful that the mortality rate fell by almost 50 percent. It says many donors, governments and aid agencies may have considered the problem solved.

But the issue is far from solved. Water Aid says that when taking into account adult deaths, funding for HIV/AIDS is balanced, but when considering child deaths, the large resources for fighting the disease are disproportionate.

Both reports highlight that relatively cheap fixes can be effective – for example educating people to wash their hands, using water purifiers and disinfectants and taking rehydration salts for diarrhoea. But the aid community is not devoting sufficient funds or attention to the problem, the reports say.

The Kenyan government is working with aid groups to educate the public on good hygiene, improve water chlorination and provide communities with water purifiers and disinfectants. But the financial burden is high, says Kenya’s Health Minister Shahnaaz Sharif. “A lot of donor agencies are not concentrating on diarrhoea and then it is left up to the individual governments to handle those programmes and most governments cannot cope,” Sharif told AlertNet.

The Kibera health worker said she believed some funding for HIV, TB and malaria would do more good if it was diverted to treating diarrhoeal diseases in young children. “If I was offered a wish list, I would say we channel a lot of funds (to) healthcare for children under five with an emphasis on diarrhoea and malnutrition,” she added.

Source: Natasha Elkington, Reuters AlertNet, 14 May 2009

 

From WaterAid report "Fatal Neglect".

Competition: Tapping Youth Innovation – Youth-Led Solutions to Clean Water and Sanitation

Tapping Youth Innovation is a global campaign to identify and support youth-led solutions to clean water and sanitation.

WaterAid America and Ashoka GenV, the world’s largest network of young changemakers, invite youth around the world to submit proposals for youth-led projects designed to improve the water and sanitation services of people living in poverty.

The ten most innovative, effective or sustainable project ideas will receive seed grants of up to US$1,000.

Online entries are preferred at www.genvcampaigns.org but you may also submit a printed application form: download the Tapping Youth Innovation flier and application form here (PDF 861KB)

Please do not respond to this blog.

Deadline: 22 March 2009

Read more here.