2015 UNC Conference

 

Water and Health Conference: Where Science Meets Policy, Water Institute

Water Institute, University of North Carolina:

Side Event by Africa AHEAD

Urban Sanitation: Sustainability through Civic Organisation

Chairman: Darren Saywell (Plan International)
& Jan Willem Rosenboom (Gates Foundation)

Download Programme: SDG in CHC pamphlet

Presentations: 

Waterkeyn J. (2015) A Practical Model to meet eight of the Sustainable Development Goals through Community Health Clubs

Rosenfeld. J (2015) Community Health Clubs in Haiti

Tobergte.L. & Muringaniza.A. (2015) Sustainability of Community Health Clubs

 Katabarwa, J.  &  Pantoglou, J. (2015) Monitoring Behaviour Change in Rwanda.

Matimati, R  & Waterkeyn,J. (2015) Civic organization  in 6 Towns in Zimbabwe.


 

Water Institute Report of the Side Event:

Urban Sanitation: Sustainability Through Community Organization

Friday, October 30, 2015   I   8:30am – 12:00pm

Why Subject Matters:

Community Health Club model could be a more positive and more sustainable approach to improving sanitation because it develops a civic action group that can ensure sustainable behavior.

Workshop Objectives:

The objectives of the workshop are to present case studies on the Community Health Club (CHC) Model first in the rural context in Zimbabwe and then show how it is being used in the urban context again in Zimbabwe and also in Haiti.

Description of format of workshop + number of attendees:

There were over 40 attendees for this workshop. The early morning session had 2 presentations followed by questions. The first presentation was by Dr. Juliet Waterkeyn on how the CHC model can be used to address all of the SDGs. The second presentation was given by Nigel Stuart for Louis Tobergte on his research concerning the long-term effectiveness of the CHC model to promote behavior change. The late morning session had 3 presentations each followed by a round of questions. The first and third presentations were given by Dr. Waterkeyn on CHCs in Rwanda and peri-urban Zimbabwe. The second presentation was given by Jason Rosenfield on CHCs in urban Haiti. Finally Jan Willem Rosenboom oversaw a panel discussion.

Major Discussion/Issues:

One of the major points of discussion was around how CHC’s work in an urban setting. Specifically questions were asked about legal title and tenure (renters/landlords), migration in and out of communities, long term sustainability in urban areas, types of sanitation infrastructure available in urban spaces because of limited space, community latrines attached to CHCs, CLTS not necessarily working in urban areas, and how do you incentivize urban volunteers. Additionally the audience seemed to be interested in what roles the local/municipal/national governments play, how does the movement scale up, gender balance in CHCs, quality assurance, how do you choose facilitators, and importance of community mapping.

Follow up Action:

For Zimbabwe from Louis’ presentation recommendations given were to increase male involvement, improve the household’s ability to construct sanitation infrastructure, to open up to the more vulnerable and less educated, and finally there is need for reinvigoration of the clubs.

From Haiti, Jason noted there is move to incorporate more reproductive health education into the CHCs (demand from the community), and there is a strong need for partnerships as well as a plan to integrate into the national strategy.

Juliet didn’t mention specific follow up actions, but one generally saw just a desire to spread this model further. During the panel Dr. Darren Saywell from PLAN noted that there needs to be an engagement of landlords and working on different planning frameworks for high density urban areas.

Jan Willem Rosenboom ended the session with stating he wanted to people to come back next year and say “which are the puzzle pieces that can be applied to the urban environment so we can really talk about city transformation.”