The BRAC WASH programme in Bangladesh has produced a new handwashing promotion video. It shows slides of handwashing promotion sessions for different groups (children, adolescent girls, women, men), as well as for schools, village WASH committees and mosques (imams).
The video was released on 5 May to coincide with the World Health Organization’s (WHO) annual global campaign to promote better hand hygiene in health care.
Posted in Campaigns and Events, Hygiene Promotion, South Asia
Tagged Bangladesh, BRAC, BRAC WASH II programme, changing behaviour, handwashing, videos
On WaterCouch.tv, Rabbi Awraham Soetendorp shares a practical example of international water cooperation that emerged during the 2013 World Water Day celebrations in The Hague, The Netherlands. In one of the sessions, BRAC WASH programme director Dr Babar Kabir explained that his programme had trained 18,000 imams in Bangladesh to include hygiene messages in their Friday prayers (see Kabir, 2010).
Imam Umer Ahmed Ilyasi
Also present in The Hague was Iman Umer Ahmed Ilyasi, Chief Imam of the All India Organization of Imams of Mosques, “the largest and oldest imam organization of the world”. Dr Kabir and the Chief Imam “agreed to cooperate on education for water and sanitation”. This cooperation has the potential to create “five hundred thousand new teachers” to spread hygiene messages all over India.
Kabir, B. et al., 2010. The role of imams and different institution[s] in hygiene promotion of BRAC WASH programme : paper presented at the South Asia Hygiene Practitioners Workshop, Dhaka, Bangladesh, 1 to 4 February 2010. The Hague, The Netherlands: IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre. Available at: www.irc.nl/page/51613
WASH training for imams in Bangladesh. Photo: Masjid Council
In a new video, Mayadevi and Kaman (Nepal), Toan and Thinh (VietNam) and Tshering, Drukda, Tashi and Deschen (Bhutan) share stories about women’s participation, leadership and their changing roles in promoting sanitation and hygiene in Nepal, Bhutan and Viet Nam.
The video is from SNV’s Sustainable Sanitation and Hygiene for All Programme (SSH4A), which has been implemented by local governments and partners in 17 districts across Nepal, Bhutan, Laos, Viet Nam and Cambodia since 2008. It aims to provide one million people with access to improved hygiene and sanitation facilities by the end of 2015. As the approach aims at addressing access to sanitation for all, addressing gender issues and inequalities is key.
SSH4A is a partnership between SNV, the Governments of the Netherlands, Nepal, Bhutan, Laos, Viet Nam and Cambodia in Asia and the IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre with support from AusAID and DFID.
Learn more about SSH4A at www.snvworld.org/node/3779 and www.irc.nl/ssh4a
In Bangladesh, IRC is supporting BRAC to measure behavioural change in the BRAC WASH II programme. Christine Sijbesma of IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre and Mahjabeen Ahmed of the BRAC share their thoughts and experiences with monitoring sanitation and hygiene behaviour of women in the programme in a recent blog post [1].
The QIS monitoring system that is being used gives special attention to gender and sanitation. First because many of the indicators differentiate between women and men. Secondly because data collection for each sample is duplicated by a male and a female monitoring team. Interestingly, preliminary results show that virtually all the male and female monitoring teams members gave the same scores for the gender indicators.
[1] Bangladeshi women catch up on sanitation, IRC, 08 March 2013
Covering 55 million people, half the population of Bangladesh, the BRAC WASH programme must be one of the largest sanitation programmes, if not the largest sanitation programme, in the world today.
Babar Kabir. Photo: BRAC
Babar Kabir is the Senior Director at BRAC and programme director of the BRAC WASH programme. He talks to IRC’s Joep Verhagen about this huge programme, the importance of the Village WASH Committee, and emerging sanitation innovations.
Could you briefly describe the BRAC WASH programme?
Posted in Hygiene Promotion, Sanitary Facilities, South Asia
Tagged Babar Kabir, BRAC, BRAC WASH II programme, changing behaviour
Innovative monitoring tools such as the Qualitative Information System (QIS), sanitation ladders and SenseMaker® are being used in a programme that seeks to provide sustainable sanitation and hygiene services to almost 55 million people in Bangladesh.
Over the last few weeks and months, people at BRAC in Bangladesh and at IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre in The Netherlands have been working really, really hard to prepare for our first Monitoring and Learning workshop that will happen at the end of February. Exciting, and frankly, a bit daunting to complete the full circle of planning, implementation, monitoring and learning, and adaptation for the BRAC WASH programme that covers half of Bangladesh and seeks to provide sustainable sanitation and hygiene services to almost 55 million people.
Preparation for this upcoming workshop started a year ago, with a joint BRAC – IRC workshop to design a Qualitative Information System (QIS). QIS is a monitoring system that allows the quantification of qualitative information, such as the quality of latrines, the use of latrines, the participation of women in management and decision making and so on. The underlying assumption is that change takes place gradually and to capture this gradual change we have developed progressive scales (‘ladders’). Each step on the ladder has a short description, called a mini-scenario, which describes the situation that signifies a particular score. The ladder below was developed to measure the quality of household latrines.
IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre announces a renewed research call for:
Faecal sludge secondary treatment technologies for challenging settings
This call is part of the BRAC WASH II programme in which EUR 1.5 million will be used for innovative research, tendered to consortia of leading European and Bangladeshi research organisations.
The planned duration of the faecal sludge research project will be 18 months.
The anticipated cost of the project is EUR 325,000. In addition there is EUR 50,000 available for piloting. (Separate budget needs to be included for this).
To download the guidelines and application form go to: www.irc.nl/page/73136
The deadline for submission of full proposal application forms is: 11 January 2013.
Future research calls will focus on low-cost water supply technologies; Geo-referenced database for monitoring; menstrual hygiene management; and saline intrusion.
Please do not send requests for information or applications to the Sanitation Updates blog.
IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre is happy to announce two research calls in the field of sanitation:
These calls are part of the BRAC WASH II programme in which EUR 1.5 million will be used for innovative research, tendered to consortia of leading European and Bangladeshi research organisations. The other action research calls will focus on low-cost water supply technologies; Geo-referenced database for monitoring; menstrual hygiene management; and saline intrusion.
1. Guidelines for research call on low-cost sanitation technologies for areas with high groundwater tables
2. Guidelines for secondary treatment options for faecal sludge
Extended deadline for submission of full proposal application forms: 31 August 2012
Please do not send requests for information or applications to the Sanitation Updates blog.
A woman health volunteer is showing the group the sanitary napkins that she sells. BRAC programme Bangladesh. Photo: Christine Sijbesma/IRC
The third bi-annual Asia Sanitation and Hygiene Practitioners’ workshop, held in Dhaka, Bangladesh, from 31 January to 2 February 2012, reported notable progress in implementing menstrual hygiene into WASH programmes.
In 2008, menstrual hygiene management was signalled as a neglected area in WASH programmes. In 2010 the workshop participants pushed ahead and discussed necessary provisions for menstrual hygiene management in toilet design (washing facilities, sufficient space, incinerators) as well as issues of availability and affordability of menstrual hygiene materials.
A major hurdle remains the lack of awareness and lack of recognition that menstrual hygiene is a human right and health issue. In 2012, participants concluded that menstrual hygiene programmes are now usually linked to school WASH, but efforts are needed to reach girls who are not in schools. Advocacy and hygiene promotion have to improve the awareness of both men and women about menstruation and menstrual hygiene management.
In the WASH programme of BRAC adolescent girls get together in a peer cluster meeting once every two months to discuss topics such as menstrual hygiene. Photo: Christine Sijbesma, IRC.
BRAC has an extensive WASH progamme which aims to bring sustainable water and sanitation services to over 37 million people in Bangladesh.
The IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre has been supporting BRAC’s WASH programmes with technical assistance since 2007. The organization has recently been contracted to support the 2nd phase of BRAC’s WASH Programme with monitoring, action-research and knowledge-sharing for the next five years.
BRAC will be supporting IRC’s contributions to Sanitation Updates, with news and information regarding sanitation initiatives around the world.
Learn more about BRAC’s WASH programme at www.brac.net/content/environment-water-sanitation-hygiene
Read how IRC is supporting BRAC at www.irc.nl/page/69649
Learning cloud gives a glimpse of the future of WASH in Asia
Which issues will sanitation and hygiene practitioners focus on in Asia? This was the question posed to the more than 50 professionals attending the 3rd Asia Regional Sanitation and Hygiene Practitioners Workshop which ends today in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Based on the above “learning cloud”, sludge management appears to be a major concern.
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