Dear Mwangi,

Interesting project. Under SHARE 2 research consortium we (WaterAid, NM-AIST, BTC, LSHTM) are working on a similar topic in an emerging city in Tanzania - Babati Town council, which about 160km from Arusha. Our interest is to study the condition for city-wide sanitation planning. Part of the research work related to policy and institutional analysis was carried in Arusha, Dar es Salaam, Moshi, Boma Ng'ombe.

Besides that at the Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology (NM-AIST) Arusha, where I am based, we do have ongoing research on urban groundwater (NERC/DFID funded) that may be of interest your project. We would be interested to collaborate especially since are going to attempt to experiment with practical transition groundwater management in Arusha. We have planned a city level meeting with key stakeholders in the week of Jan 29th.

Best
Hans

Dear Mwangi,

the lockdown workshop that will be held in January only includes selected stakeholders and co-authors of this guideline.
It will be a two days concentrated team work in which we will go through all chapters of the document in detail. Hence, I doubt the usefulness of attendance for your team.
I can connect you with key stakeholders and institutions though.
I will send you a contact from GIZ in Tanzania who can assist you with the Tanzanian policy analysis in a private message.

Best,
Dennis

Dear Mwangi,

Thanks for this information. You should talk to the colleagues at the Water Sector Trust Fund (Mara Road, Upper Hill) and the GIZ Water Sector Reform Programme .

They have a strong focus on FSM within the UBSUP programme. Email me seperately and I can forward you their details.

Best regards,

Doreen

Dennis,

Thanks for all this useful information. Interesting to learn about the project you are doing with UN-Habitat. Please let us know about the upcoming workshop so our team can see about participation. Admittedly our work is not as technical (in the engineering sense) as what you seem to be doing, but the context and view of stakeholders your team has would serve our project well.

I will share these documents with the rest of our team. Thanks for the heads-up about the GIZ document. Do you know whom I can reach out to about it once it's ready.

Best

Daniel, thanks for the pointers about the work that Nelson and SEI is doing. Will review this to explore potential synergies. We havent started the Uganda phase of the project, we will do so next year. We are still searching for Uganda-based research partners - no implementation at this stage. Any pointers would be appreciated.

Best

Dear Mwangi,

that is an interesting and really useful project you are working on! Thanks for sharing this information.
BORDA Africa with support from UNEP and UN-HABITAT is working on a project in Tanzania titled "Demonstration of decentralised wastewater projects in non-sewered areas of Dar es Salaam".
A project factsheet is attached. The 3 outputs are:

Output 1: M&E of selected treatment technologies conducted – and their social, financial and institutional performance – and baseline data established.

Output 2: Workshops at city level conducted, to disseminate the idea, review the regulatory framework
and develop technical standards.

Output 3: Technical standards and guidelines developed for the application, construction and operation
of decentralised wastewater treatment systems.

The working title of the document under development has been changed to "National Guidelines for Decentralised Wastewater and Faecal Sludge Management", to address decentralised wastewater management and faecal sludge management.

Particularly the third output might have a number of synergies with your project, as it aims at supporting the existing regulatory framework with a guideline on decentralised sanitation.
We are currently in the commenting phase of the second draft document. Involved stakeholders are ministries and LGAs, utilities, regulators, NGOs, universities and private sector entities.

A lockdown workshop will be conducted early January to finalise the blueprint of this document.

Are you aware of the "Regional Guidelines on Wastewater Management in Coastal Cities on the Red Sea And Gulf of Aden"? UNEP supported the development of this transnational guideline. I attached the document as well.
Is that something you are aiming to do for the East Africa Region (or in this case Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda)?

Also interesting for you: GIZ conducted a policy analysis titled "Analysis of Policies, Strategies and Regulatory Frameworks for Urban Sanitation in Tanzania". The final draft was sent out recently, but I do not know if I can share it here, that's why I cant attach it right now.
The analysis lists the relevant policies and acts and examines the roles of the different actors.
I can put you in touch with the relevant people to get in touch for further information.

Best regards,
Dennis

Dear Mwangi Chege,
Thank you for sharing about your project which I think will make a good contribution towards assessing the sanitation policy landscape in the East African region. One of my colleagues at the Stockholm Environment Institute, Nelson Ekane (www.sei-international.org/staff?staffid=166) has done research on sanitation policy and governance in the same region. If you see any opportunities to collaborate or just want to know more about his work in the area, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with him. I am also curious to know which stakeholders/organizations you are working with in Kampala and Mbarara as research or implementing partners.

Regards,
Daniel

Dear Elisabeth,

Thanks for the thoughtful questions. The topic of sanitation is not new to APHRC. We have been running the Nairobi Urban Health Demographic Surveillance System (NUHDSS) in two of Nairobi's informal settlements for over 15 years. This exposed us to the sanitation challenges experienced in these areas, so it is a subject we are familiar with. However this is the first project we are undertaking that is exclusively focused on sanitation and it builds on the knowledge gained through the NUHDSS.

To date our project has focused on Nairobi. This includes advocacy work around World Toilet Day and a knowledge sharing forum for researchers in WASH. We plan to extend activities to Uganda and Tanzania in 2018.

One of the difficulties we have faced to date is obtaining reliable data, for instance on urban sewerage coverage as different stakeholders having different views on what the actual coverage is.

Another challenge has been difficulty in reaching relevant stakeholders outside Nairobi which explains the lag in engagement in Uganda and Tanzania. However we have made progress in the last couple of months and aim to increase the level of activity in those two countries next year.

Dear Mwangi Chege,

This looks like a really interesting project. Is the topic of "sanitation" new to your organisation, APRHC? If not, could you tell us a bit what previous projects you have worked on (I first came across APHRC via your interesting policy briefs on menstrual cups. These are also included in the SuSanA library and cited on the Wikipedia article about menstrual cups).

I see your projects will work in these 6 cities:

The multi-disciplinary team will work in six rapidly urbanizing areas in East Africa: Mbarara and Kampala (Uganda), Nairobi and Nakuru (Kenya) and Dar es Salaam and Arusha (Tanzania), taking advantage of devolution that have given sub-national governments implementation mandates, as well as requirement for a stronger focus on gender mainstreaming.

Now that one year of the project is up, could you tell us a bit about:
- Current state of affairs
- Achievements to date
- Difficulties faced so far
?

Thanks,
Elisabeth

As a Tanzanian working in the sanitation sector I would say this project came at the right time. I think Tanzania is somehow behind in-terms of implementation of sustainable FWM practices; I am aware of a Fecal Sludge Management (FSM) project in UDSM. I think if such efforts are backed up by policies then we will soon see more positive results in-term of uptake and synthesis my communities- which is our end goal. Bravo Chege et al. I will be happy to contribute in whatever way I can. All the best.

Fides
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Dear all,

Elisabeth has suggested that I provide a bit more information about this project. Please find below some further details.

Best Mwangi

++++++++

Title of grant: Policy analysis and research support in fecal waste management (FWM) in East Africa

Subtitle: An evidence-based approach towards sustainable fecal waste management in rapidly urbanizing centers within three East African countries.

Name of lead organization: African Population and Health Research Center (APHRC)
Primary contact at lead organization: Blessing Mberu – Program Lead, Urbanization and Wellbeing (UWB)
Grantee location: Nairobi, Kenya
Developing country where the research is being tested: Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda
Start and end date: 2016-2019
Grant type: Global Development - Water Sanitation and Hygiene
Grant size: USD 1,299,991

Short description of the project:
The Fecal Waste Management (FWM) project is a dual-inquiry into policy and practice along the sanitation value chain in East Africa. This three-year project seeks to improve and expand the implementation and resourcing of national sanitation policies in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda. Anticipated project outcomes align with the Ngor Declaration of 2015, and Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6.2 on Clean Water and Sanitation. The Ngor Declaration aims to see countries allocate fiscal spending of at least 0.5% of national Gross Domestic Product (GDP) towards sanitation. SDG 6.2 seeks to achieve access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all; end open defecation while paying special attention to the needs of women and girls and other vulnerable populations. Overall, these investments are anticipated to have a five-fold return: socio-economic benefits including increased productivity of the working population, prevention of illness, prevention of disability, reduced healthcare costs and prevention of early death.

Goals:
see my post before this one

Objectives:
• Provide a roadmap for inclusive urban sanitation policy at national and sub-national level, consistent with SDG 6.2 and Ngor declaration as relates to FWM in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
• Establish APHRC as an authority in sanitation research and policy within the East Africa region, especially focused on urban sanitation.
• Strengthen the integration and mainstreaming of gender into the sanitation guidelines for Africa

Research or implementation partners:
• African Ministers’ Council on Water (AMCOW)
• SuSanA network
• Sanergy
• Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Finance (WASH-FIN)

Links, further readings: aphrc.org/post/projects/fecal-sludge-management

The African Population and Health Research Center (APHRC) is conducting a dual-inquiry into policy and practices around fecal waste management in East Africa. This project seeks to strengthen the design, implementation and resourcing of national sanitation policies in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda.
The project's anticipated outcomes align with the Ngor Declaration of 2015, and Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6.2. It involves collaboration across three APHRC divisions: Research; Policy Engagement and Communication; and the Research Capacity Strengthening (RCS) divisions. The multi-disciplinary team will work in six rapidly urbanizing areas in East Africa: Nairobi and Nakuru (Kenya), Mbarara and Kampala (Uganda), and Dar es Salaam and Arusha (Tanzania).

Project Goals:

• Develop a regional synthesis of policies, programs, innovations and gaps in fecal waste management in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda
• Collect data that validates the state and existing gaps in fecal waste management policies, investments and practices in selected urban areas in East Africa in order to develop recommendations and policy engagement agenda for maximizing investments and opportunities in the sector.
• Build a networked cohort of well-trained scholars able to generate high quality research and interact with policymakers and practitioners on issues around fecal waste management
• Use the body of evidence from policy, programs, innovations reviews and gaps in fecal waste management as an advocacy tool for a networked approach to policy-makers and other stakeholders in order to improve sanitation and management of fecal waste, while ensuring wider opportunities for the engagement by women in decision-making processes.