In July, the annual Water, Engineering and Development Centre (WEDC) conference, “Ensuring Availability and Sustainable Management of Water and Sanitation for All,” was held in Kumasi, Ghana. SPRING/Ghana took advantage of this in country opportunity to host a side table event to present on its nutrition sensitive WASH activities in the Northern and Upper East Regions. SPRING/Ghana WASH Advisor, David Nunoo, and SPRING/DC WASH Technical Advisor Steve Sara presented on the WASH 1,000 approach. WASH 1,000 builds on and enhances standard community led total sanitation (CLTS) methodology by incorporating four nutrition-sensitive WASH behaviors (i.e. clean play spaces for children, washing hands at appropriate times, safe drinking water and disposing of adult and infant feces) into CLTS activities. The session drew around 70 participants and the presenters were commended for designing an evidence-based intervention that supported national goals and integrated recent developments in the WASH and nutrition sectors. Constructive feedback focused on making food hygiene messages more specific and more prevalent in the design. The presentation stimulated an interesting discussion on how to create a clean household environment and where nutrition-sensitive WASH work is headed.
To date, the project has trained 1,495 natural leaders and 1,755 water and sanitation committees in WASH 1,000. As SPRING/Ghana enters its last year, we will continue implementing WASH 1,000 in 1,000 day communities (i.e. targeting households with children under two) through activities such as tippy tap demonstrations and learning tours.
For more information on WASH 1,000 see the poster presented at the conference.
