Sanitation and Hygiene

The Sanitation and Hygiene (S&H) theme focuses on S&H in rural areas, beginning with research on initiatives to improve household S&H (as compared with S&H in institutions, such as schools and clinics, or in public places, e.g. markets).

The dynamics of S&H are, in many respects, different from water supply, and S&H policies and programmes face particular challenges of design and implementation. For example, a central feature of improvement of S&H is changes in behaviour, which compares with the focus of water supply projects on use by communities.

Research Areas

Research areas of interest include:
  • Socio-cultural aspects: behaviour change - local perceptions and benefits
  • Technical aspects: design, management; sustaining S&H technologies
  • Policy and institutional drivers, including how political will may be successfully mobilised
  • Financing systems
  • Gender aspects
  • Environmental aspects: hydro-geology and links with water resource management

Activities

Case Studies

A case study was carried out in Southern Nations, Nationalities and People’s Region (SNNPR), focusing on the approach adopted by the SNNPR Bureau of Health to meet the challenge of the Universal Access Plan.

The Regional Bureau of Health (BoH) in SNNPR region has been piloting different approaches since 2003. Methodologies promoted include community dialogue systems, training of voluntary community health promoters, and participatory hygiene promotion approaches, and coverage in the region has increased dramatically. This study aimed to assess technical and socio-cultural factors affecting the success of the approach, and how political momentum was created, messages communicated and policy objectives institutionalised.

The study identified a number of key factors for success, including high-level political leadership from the minister and the cabinet, a willingness to improvise and try a variety of approaches, the use of local (cheap) materials for latrine construction, skill in managing donor inputs, and the decision to make S&H part of a broader community health package accompanied by training of a team of health extension workers.

Long-Term Action Research Studies (LARS)

The S&H component will play a central role in the planned LARS focusing on achievement of the Universal Access Plan. The S&H aspects of the study will build directly on the findings of the case study already undertaken.

Page last updated 16 Jun 2008