24th -29th January 2015
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) hosted 70 representatives from partner organisations across the globe that they are currently funding. This six-day workshop that took place in Hanoi, Vietnam (24-29 Jan) has the recurring theme: Building Demand for Sanitation (BDS).
Africa AHEAD was represented by the Director of Programmes, Anthony Waterkeyn, who presented a poster that explains the national roll-out of CHCs across all 15,000 villages in Rwanda and also highlights the significant impact currently being achieved in Rusizi District, where a Randomised Control Trial is being undertaken by Innovations for Poverty Action to assess the health and socio-economic impact of CHCs.
The workshop provided a great opportunity for AA to demonstrate how the CHC model is particularly capable of putting ‘women at the centre of development’, a recurring theme that BMGF is prioritising as the world moves towards the Sustainable Development Goals later this year. After all, sanitation is not just about building toilets, nor is it just about hygiene behaviour change, it is fundamentally about ‘putting women and girls at the centre of development’.