On the occasion of the Wilson Center's 50th anniversary, its Environmental Change and Security Program and nine co-sponsoring programs convened experts on November 28 from government, the NGO sector, and academia for a comprehensive look at the first year of the U.S. Government Global Water Strategy and new research and practice on water, peace, and conflict.
In some remote parts of Ghana, girls are told that crossing a river during their menstrual period will offend the river deity — so some skip school to avoid incurring the deity’s wrath. In some rural communities in western Nepal, menstruating women are told that their presence jeopardizes crops, water supply, and health — so they go into quarantine each month. In Afghanistan, some women are told that showering during menstruation causes infertility — so they spend their entire cycle without washing themselves.
Sustainable WASH investments underpin USAID’s Water and Development Plan. Achieving sustainability requires country partners and communities to have ownership of processes and systems in place to ensure that inputs and resources are able to be sustained after an activity ends. Monitoring and evaluation during activity implementation provide insight into USAID-funded activities' performance, but after the activity ends it is difficult to know if the outcomes observed will be sustained.
Since 2005, USAID and NASA’s joint SERVIR project has been helping communities across the world better prepare for natural disasters. Working in close collaboration with local scientists and development partners via a series of regional hubs in Africa and Asia, SERVIR combines NASA’s state-of-the-art scientific innovations and satellite technology with USAID’s extensive development know-how and global reach to streamline rural communities’ benefits of satellite data.
Success in the water and sanitation sector cannot be defined by only the number of boreholes drilled or toilets built. In addition to helping communities gain first-time access to improved water and sanitation services, USAID is focusing on building strong, self-reliant, systems to deliver services beyond the life of our projects. That not only means adapting our approach, but also expanding how we measure outcomes.
Water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) are critical in the prevention and care for all of the 17 neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) scheduled for intensified control or elimination by 2020. Provision of safe water, sanitation and hygiene is one of the five key interventions within the global NTD roadmap. Yet to date, the WASH component of the strategy has received little attention and the potential to link efforts on WASH and NTDs has been largely untapped.
UN-Water is the coordination mechanism for the United Nations’ (UN) efforts on water and sanitation. The mission of UN-Water is to enable the UN to ‘deliver as one’ on water-related issues by maximizing UN system-wide coordinated action and coherence. Through its Members and Partners UN-Water ultimately works to strengthen Member States in their efforts to secure sustainable water and sanitation for all.
We have been using the same toilet system for the past 200 years. The sewer system is safe and clean, but also resource intensive, and many countries cannot afford the water and energy needed. Can there be a new solution? That is the ambition of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) project committee 305 that is working to define a standard for a new type of toilet, which could help meet Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 on safe sanitation for all.
The annual virtual conference on MHM in schools provides a vital global platform for practitioners and policy makers to share ideas, discuss approaches to common problems, and to assess progress against the five priorities of the ‘MHM in Ten’ agenda. Now in its seventh year, the conference illustrated some of the successes and challenges we face if we are to realise the MHM in Ten priorities that will improve girls’ lives by 2024.
Created in 2010, the Sanitation and Water for All Partnership (SWA) is a multi-stakeholder global platform to support member countries in achieving universal access to safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH). SWA’s goal is to mobilize the full range of partner expertise to support national governments in achieving their targets for access to safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene. Consistent with the S enator Paul Simon Water for the World Act of 2014 , the U.S.
