As the CLTS Knowledge Hub, we co-convened a regional workshop in Saly, Senegal, 25th-28th June 2018 with WaterAid, WSSCC and UNICEF and support from AGETIP.
The event brought together those engaged in rural WASH programming from 14 countries across the region (Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Chad, Democratic Republic Congo (DRC), Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, and Togo) alongside experts working at regional and global levels.
Over the course of four days participants shared latest experiences, innovations, challenges and research, mapped knowledge gaps and discussed ways forward with the aim of improving capacity and knowledge.
Browse photos from the workshop on our Facebook page
Reaching the ‘Last Mile’ – Leaving No One Behind
Recommendations for reaching the ‘Last Mile’ include:
- Urgently advocate to increase domestic resource allocation.
- Create specific country-level strategies for reaching the ‘Last Mile’.
- Use of evidence on ‘Last Mile’ demographics and practices to encourage inclusion in policies, strategies, capacity building, programmes and monitoring systems.
- Avoid rigid policies and practices and be less dogmatic about what approaches are used.
- Use area-wide approaches
Sustainability and post-ODF interventions
Recommendations for sustainability and POST-ODF interventions include:
- Systematise post-ODF interventions
- Identify, strengthen and promote local technological solutions
- Conduct formative research focusing on: 1) the last mile to better quantify and understand these groups and identify barriers to them gaining improved sanitation options, 2) sustainable, locally available solutions, and 3) on ways to change long-term behaviour and social norms.
- Strengthen knowledge management initiatives to better support the region, especially for francophone practitioners.
- Collect, make publically available and respond to data.