Country Activity Reports

The WSSCC's vision of stimulating action, collaboration and political will to further WASH issues on a regional and national level, is realised through National Coordinators (NCs) who play an essential role in taking the agenda of global sustainable development forward. Working voluntarily through coalitions, the NCs translate the WASH vision into realities on the ground through the four P's - Partnerships (Networking & Coalition building), Progress (Monitoring & Evaluation), Promotion (Advocacy), Profile (Communication) - and work with governments, civil society, the private sector, NGOs, International Organisations, the media and grassroots communities to achieve these results on multiple levels.

The year 2007 saw a number of countries make considerable strides in the fields of coalition building, evaluation and monitoring, advocacy and awareness raising and political mobilisation. During the year, World Water day and International Sanitation Week were duly marked, with campaigns, meeting, competitions and programmes. Numerous studies were also conducted to evaluate best practices for local sanitation needs, the impact of improved sanitation as well as the use of sanitation technologies. Additionally, baseline studies were conducted, along with studies undertaken to monitor existing programmes.

Encouraging community participation through programme approaches such as Community Led Total Sanitation Effort (CLTS), for example adopted in Nigeria, featured high on the list of priorities for most countries, as did the need for greater gender balance in Water Resource Management. Most significant in many countries, particularly India, Nigeria, the Philippines and Kenya was the WASH Coalition's ability to influence government action on water, sanitation and hygiene through policy development, technical assistance, research, advocacy and consultation. 2007 also saw the WASH family grow to include four new countries in West Africa - Benin, Togo, Niger and Mali. WSSCC Programme Officer for Networking and Knowledge Management Carolien van der Voorden was in the region to assist with coalition building and to provide guidance, material and technical assistance.  Pilot projects have also been launched in some countries.

A number of campaigns were launched which all carried similar themes but were tailored to suit the particular socio-economic realities of the respective local environments. There has also been a strong emphasis on education and school sanitation across the board and in almost all countries, with WSSCC advocacy and education toolkits being translated into local languages to further this effort.  A number of workshops have also been conducted to guide both government officials and community leaders towards better water supply, sanitation and hygiene. International meetings, conferences and seminars were attended by National Coordinators and Regional representative where they were able to gain insight into developments on a global level. 

Please click here for a summary of some of the work done by various National and Regional WASH Coalitions in the year 2007.