Promoting sustainability in refugee and IDP responses

The majority of refugee and internally displaced camps are set up as a temporary measure to accommodate people fleeing from conflict or natural disasters. However, in many conflict-related camps, the duration of the camp is longterm, resulting in high operation and maintenance costs arising from the installation of short term emergency water and sanitation facilities. While there are real constraints to agencies adopting long term approaches from the very start, such as government policy, land or funding issues, agencies setting up camps should have a thorough analysis of the most probable scenarios and design, plan approaches and use technologies with that scenario in mind. With the right choice of technology, which may have higher up-front costs, huge savings can be made over time on operation and maintenance costs making the systems more sustainable and resistant to external shocks

Groundwater supply sustainability in fragile states: a case study examining challenges and approaches

Sustainable groundwater supply development in developing countries remains an ongoing challenge due to a range of technical and community related factors. The challenge in fragile states becomes increasingly difficult due to often adverse operational environments and rapid NGO interventions. Such challenging conditions reduce the likelihood of achieving sustainable supplies in the long term. Recent practical experiences in Wau, South Sudan are presented and used to examine groundwater supply sustainability challenges and potential solutions that can be applied in wider fragile state contexts. It should be recognised that groundwater supply sustainability cannot always be realistically achieved in fragile state environments; however, long term financial and developmental incentives exist to maximise sustainability potential wherever the context allows. A combination of preparedness and informed early-phase decision making in collaboration with capable local partners can maximise groundwater supply sustainability potential in challenging fragile state working environments

Learning from Oxfam's tiger worm toilets projects

The world is witnessing the highest levels of forced human displacement on record, leading to people being housed in urban centres and camps. Generally the sanitation needs of these people are initially met by external agencies. The long-term costs of operating and maintaining traditional sanitation systems can be unviable when communities or local authorities take over their management. Therefore Oxfam has been trialling the Tiger Worm Toilet (TWT) in peri-urban and camp settings. The aim of this paper is to review Oxfam’s TWT projects and to share the learnings, together with the innovations that have occurred. The learnings are that TWTs are not the solution to all sanitation problems, but they have been proven to work well at household level. Monitoring and documenting the trials has been an ongoing problem due to a number of issues, which are linked to short term funding, and the use of project rather than program approaches

Ecological sanitation in refugee camps: implementing urine diversion dry toilets in Dollo Ado, Ethiopia

The choice of sanitation technology in humanitarian crisis is based on various factors including the terrain, social and cultural norms and agency experience. There is the continued need for humanitarian response mechanisms to factor the environmental impact and sustainability of the technologies used in the provision of safe water supply and sanitation to affected communities. The acceptability of using ecological sanitation technologies such as Urine Diversion Dry Toilets (UDDT) in refugee contexts needs significant exploration. Using refugee camps in Dollo Ado as a case study, this paper outlines how the UDDT technology has been implemented in the context of protracted refugee camps, the successes and the areas needing further exploration to make it better able to be adopted across various refugee programmes and contexts

Household water filters and waterborne epidemics: a case study from South Sudan

In 2016, the Technical Working Group (TWiG) of the national WaSH Cluster of South Sudan focused on water filter technologies in order to assess the suitability of the many filter products available for application in WaSH interventions within South Sudan. However, the TWiG didn’t analyse past disasters and water borne epidemics together with endemic diseases, and this paper wants to identify if there are and which are the criteria and information to be considered to choose the best filter (or other water treatment) to be distributed. Even if further specific research is needed, it looks clear that the analysis of historical epidemics of waterborne diseases in the area of intervention, together with considerations about the general context and technical characteristics of the available treatment devices, can help to identify the best water treatment solutions

Shedding light on humanitarian sanitation

Lighting should be provided for WASH facilities in Humanitarian contexts according to several standards. Evidence for this and the practical budget, operational and management responsibilities are less clear. A three-country research project looking at the impact of lighting on WASH use and Gender- Based Violence (GBV) required a multi-disciplinary approach, combining OXFAM’s practical implementing expertise with WEDC’s research-orientated approach. The research showed how much more is needed for safe sanitation than just building latrines. Lack of usage of latrines had implications for environmental health. A reason for not using latrines was due to fear of many things, including GBV. The location of the facility was a common concern, but simple lessons are not easy to distil as the context varies between settlements and changes rapidly overtime. The provision of lighting was welcomed by a wide range of stakeholders, but other factors still affect both GBV and WASH outcomes

Setting priorities for humanitarian water, sanitation and hygiene research: a meeting report

Recent systematic reviews have highlighted a paucity of rigorous evidence to guide water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) interventions in humanitarian crises. In June 2017, the Research for Health in Humanitarian Crises (R2HC) programme of Elhra, convened a meeting of representatives from international response agencies, research institutions and donor organisations active in the field of humanitarian WASH to identify research priorities, discuss challenges conducting research and to establish next steps. Topics including cholera transmission, menstrual hygiene management, and acute undernutrition were identified as research priorities. Several international response agencies have existing research programmes; however, a more cohesive and coordinated effort in the WASH sector would likely advance this field of research. This report shares the conclusions of that meeting and proposes a research agenda with the aim of strengthening humanitarian WASH policy and practice