ICT enabled monitoring fosters greater accountability and improves WASH services in communities

UNICEF has been supporting the Ministry of Water Resources in the development & rolling-out of WASH Information Management System (WASHIMS) across Nigeria. WASHIMS is an user friendly tool for building, organizing and processing sector data for informed decision making. It has evolved from a stand-alone system in 2013 to an on-line web-based platform that now includes features for real time tracking. From only 12 Local Government Areas (LGA) using WASHIMS in 2013, presently there are 70 LGAs regularly operating it. Up-to-date data on the WASH situation is available for over 22,000 communities compared to only 2,600 in 2013. The introduction of real-time tracking of water point functionality has contributed to an increase in functionality from 56% to 71%, with one LGA reporting 98% functionality over 1 year. The widespread use of WASHIMS across the 70 LGAs has renewed interest among all sector players with potential for rapid scale-up across Nigeria

Containment of the acute watery diarrhea outbreak in Sudan: the WASH side of the story

Sudan is prone to WASH related epidemics including repeated Acute Watery Diarrhoea (AWD) outbreaks. In 2016-2017, Sudan witnessed an unprecedented resurgence of AWD outbreak, reaching 36,460 cases and 818 deaths encompassing all states. The total cases exceeded by 60% the “worst case” scenario envisaged in the National AWD Preparedness and Response Plan, necessitating its reformulation. The rapidity and severity of the outbreak required the relevant Ministries to collaborate in an extraordinary manner with key support from UNICEF and WHO. Coordination forums led at the highest-level including the Vice President, Ministers and Governors ensured rapid assessment and response to the outbreak. The initial ad-hoc response eventually metamorphosed into a systematic, coordinated and integrated Health and WASH planning and response. Timely WASH interventions on a massive scale aided by innovative ladder approach of moving from emergency temporary to long-term durable solutions effectively contributed to containing AWD

WASH Committees (WASHCOM) drive birth registration and immunization of children in their communities

Under the “Federal Government of Nigeria – UNICEF” Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WASH) programme, the normal process of engagement in a community includes the establishment of a WASH Committee (WASHCOM) and training of its members on their roles and responsibilities, record keeping and management of WASH facilities to ensure ownership and sustainability of WASH interventions. Experience in some of the intervening states showed that once WASHCOMs are empowered, they take additional responsibility to address developmental challenges beyond WASH in their communities. Building on this, an expanded WASHCOM guideline covering inter-sectoral issues was developed for sensitizing WASHCOMs on child survival issues affecting their communities. UNICEF Nigeria piloted the roll-out of this guideline for cross-sectoral integration using WASHCOMs as an entry point to address birth registration and immunization in 29 communities in Benue and Jigawa states. The results recorded thus far clearly demonstrates the potential for engaging WASCHCOMs to address child survival issues

Smart-phone drives performance and enhances WASH services delivery in communities in Nigeria

The deployment of mobile technology has helped to transform data/evidence gathering in programme management and tracking results under the “Federal Government of Nigeria – UNICEF” Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WASH) programme in Nigeria. UNICEF has demonstrated the use of smartphonebased real-time reporting to incite improved programme performance management and accountability. Smart-reporting involved Local Government Area (LGA) level coordinated planning, implementation, monitoring and reporting of results by field facilitators using mobile-app supported templates and online tools. This system, within the short time has improved the quality of planning and target setting; fostered greater accountability amongst team members; improved performance of staff and effective use of financial resources and other logistics and demonstrated greater attainment of results. The results so far clearly demonstrate the viability of the Smart-reporting system to improve accountability, advance the management and delivery of WASH programme results with potential for wider scale-up across the country

Sustaining open defecation free status: the vital role of validation exercise

UNICEF-Nigeria in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Water Resources (FMWR) and key stakeholders is implementing Community-Led Total sanitation (CLTS) to accelerate sanitation coverage in rural areas with good success. Over 8,400 communities have been certified Open Defecation Free (ODF) across 21 States. Sustaining ODF status has never been so important to consolidate the initial success and moving up the sanitation ladder. 10% of randomly selected ODF certified communities are considered for the validation exercise. This exercise has reduced ODF relapse rates from 44% in 2014 to 11% in 2016. This has further improved the quality of CLTS facilitation and an increase in improved latrines. The resources spent on the validation exercise (US$6.4 per community) is much less than the funds (US$ 197) required to get the relapsed communities back to ODF

Asset creation versus sustaining services: institutionalizing VLOM to deliver SDG-6.1 target in Nigeria

Despite investments in water supply infrastructure, functionality remains low owing to a variety of factors including poor Operation & Maintenance regime and low community ownership. To overcome these challenges, a robust Village Level Operation and Maintenance (VLOM) approach was piloted. The approach is institutionalized within the State Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Agencies (RUWASSAs) by shifting agencies’ focus from mere asset creation towards sustained service delivery. The VLOM units established in the twelve RUWASSAs work with trained local area mechanics (LAMs), parts dealers and community caretakers towards ensuring 100% functionality of schemes. The LAMs charge communities for their services against agreed rates. This is linked to the Facility Tracking System resulting in 11% increase in functionality since inception of the pilot project. Once scaled up and sustained, this approach will optimize investments needed to achieve WASH SDG-6.1 target in Nigeria

Sudan’s SDG-6 journey: learnings for countries in similar challenging contexts

This record includes an extended abstract and MP4 presentation. Presented at the 42nd WEDC International Conference