Dear Colleagues:
The Water CKM project received a one-month extension, allowing time to send out additional  WASH Research Updates.This update includes the latest updates to Globalwaters.org and 30+ recently published articles and reports on COVID-19, gender, hygiene, sanitation and water issues. 

Updates to Globalwaters.org
- Webinars - COVID 19 and WASH: What We Know and What's Next, March 11, 2021 .
- Reports - Assessing the Effects of COVID-19 on Access to Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene in USAID High Priority and Strategy-Aligned Countries: Synthesis Report . Nepal Deep Dive | Rwanda Deep Dive | Senegal Deep Dive | Ghana Deep Dive | Kenya Deep Dive |
- Blog - Safeguarding Water for the Future: Helping Water Utilities Become Resilient and Financially Sustainable  
- Blog - Protecting and Empowering Women and Girls for Safer Access to Water  
- Newsletters - Global Waters Stories - March 2021
- Newsletters - Water Currents: World Water Day 2021
- USAID in the News - USAID Recognizes World Water Day - Statement by Acting Administrator Gloria Steele  

Recent Reports and Journal Articles
COVID-19
-  Pragmatic Recommendations for Infection Prevention and Control Practices for Healthcare Facilities in Low- and Middle-Income Countries during the COVID-19 Pandemic . Am. J. Trop. Med. Hyg., 104(Suppl), 2021.
-  Estimation of rainwater harvesting potential for emergency water demand in the era of COVID-19. The case of Dilla town, Southern, Ethiopia . Environmental Challenges, April 2021.
-  The water-energy-food nexus and COVID-19: Towards a systematization of impacts and responses . Science of The Total Environment, July 2021.
-  Lessons Learned: Adapting Wash Activities to Respond to COVID-19 . PRO-WASH, March 2021.

Gender Issues
-  A gender perspective to understanding and enhancing the functionality of water supply systems in Nepal . IWMI Technical Brief, March 2021. 
-  Overcoming Barriers to Women’s Participation in Water Supply through Innovative Technology . wH2O: The Journal of Gender and Water, March 2021.
-  Water, women and disability: Using mixed-methods to support inclusive wash programme design in Vanuatu . The Lancet Regional Health - Western Pacific, March 2021.
-  Empowering Women in Water Diplomacy in the Middle East and North Africa: A Comparative Study of Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco and Palestine . GWP, March 2021. 

Humanitarian WASH
-  Lessons learned from conducting six multi-country mixed-methods effectiveness research studies on water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) interventions in humanitarian response . BMC Public Health, March 2021. 
-  Universal WASH coverage; what it takes for fragile states. Case of Jariban district in Somalia . PLoS One, February 2021.

Handwashing/Hygiene
-  Multi-Sectoral Participatory Design of a BabyWASH Playspace for Rural Ethiopian Households . Am Jnl Trop Med Hyg, March 2021.
-  Evaluating the Efficacy of the Supertowel™ as a Handwashing Product: A Simulation of Real-World Use Conditions . Am Jnl Trop Med Hyg, March 2021.
-  Effectiveness of Mass Media Campaigns to Improve Handwashing-Related Behavior, Knowledge, and Practices in Rural Bangladesh . Am Jnl Trop Med Hyg, March 2021.
-  2020 Handwashing Research Summary . GHP, March 2021.
-  Absorbency of Biodegradable Materials for Menstrual Hygiene Management Products in Low-and Middle-income Countries . Preprint from Research Square, March 2021.
-  Hand hygiene and safety behaviours at shopping centres in COVID-19: an observation in Wa township in Ghana . Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development, March 2021.

Sanitation Issues
-  How does sanitation influence people's quality of life? Qualitative research in low-income areas of Maputo, Mozambique . Social Science & Medicine, March 2021.
-  Rural Sanitation Programming in Challenging Contexts: A Desk-Based Review . Sanitation Learning Hub,, February 2021.
-  Sanitation, Wastewater Management and Sustainability: from Waste Disposal to Resource Recovery . Stockholm Environment Institute, March 2021. 
-  Predictive models using “cheap and easy” field measurements: Can they fill a gap in planning, monitoring, and implementing fecal sludge management solutions? Water Research, May 2021. 
-  Field-testing and demonstration of sanitation technologies: Guidelines for the South African sanitation technology enterprise Programme (SASTEP) . Gates Foundation, March 2021.
-  Green Infrastructure for Sanitation in Settlements in the Global South: A Narrative Review of Socio-Technical Systems . Sustainability, February 2021.
-  SARS-CoV-2 RNA in Swabbed Samples from Latrines and Flushing Toilets: A Case–Control Study in a Rural Latin American Setting . Am Jnl Trop Med Hyg, March 2021.
-  SARS-CoV-2: sewage surveillance as an early warning system and challenges in developing countries . Environmental Science and Pollution Research, March 2021.
-  Open Waste Canals as Potential Sources of Antimicrobial Resistance Genes in Aerosols in Urban Kanpur, India . Am Jnl Trop Med Hyg, March 2021.

WASH Issues
-  Global Strategy on Water, Sanitation and Hygiene to Combat Neglected Tropical Diseases – 2021-2030 . WHO, March 2021.
-  Reimagining WASH: Water Security for All . UNICEF, March 2021.
-  Factors associated with water quality, sanitation, and hygiene in rural schools in 14 low- and middle-income countries . Science of The Total Environment, March 2021.
-  The enabling environment is not a checklist: building practical authority to improve WASH . D. Barrington, Colorado WASH Symposium, 2021.
-  Social outcomes of a community-based water, sanitation and hygiene intervention . Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development, March 2021.

Water Issues
-  UN World Water Development Report 2021 ‘Valuing Water’
-  UN Water Summary Progress Update 2021: SDG 6 — water and sanitation for all, February 2021 .
-  The Role of Psychological Ownership in Safe Water Management: A Mixed-Methods Study in Nepal . Water, February 2021.
-  Toxic cyanobacteria in water . WHO, February 2021. 
-  Storing water: a new integrated approach for resilient development . CGIAR, March 2021.
-  Use of effective lids reduces presence of mosquito larvae in household water storage containers in urban and peri-urban Zika risk areas of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador . Parasites & Vectors, March 2021.
-  Rural Water 2021 + Blue Pages: Directory of rural water supply services, tariffs, management models and lifecycle costs . RWSN, March 2021.
-  Using Twitter to Evaluate the Perception of Service Delivery in Data-Poor Environments . World Bank, March 2021.

Hi Dr Dan
This a very Nice opportunity. 
I have sent you a mail
Olivier Konan 
Communication Specialist 
USAID/MuniWASH 

Dear Colleagues:

Below is an informal update from CKM that is distributed biweekly. If you would like to be added to the mailing list, please send me your email address and mine is This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

The purpose of this informal research update is to highlight some of the most recent WASH sector studies and resources by USAID and others. Please send links to recent or upcoming studies and events that you would like to feature in upcoming issues. We welcome your suggestions to make the updates more useful.  This biweekly features:

• Globalwaters.org updates
• Other USAID updates
• Events
• Water quality/water security studies
• Health studies
• Sanitation studies
• WASH & COVID-19 updates

UPDATES TO GLOBALWATERS.ORG
USAID Global Water and Development Report FY 2018–2019 . USAID, October 2020. During the first two years of the U.S. Global Water Strategy implementation (Fiscal Years 2018 and 2019), USAID provided $835 million to support water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) activities in 51 countries.

What Does it Take to Sustain Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Outcomes? Lessons from Six Ex-Post Evaluations . USAID Water CKM Team, October 2020. Through its commitment to identifying sustainable approaches to WASH, USAID commissioned a series of six ex-post evaluations of its WASH activities completed three to 10 years prior. These studies identified what outcomes had been sustained years later and why. Link to the October 22, 2020 webinar .

USAID Water and Development Technical Series . These technical briefs provide guidance on important topics for developing and implementing water and sanitation activities in support of the U.S. Government Global Water Strategy and USAID’s plan under the strategy. Technical Briefs are available on: Rural Water Services , Rural Sanitation Services , WASH and Its Links to Nutrition , Gender Equality and Female Empowerment in WASH , and Urban Sanitation Services .

OTHER USAID UPDATES
USAID Transform WASH: Ethiopia’s Business Environment and Business and How It Influences WASH Market Development . IRC WASH, September 2020. This Learning Note explores challenges in the private sector enabling environment and highlights opportunities for growth and investment in the WASH sector.

Additional Learning Notes .  Nutrition, Water, Sanitation & Hygiene Assessment among Urban Poor Children and Adolescents: A Community Case Study of the Katwe II Slum in Kampala, Uganda . USAID, July 2020. This community case study sought to understand factors that contribute to poor nutrition among poor children and adolescents in Katwe II and what solutions can be used to best address their needs and the report has highlighted them.

EVENTS
World Toilet Day 2020: Sustainable Sanitation and Climate Change, November 19, 2020 - World Toilet Day is a United Nations Observance that celebrates toilets and raises awareness of the 4.2 billion people living without access to safely managed sanitation. It is about taking action to tackle the global sanitation crisis and achieve Sustainable Development Goal 6: water and sanitation.

iDE and PRO-WASH Learning Journey Using Human-Centered Design Tools for WASH . iDE and PRO-WASH offer a four-week learning journey where participants will use a new Human Centered Design tool: the Possibilities Map for Market Based Sanitation. This journey includes two online meetings and one-on-one support from Human Centered Design and WASH experts over a four-week period. The event starts on Tuesday, November 10th and runs for four weeks -  

WATER QUALITY/WATER SECURITY
Water in the Balance: The Economic Impacts of Climate Change and Water Scarcity in the Middle East . World Bank, September 2020. The report emphasizes how the growing dependence on shared water resources reinforces the need to manage water across boundaries.

Integrating Water Quality Testing into Household Surveys: Thematic Report on Drinking Water . UNICEF; WHO, October 2020. Integration of water quality testing into household surveys has become a feasible option due to the increased availability of affordable and accurate testing procedures and their adaptation for use by household survey experts. 

Water Borrowing Is Consistently Practiced Globally and Is Associated with Water-Related System Failures across Diverse Environments . Global Environmental Change, September 2020. These data are the first to demonstrate that borrowing water is commonly used by households around the world to cope with water insecurity.

Empowerment in Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Index . World Development, January 2021. Limited tools exist to measure women’s empowerment and gender outcomes in WASH. The Empowerment in Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Index is a novel survey-based index designed to measure agency, participation and empowerment in the water and sanitation sector.

HEALTH
Baby WASH Programming: Integrating Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Interventions across Sectors to Impact Child Health Outcomes Learning Note . UNICEF, September 2020. The mainstreaming of Baby WASH follows three key principles, so that interventions are: (1) Context Specific, with responses tailored to meet the different needs of families in these contexts (development/humanitarian emergency; location such as workplace, school, health facility; urban/rural, etc.). (2) Integrated into existing sectoral programmes in WASH, MNCH, nutrition and ECD. Stand-alone Baby WASH programmes are less likely to be successful and risk duplication. (3) Based on high-quality research and evidence. Baby WASH is a relatively new concept and the evidence base is evolving. 

Effects of a Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Mobile Health Program on Diarrhea and Child Growth in Bangladesh: A Cluster-randomized Controlled Trial of the Cholera Hospital-based Intervention for 7 Days (CHoBI7) Mobile Health Program . Clinical Infectious Diseases, August 2020. The CHoBI7 mHealth program lowered pediatric diarrhea and stunting among diarrhea patient households. This research was supported by a USAID) Development Innovation Ventures grant awarded to Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.

Handwashing Compendium for Low Resource Settings: A Living Document . Sanitation Learning Hub, October 2020. The compendium is a living document which will be updated regularly as more examples and good practice emerge. It has been developed and disseminated quickly so immediate, relevant and timely actions can be taken. This version is the third edition.

Hygiene Along the Continuum of Care in the Early Post-Natal Period: An Observational Study in Nigeria . BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth, October 2020. In this study setting, hand hygiene practices during post-natal care and the first 6 hours in the home environment were consistently inadequate. Effective strategies are needed to promote safe hand hygiene practices within the post-natal care ward and home in low resource, high-burden settings.

SANITATION
Integrating Savings and Income-Generating Activities into Community Health Clubs for Improved Sanitation . PRO-WASH, September 2020. A qualitative study was undertaken to better understand barriers and motivators to latrine construction and how, and if, the integration of these activities with Community Health Clubs improved uptake of latrine construction. This learning brief shares key study findings along with additional key lessons from implementation.

Women Are More Likely to Expect Social Sanctions for Open Defecation: Evidence from Tamil Nadu India . PLoS One, October 13, 2020. Open defecation practices are known to cause psychosocial stress among women due to their experiences with sanitation insecurity, which may include fear of disapproval from community members. Results highlight the need for gendered intervention strategies when sanitation programs leverage social influence for behavior change.

A Review of the Financial Value of Faecal Sludge Reuse in Low-Income Countries . Sustainability, October 2020. The most common form of reuse in practice is agricultural composting, which is also the lowest value product. Few cases were able to achieve more than $5/person/year from sludge reuse, therefore other drivers are needed to promote proper human waste disposal.

Technical Brief on Water, Sanitation, Hygiene (WASH) and Wastewater Management to Prevent Infections and Reduce the Spread of Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) . FAO, WHO, 2020. This technical brief on WASH and wastewater management to reduce the spread of AMR provides a summary of evidence and rationale for WASH and wastewater actions within AMR national action plans.

Sludge Bomb: The impending Sludge Emptying and Treatment Crisis in Blantyre, Malawi . Journal of Environmental Management, January 2021. Very few pit-emptying companies operate in Blantyre. The majority of pit latrines will need to be emptied within the next 3 years.

Strategies to Connect Low-Income Communities with the Proposed Sewerage Network of the Dhaka Sanitation Improvement Project, Bangladesh: A Qualitative Assessment of the Perspectives of Stakeholders . Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health, October 2020. This study assessed the challenges and opportunities of bringing low-income communities (LICs) under a sewerage connection within the proposed sewerage network plan by 2025.

WASH & COVID-19 UPDATES
WASH During COVID-19: What We Know So Far . Global Water 2020, September 2020. The Congressional International Water and Sanitation Caucus is a bipartisan group of Members concerned about international water and sanitation challenges. Caucus members launched the Caucus in September 2020 with an online event featuring remarks from the co-chairs and a discussion on “WASH During COVID-19: What We Know So Far.

” What COVID-19 Reveals about the Neglect of WASH within Infection Prevention in Low-Resource Healthcare Facilities . American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene, September 2020. What COVID-19 reveals about infection prevention in low-resource healthcare facilities is that we can no longer afford to “work around” WASH deficiencies. Basic WASH services are a fundamental prerequisite to compliance with the principles of IPC that are necessary to protect patients and healthcare workers in every setting.

COVID-19: Recommendations for Prevention and Response . UNC Water Institute, July 2020. This resource is intended to synthesize currently available evidence and guidance on SARS-CoV-2 virus and COVID-19 disease occurrence, transmission, and management in the context of water, sanitation, and hygiene (WaSH) and environmental health.

COVID-19 and Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WASH) Communication Toolkit . SWA, September 2020. This collection of communications materials serves as a way for organizations and individuals to share key policy messages on COVID-19 and WASH through professionally developed graphics and other materials at no cost.Disclaimer: The contents of this issue are the responsibility of the USAID Water Communications and Knowledge Management Project and do not necessarily reflect the views of USAID or the United States Government.

Dear Colleagues:

Below is an excerpt from the Water Currents issue on WASH and financing and the complete issue is on the Globalwaters.org website .
Upcoming issues of Water Currents will be on COVID-19 and water utilities and handwashing research published from January - June 2020 so let me know if you have studies and resources that we can include.

Overviews
How Improved Financing Enhances Water and Sanitation Service Delivery . Global Waters Radio, March 2019. How can better financing help extend water and sanitation services to those most in need? To answer that question, Global Waters Radio speaks with two experts: Ella Lazarte, senior water and sanitation advisor at USAID, and Barbara Kazimbaya-Senkwe, global knowledge management and communications lead with the USAID–supported WASH-FIN program.

Reform and Finance for the Urban Water Supply and Sanitation Sector . World Bank, August 2019. This summary note integrates three lines of work—utility reform, sector reform, and sector finance—for readers to understand the critical links among the three spheres.

Utilities in Developing Countries, in Financial Tailspin, Try to Keep Water Flowing During Pandemic and Beyond . Circle of Blue, May 2020. Water utilities are experiencing a “double hit” in their finances that could hinder operations into the future.

Rethinking the Economics of Rural Water in Africa . Oxford Review of Economic Policy, January 2020. The findings conclude with policy recommendations to network rural services at scale, unlock rural payments by creating value, and design and test performance-based funding models at national and regional scales.

Channeling Financial Flows for Urban Water and Sanitation . Center for Strategic and International Studies, November 2019. New sources of financing are needed to provide clean water and sanitation for citizens around the world. The challenge is particularly acute in cities where population growth and urbanization are stretching resources and deteriorating living conditions.

Financing for Water—Water for Financing: A Global Review of Policy and Practice . Sustainability, February 2019. The relationship between the water and financial sectors is explored through a review of past and current policies and practices, and new needs driven by growing water insecurity (i.e., drought and floods) and climate change.

The complete issue is also on the Globalwaters.org website.

Despite investing billions of dollars in rural water and sanitation over the past 30 years, sustainable services for water, sanitation, and health (WASH) remain elusive. The failure to achieve sustained services is not an infrastructure failure, but a systems failure. Local systems—the network of people and intangible, interacting factors that support and deliver a service—are the drivers of service delivery. Service levels can improve through understanding and strengthening both local and national systems.

This issue of Water Currents focuses on the work of the many local governments, communities, and sector partners, as well as investments by USAID in programs like the  Sustainable WASH Systems Learning Partnership (SWS)  that are exploring new approaches to strengthening local systems to achieve greater service sustainability.

In addition to SWS, we would also like to thank  Agenda for Change ,  Millennium Water Alliance , and the  Institute for Sustainable Futures  for contributing to this issue.

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Learning Documents
Strengthening Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Systems: Concepts, Examples, and Experiences . Agenda for Change, February 2020. This paper describes the concepts, frameworks, and tools that Agenda for Change members use for analyzing systems; provides practical examples of systems strengthening efforts; and outlines the journeys that members have gone through in progressively embracing systems strengthening approaches.

System Approaches to Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene: A Systematic Literature Review . International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, January 2020. Based on this review, the authors propose four recommendations for improving the evidence base on evaluating interconnections among factors within WASH systems.

Sustaining Rural Water: A Comparative Study of Maintenance Models for Community-Managed Schemes . SWS, July 2019. This study considers different variations of maintenance approaches. It provides a typology for characterizing maintenance service provision models, a framework for analyzing them, and an in-depth study of seven maintenance models that represent different cases from the typology of approaches.

Application of the District-Wide Approach in 5 Pilot Districts of Rwanda: Lessons  Learned . Agenda for Change, February 2020. The district-wide approach is a relevant and effective approach for articulating WASH plans and to get buy-in from various stakeholders for attaining universal access and the stakeholders’ roles therein. As both a process and an output to investment planning, the district-wide approach has been effective.

Understanding Rural Water Services as a Complex System: An Assessment of Key Factors as Potential Leverage Points for Improved Service Sustainability . Sustainability, February 2020. Researchers conducted four participatory factor mapping workshops with local stakeholders across multiple rural water contexts to identify the factors and interactions that support service sustainability.

How to Use Learning Alliances to Achieve Systems Change at Scale . IRC, 2019. IRC describes the thinking behind its use of learning alliances in this working paper, offering practical guidance on how to adopt the approach and build a change hub to support it. It cites examples from Ghana and Uganda.

Strengthening Sanitation and Hygiene in the WASH Systems Conceptual Framework . Sustainable Services Initiative (SSI), August 2019. This discussion paper reflects SSI’s thinking on WASH systems, particularly on questions such as: what are key differences among water supply, sanitation, and hygiene that may affect systems strengthening approaches, and are conceptual frameworks and concepts for WASH systems fully applicable to all three WASH subsectors?

Doing WASH Well: A Set of Principles for Implementing Agencies and their Evaluators . Waterlines, July 2019. The authors of this editorial propose a set of principles that could guide WASH actors and form an evaluation benchmark for WASH systems.

Beyond Building Blocks? Identifying and Monitoring Dynamic Drivers of Sector Performance . WaterAid, March 2019. One recommendation in the report is that WASH donors and implementing partners should continue to deploy building block frameworks, but with greater emphasis on using and improving them for the purposes of recurrent monitoring. 

Collective Action Towards WASH Systems Strengthening . WASHfunders, November 2019. This article describes how Agenda for Change members and other organizations collaborate on WASH systems issues.

Understanding the WASH System and Its Building Blocks: Building Strong WASH Systems for the SDGs . IRC, 2018. This paper presents a set of nine building blocks of WASH systems intended to reduce complexity to a manageable level, enabling and supporting action, while neither oversimplifying reality nor losing sight of the broader WASH system.

Groundwater as a Source of Drinking Water in Southeast Asia and the Pacific: A Multi-Country Review of Current Reliance and Resource Concerns . Water, August 2019. The authors reviewed current and emerging groundwater resource concerns using a systems thinking approach to assess how groundwater resource issues influence household water services.

Evaluating Systems Change Efforts: Where to Start . Collective Impact Forum, February 2020. Panelists in this webinar discuss how evaluating system change is different from evaluating programs. They explain some of the core evaluation principles needed when advancing systems change work.

Embracing Complexity: Towards a Shared Understanding of Funding Systems Change . McKinsey & Company, January 2020. How can systems change across the world be financed more effectively? How can change be better supported for the benefit of society? This report provides donors and investors, as well as charitable initiatives and organizations, with answers to these questions.

Country Reports – Sanitation
Exploring a Network’s Value: Lessons from Ethiopia . SWS, February 2020. In Ethiopia, LINC is supporting activities to strengthen learning networks for sanitation in two small towns. For the long-term sustainability of a network, it is critical to understand how members value the network, i.e., what they hope to gain and what they want to contribute.

Systems Reboot: Sanitation Sector Change in Maputo and Lusaka . Water and Sanitation Urban Partnership, November 2019. Using systems thinking principles, this report explores the development of on-site sanitation in two capital cities over the last 10 years and provides insights into how the WASH system can deliver better results for urban residents in both cities.

Planning Differently: Developing Long-Term, Strategic Plans for District-Wide Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Services in Ethiopia . Millennium Water Alliance, May 2019. Long-term (e.g., 2018–2030) strategic planning at the district level is a necessary first step to identifying sources of increased financing based on projected requirements.

Country Reports – Water Supply 
A Local Systems Analysis for Rural Water Services Delivery in South Ari and Mile, Ethiopia . SWS, September 2019. This report summarizes the strengths of the decentralized local systems that deliver services, describing key actors and factors and the interactions between them. The report makes recommendations for activities to strengthen the systems that improve service delivery.

Capacity Development in the WASH Sector of Ethiopia . Millennium Water Alliance, November 2019. When considering how to improve capacity in Ethiopia’s WASH sector, several factors must be taken into account. One such factor is that capacity development should include operations and maintenance for already-existing water points to increase sustainability.

Service Delivery Models for Universal, Safe and Sustainable Water Services in Ethiopia . Millennium Water Alliance, June 2019. This paper presents and discusses characteristics of the main rural service delivery models in Ethiopia. It includes discussion on levels of service, types of infrastructure, and management models, including support arrangements.

Creating a Roadmap for Sustainable Water Service Delivery in Haiti . USAID Global Waters, February 2020. Through in-depth assessments of each of its five targeted urban areas—Canaan, Cap Haïtien, Jérémie, Les Cayes, and Mirebalais—the USAID Haiti Water and Sanitation Project identified unique circumstances that constrain water service delivery as well as many shared challenges.

Cliff Nyaga and Pauline Kiamba on Sustainable Rural Water Improvements in Kenya . Global Waters Radio, September 2019. This podcast features best practices and lessons learned from SWS efforts to create and sustain rural water supply improvements in Kitui County.

Emerging Lessons on Sustaining Rural Water Services in Uganda: A Case Study of Whave's Preventive Maintenance Model . SWS, December 2019. This case study focuses on results in three districts where SWS partner Whave has operated for more than four years, achieving high rates of hand pump functionality with a short duration for breakdowns (less than three days of downtime on average).

Training/Tools 
Strengthening WASH Systems: Tools for Practitioners . Sustainable Services Initiative, April 2020. The toolbox provides information on systems strengthening in a summary format, developed for country or field based practitioners. It is written primarily from the perspective of an NGO wishing to engage in systems strengthening at the local level.

WASH Systems Glossary of Terms . Agenda for Change, 2019. Included terms and definitions cover aspects of WASH systems strengthening and collaboration used by Agenda for Change members and other systems leaders.

All Systems Go! IRC WASH Systems Symposium . The symposium, held March 12–14, 2019, brought together systems thinkers and doers from the WASH sector to discuss how systems approaches can help build sustainable and expanded WASH services around the world. Resources include presentations, a concept note, and videos.

Strong Systems: Making Water and Sanitation for Everyone, Everywhere and Forever a Reality . IRC, March 2019. In his keynote speech at the 2019 All Systems Go! WASH systems symposium, IRC’s Patrick Moriarty discusses how to build sustainable WASH systems and lasting services.

WASH Systems Academy . IRC, 2019. IRC has launched a series of free online courses aimed at assisting WASH sector professionals in applying systems strengthening approaches in their work. It includes multiple self-paced courses.

Sector Strengthening Programme Design Toolkit . WaterAid, June 2018. As part of its global strategy aimed at sustainability, WaterAid is designing WASH programs using a set of participatory tools that help identify barriers in the system and devising activities to overcome these barriers.

Technology Applicability Framework . Rural Water Supply Network, n.d. The Technology Applicability Framework is a decision-support tool on the applicability, scalability, and sustainability of specific WASH technologies to provide lasting services in a specific context.

Websites 
USAID Sustainable WASH Systems Learning Partnership  – SWS tests new ideas, approaches, and tools to overcome barriers for improving WASH service sustainability.

Agenda for Change  – Agenda for Change works to deliver positive change toward WASH service delivery through a systems-wide approach that tackles policy, financing, and institutions.

Millennium Water Alliance (MWA)  – MWA has created consortium field programs in which member NGOs bring their strengths and share ideas on effective approaches for maximum efficiency and long-term effectiveness in WASH programs. Read reports on  WASH Systems in Ethiopia  from MWA.

IRC  – IRC is an independent, nonprofit organization that drives resilient WASH systems from the ground up. The site includes a collection of  WASH systems resources .

Dear Colleagues:

The February 2020 issue of Water Currents includes recent research and studies on a variety of sanitation-related topics such as market-based sanitation, community-led total sanitation, fecal sludge management, sanitation financing, and others.

www.globalwaters.org/resources/assets/wa...ts-sanitation-topics

If you have topic suggestions for future issues of Water Currents, please let us know.

An excerpt: Market-Based Sanitation
Gaming for Profit: Using a Game to Learn about Market-Based Sanitation. USAID, November 2019. USAID’s Market-Based Sanitation game teaches the fundamentals of a sanitation market system and how an enterprise’s choices affect their viability as a business. Links to the game materials are on the USAID WASHPaLS (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene Partnerships and Learning for Sustainability) website.

Developing Consumer Markets within Rural WASH Systems. All Systems Go! WASH Systems Symposium, March 2019. This paper takes a look at how consumer WASH markets are being developed and the role of different types of actors in the system.

Webinar: Designing Effective Sanitation Enterprises. USAID WASHPaLS, September 2018. WASHPaLS presents a detailed discussion of the elements of a sanitation enterprise, including mechanisms and practices, design approaches, and key considerations based upon the findings of a WASHPaLS desk review.

Triggers for Growing a Sanitation Business Aimed at Low-Income Customers: Experience from Five Cities. Water and Sanitation for the Urban Poor (WSUP), May 2019. This Topic Brief presents WSUP’s experience supporting sanitation businesses oriented toward low-income customers in five cities. Each case study highlights changes to the business model or enabling environment with the potential to trigger business growth.

Ensuring the Quality of Sanitation Products During Project Scale-Up. PSI, June 2019. The USAID–funded Sanitation Service Delivery Project uses a market-based approach to increase access to sanitation.This includes identifying and supporting private sector actors to produce prefabricated latrine materials and install household latrines.

Community-Led Total Sanitation

Policy Diffusion in the Rural Sanitation Sector: Lessons from Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS). World Development, December 2019. This paper analyzes the reasons that drove the wide diffusion of CLTS. The approach was perceived as a fast and effective solution to the problem of open defecation and spread under the leadership of influential donors, NGOs, persuasive practitioners, and academics.

A Market-Based, Pro-Poor Approach to Rural Sanitation. Global Communities, October 2019. This report discusses a major paradigm shift for CLTS approaches and related government programs and policies in Ghana.

How Does Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) Promote Latrine Construction, and Can It Be Improved? A Cluster-Randomized Controlled Trial in Ghana. Social Science & Medicine, January 2020. This study examines what psychosocial determinants enhance the effectiveness of CLTS in increasing latrine coverage and whether CLTS would be improved with the addition of the risks, attitudes, norms, abilities, and self regulation approach, known as RANAS.

An Examination of CLTS's Contributions Toward Universal Sanitation. USAID WASHPaLS, August 2018. The review offers a description of the CLTS intervention, tracing its evolution in theory and practice, and analyzes its strengths and weaknesses. Read the report or view the webinar that presents the findings.

Sustainable Total Sanitation in Nigeria: Final Research Report. Institute for Fiscal Studies, 2019. This evaluation examines the large-scale rollout of two different WaterAid sanitation interventions in Nigeria, one taking a CLTS approach and the other focused on sanitation marketing, their impacts on toilet ownership, and the possible interactions between the two approaches.

Role of Implementation Factors for the Success of Community-Led Total Sanitation on Latrine Coverage. A Case Study from Rural Ghana. Environmental Science and Technology, April 2019. This study of 94 communities in rural Ghana determined that the success of CLTS interventions can be improved by investing in follow-up visits, the support of local leaders, and the careful application of incentives.

The Role of Social Identification for Achieving an Open-Defecation Free Environment: A Cluster-Randomized, Controlled Trial of Community-Led Total Sanitation in Ghana. Journal of Environmental Psychology, December 2019. Researchers studied the effectiveness of CLTS in more than 100 communities in Ghana to determine whether social identification affected open defecation rates. The results highlight the need to consider the social context when planning and implementing sanitation campaigns.

CLTS Knowledge Hub – Community-Led Total Sanitation. The CLTS website aims to be a global hub for CLTS, connecting the network of practitioners, communities, NGOs, agencies, researchers, governments, donors, and others involved or interested in CLTS. The knowledge hub publishes Frontiers of CLTS: Innovations and Insights and each issue focuses on a specific CLTS topic.

Dear Colleagues:

The USAID Water CKM project sends out a weekly email with links to recent WASH research, upcoming webinars, etc. and we are now posting these on Sanitation Updates and hope these will be useful to you:

WASH Research Updates

- November 4, 2019 – Behavior change, WASH financing and others
- October 28, 2019 – Globalwaters.org updates and others
- October 8, 2019 - Research on open defecation, child health and others

Dear Colleagues:

Water Currents is a biweekly compilation from the USAID Water Communications and Knowledge Management Project of recent research on a specific WASH topic. Please let us know if you have suggestions for Water Currents topics, comments on how to make Water Currents more useful to you or if you would be interested in collaborating with us on a Water Currents issue.

- Water Currents: - Handwashing Research, January-June, 2019 .
- Water Currents: Peri-Urban Sanitation, June 11, 2019 .
- Water Currents: Menstrual Hygiene Day 2019, May 23, 2019 .
- Water Currents: WASH and Neglected Tropical Diseases, May 7, 2019 .
- Water Currents: Learning from Failures, April 23, 2019
- Water Currents - WASH and Health Care Facilities, April 4, 2019

Dear Colleagues:

This issue of Water Currents highlights recent studies and resources on fecal sludge management, container-based sanitation, shared sanitation, and other topics. As noted in USAID’s Water and Development Plan included in the U.S. Global Water Strategy, separating individuals and communities from human waste, properly treating fecal waste, and promoting key behaviors that lessen the risk of illness are critical sanitation and hygiene interventions that reduce diarrheal disease, child mortality, malnutrition, neglected tropical diseases, and other waterborne illnesses, such as cholera.

The first six studies are from the Creating Demand for Peri-Urban Sanitation (SanDem) project, which aims to better understand how to improve the quality of peri-urban sanitation using demand-side/behavior change approaches in Lusaka, Zambia.

Read the complete issue .

Dear Sir/Madam, I am a recent graduate from sanitary engineering and looking forward for a job opportunity in the WASH Sector, would appreciate being on the list for WASH weekly research update for all the happenings in WASH and also possibilities for job and/or studies opportunity.

Best Regards, Suzette Smith

Dear Colleagues:

Links to each of the studies below are on Sanitation Updates :

The USAID Water CKM project sends out an informal bibliography each week via email of some of the latest WASH-related studies, webinars, etc. Please contact us if you would like to be added to the subscription list.

RECENT WEBINARS

Water as a Tool for Resilience in Times of Crisis – In this webinar, the Environmental Change and Security Program, USAID’s Sustainable Water Partnership, and Winrock International discuss where the challenges lie and what practitioners and policymakers can do to bolster effective water management for the world’s most vulnerable communities.

JOURNAL ARTICLES

Lasting results: A qualitative assessment of efforts to make community-led total sanitation more inclusive of the needs of people with disabilities in Rumphi District, Malawi. Disability and Health Journal, 28 May 2019. Implications for future replication show the need to invest in training a wider group of people to assist with implementation and to keep the program simple and focused on more active learning methods to make sustainable behavioral changes.

Water, sanitation and hygiene: measuring gender equality and empowerment. WHO Bulletin, June 2019. Based on a process of expert input and literature review, here we offer a compilation of current water, sanitation and hygiene indicators that measure gender equality and empowerment in four interrelated priority areas.

When the pits fill up: (in)visible flows of waste in urban India. Journal of Water, Sanitation and Hygiene for Development, June 2019. Based on a rich ethnography of cleaning trucks in Bangalore, India, we show that trucking operations dispose of sludge in ways that harm both public health and the environment, and that the caste composition of sanitation work helps to keep it invisible from officials and the public.

REPORTS

WASH reflections series: Water safety planning: What have we learned so far? WHO, May 2019. Water safety plans have been implemented in at least 93 countries, with 46 countries reporting to have policies or regulations in place that promote or require WSPs.

Optimizing Access to Safe Water through Chlorinated Dispensers in Rural Kenya, Uganda and Malawi. Evidence Action, March 2019. Furthermore, community knowledge about the chlorine dispensers and other water treatments methods contributed significantly (p<0.001) to a household using chlorine across the three countries. In Kenya, households that attended Village Community Sensitization forums were 3.2% more likely to treat their water, while in Uganda and Malawi, households who attended Community Education Meetings were 2.5% and 7.0% respectively more likely to chlorinate their water.

BLOGS

There’s a Better Way to Manage Human Waste by Pallavi Bharadwaj. Engineering for Change, March 2019. Sadly, from India all the way to Kenya, the practice of manual scavenging, as the dirty clean-up work is called, is still fairly common. Despite the practice being banned since 1993 in India, the news of sewer deaths are not rare.

Economist-engineers and public health economists: is WASH economics a “field”? WASHeconomics, May 29, 2019. This post explores ways of breaking down the “field” of WASH economics.

Reflections from a mother on Menstrual Hygiene Day. Water Blog, May 28, 2019. I recently returned to work after six months of maternity leave with my second child. Transitioning back to my ‘original’ role as a Water Supply and Sanitation Specialist at the World Bank, alongside my new role as a Mum, has been a challenging but fun experience!

Dear Colleagues:

The USAID Water CKM team prepares an informal bulletin each week with some of the most recent WASH-related research and these are archived on a Google Document . Please let us know if you find this useful or contact us if you wish to subscribe to the weekly updates.

FEBRUARY 4, 2019

BLOG POSTS

How Humans Get in the Way of Clean Water. Scientific American, Jan 26. There are many cheap and effective ways to provide safe water to the world’s poor regions. But projects often fail due to inadequate planning, maintenance or persuasive power.

Taking Concrete Actions to Leave No One Behind: Government of Ghana Pro-Poor Policies and Sanitation Guidelines for Targeting the Poor and Vulnerable. Global Communities, Jan 8. Global Communities Ghana, with funding from USAID, as part of the WASH for Health project has been collaborating with the Government of Ghana Ministry of Sanitation and Water Resources to develop Guidelines for Targeting the Poor and Vulnerable for Basic Sanitation Services in Ghana, published in 2018, to provide guidance for targeting poor and vulnerable populations.

The economics of antimicrobial resistance and the role of water and sanitation services. WASHeconomics, Jan 21. Seeing a paper published a few weeks ago in Nature Communications (more on that below) reminded me of some reading I did last year on WASH and antimicrobial resistance (AMR), and got me thinking about the economics of this.

Menstrual health programs need a new focus in developing world, critic says. Washington Post, Jan 13. In her new book, “The Managed Body: Developing Girls and Menstrual Health in the Global South,” she contends that programs to provide pads and cups to girls in developing countries — also known collectively as the Global South — miss the mark, well-intentioned though they may be. They overlook higher priorities, such as clean water and comprehensive education efforts, she says, and actually work against eradicating taboos surrounding menstruation.

REPORTS

WASH and Health working together: a ‘how to guide’ for NTD programmes. WHO, January 2019. This toolkit provides step-by-step guidance to NTD programme managers and partners on how to engage and work collaboratively with the WASH community to improve delivery of water, sanitation and hygiene services to underserved population affected by many neglected tropical diseases.

WASH Innovation Catalogue. Elrha, Jan 2019. Our WASH Innovation Catalogue is the first of its kind. It offers a unique overview of some of the most promising new solutions in WASH, and is designed to help practitioners decide which innovations could help them solve their most pressing problems. Taking an innovation from idea to scale can take years, and the innovations featured in this catalogue are all at different stages on that journey, but what this offers the WASH sector now is a look at the exciting work happening around the world to address common challenges.

JOURNAL ARTICLES

Exposure to Livestock Feces and Water Quality, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) Conditions among Caregivers and Young Children: Formative Research in Rural Burkina Faso. AJTMH, Jan 28. Poultry and other livestock feces were visible in all 20 and 19 households, respectively, in both kitchen areas and in the household courtyards where children frequently sit or crawl. Direct soil ingestion by young children was observed in almost half of the households (45%). Poor handwashing practices were also common among caregivers and children. Although latrines were available in almost all households, child feces disposal practices were inadequate.

A culture-dependent and metagenomic approach of household drinking water from the source to point of use in a developing country. Water Research X, Feb 1. Using culture-dependent and -independent techniques, microbial water qualities was examined. Potential health risks increased when water was stored for more than 3 days.

Safely-Managed Hygiene: A Risk-Based Assessment of Handwashing Water Quality. Environ. Sci. Technol., January 28. Our model suggests that handwashing with non-potable water will generally reduce fecal contamination on hands but may be unable to lower the annual probability of infection risks from hand-to-mouth contacts below 1:1000.

UPCOMING CONFERENCES

AfricaSan5 – AfricanSan5 will be held on 18-22 February 2019 in Cape Town, South Africa. The conference Sub-themes are: 1. Hygiene and the SDGs: Leave no one behind; 2. Policies, institutions and regulation; 3. Monitoring and using evidence to improve hygiene & sanitation; 4. Building capacity and financing sanitation in Africa.

JANUARY 28

JOURNAL ARTICLES

Determinants of Latrine Use Behavior: The Psychosocial Proxies of Individual-Level Defecation Practices in Rural Coastal Ecuador. AJTMH, January 21. Using the integrated behavior model of water, sanitation, and hygiene framework, we sought to characterize determinants of latrine use in rural Ecuador.

Effect of Neighborhood Sanitation Coverage on Fecal Contamination of the Household Environment in Rural Bangladesh. AJTMH, January 21. Improved sanitation coverage in the neighborhood had limited measurable effect on FCs in the target household environment. Other factors such as access to improved sanitation in the household, absence of cow dung, presence of appropriate water drainage, and optimal handwashing practice may be more important in reducing FCs in the household environment.

Pit latrine fill-up rates: variation determinants and public health implications in informal settlements, Nakuru-Kenya. BMC Public Health, January 15. This study argues for a need to link information and awareness to users, construction artisans, property owners and local authorities on appropriate vault volumes and management practices.

Perceptions of drinking water cleanliness and health-seeking behaviours: A qualitative assessment of household water safety in Lesotho, Africa. Global Public Health, January 18. Qualitative interviews conducted in the Maseru District of Lesotho addressed how people decided if their water was safe, their understanding of the linkage between water and enteric illness, and health-seeking behavior. Respondents overwhelmingly relied on visual inspections to determine if their water was clean and not all participants linked consuming unsafe water with diarrheal disease.

Water, not temperature, limits global forest growth as climate warms. Science News, January 16. The growth of forest trees all over the world is becoming more water-limited as the climate warms. The effect is most evident in northern climates and at high altitudes where the primary limitation on tree growth had been cold temperatures. The research details the first time that changes in tree growth in response to current climate changes have been mapped at a near-global scale.

As we grow up: a digital book on menstrual hygiene management. WSSCC, December 2018. This book brought out by Saksham, Noida Deaf Society and WSSCC is in 5 different formats