Dear Elisabeth,

thanks. I uploaded 3 publications this week.

Two things came to my mind here:

1. the term "open access" makes more sence, I agree. And I would like to add here that not only availability might be the problem, but also language and overall the level of academic writing of which some practicioners might not be familiar with (and not so eager to sit down to read a 200 page long article). The idea of summarizing these things for the susana library came to my mind. It would be a huge timeconsuming task but maybe this would be a way to "break it down" a bit and encourage people to read a shorter version with perhaps easier language (like in Germany official documents also are formulated in "easy language") so people whos first language is not English might understand better. Or would that just be a duplication of wikipedia?

2. For bringing the library up to date a similar thing like the wikedia edit-a-thon might be interesting to try. E.g. you could set up a timeframe for people to share their publications and promote that widely throughout the network. A feature should be that the most recent publications should be uploaded and then it can be published in the NewsMail as well. I like to think that everyone publishing a document would have interest to spread the word and get people to read it....

Anyway, my internship is basically over and I hope I could support in this regard for a bit!

Kind Regards,
Magdalena

Dear Magdalena,

Thanks for your reply which answered all my questions very well.

You said:

Perhaps we have to think of a more userfriendly approach or promote the library to our partners so that they see the value of having their publication in the SuSanA library as well.

Do you have any ideas for this? It would be good to brainstorm a bit about it.

Another thing to consider is why upload to the SuSanA library if the same document is already uploaded elsewhere like in the WEDC library or in the SSWM library. We were thinking of perhaps allowing "meta searches" from the SuSanA library into other people's libraries as well. But then the problem arises how to rank search results (Google has it figured out so I guess one would need a Google algorithm somehow).

Anyhow, this is just to put some ideas out there and to see what people think?

You also said:

Unfortunately, many Phd Theses and other academic papers are not open source....

I completely agree with you on this point. Just to be pedantic (sorry), I woulnd't use the term "open source" here. I think for publications the correct term is "open access" which would be ideal, but even only "free access" would already be good. Note that free access and open access is not quite the same thing.
So our complaint could be formulated like this: Sadly many publications are not easily available because they are behind a paywell; also many PhD theses are not made available to the public e.g. due to embargos by industry partners who might have co-funded the research work. - Sometimes, MSc and PhD theses are not put online simply because the university has no system for this. In this case, the SuSanA library could step in and be the go-to place to have your work uploaded to the internet and made available and "findable" to the world!

Keep up the good work in finding and uploading relevant publications to the SuSanA India chapter part of the library!

Regards,
Elisabeth

Dear Elisabeth,

thank you for your detailed answer and thoughtful questions! Knowledge management and knowledge exchange is not always easy to maintain.

Firstly, for SuSanA members with a profile on our homepage it is possible to upload documents of their own via their profile! I think then the secretariat has to review and publish them in the final step... but not a lot of SuSanA Partners are too eager to do this themselves so yes, e-mailing to the sectretariat I think is common practise so far or announcing it on the forum.
Perhaps we have to think of a more userfriendly approach or promote the library to our partners so that they see the value of having their publication in the SuSanA library as well.

Secondly, I did not intend to upload all of them, as you said, I wanted to filter out the most interesting ones for the Indian context and perhaps a good mixture of different questions, case studies and reports (intened number was around 15). But yes, over time the library can be "filled up" with these.

The Indian Chapter library is composed out of our "regular" SuSanA library by adding a filter when uploading documents so it is mirrored on this library as well!

I hope this answers all the questions so far.

At the moment I am again looking for new interesting publications and will upload a small selection in the upcoming weeks.

Unfortunately, many Phd Theses and other academic papers are not open source....

Kind Regards,
Magdalena

Dear Magda,

Thanks for your post. That must have been a lot of work to put that list of 60 documents touching on sanitation in India together! Thank you. Are you now entering all of them into the SuSanA library (a lot more work)?

We should perhaps come up with an easy system where people can propose publications for inclusion in the SuSanA library. At the moment, this is e-mail based i.e. if someone wants a document in the library, and it's not already in there, they can e-mail the secretariat about it.

The secretariat tries to also pick out documents that were highlighted in forum posts (but it can happen that a document is missed if the secretariat overlooks the post). Hence, don't hesitate to alert the secretariat with a separate e-mail to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

Normal users cannot upload documents to the library themselves, only the secretariat can. This is to safeguard the quality of entries. But perhaps users could somehow flag or put documents into a waiting list for uploading. Have you thought about such a mechanism?

Regarding the 60 documents that you found, from my perspective, they could all be uploaded (there is no harm in having documents more in the library). However, if it's found too time consuming to do so, then I would focus on those that are currently not yet available on the internet, like MSc or PhD theses, or those that are difficult to find (although Google finds everything for you these days) or those that we find particularly good.

Another question: how was this "SuSanA India Chapter library" (www.susana.org/en/regional-chapters/indi...brary-indian-chapter) actually created? Did it take out all those documents from the library that had a filter tick for country India? And will it automatically be updated when new such documents are added to the library?

If anyone is not yet familiar with SuSanA's library, you find it here:
www.susana.org/en/resources/library

It currently has 2200 entries and it can be filtered by several different parameters using the green filter button at the top right.The filter button is really important to help narrow down one's search. This means, the person entering the document into the library also has to tick the right filter boxes (very important!). You can also do a word search which searches the title and summary text for the word that you have entered in the search field.

Regards,
Elisabeth

Dear all,

I am Magda, intern at the SuSanA Secretariat and currently working on strengthening the SuSanA Indian Chapter.

The SuSanA Indian chapter shall contribute to the Indian Government’s Clean India Campaign “Swachh Bharat Abhiyan” by strengthening discussion on sanitation and by linking the Indian and the global discourse on sustainable sanitation. The SuSanA Indian chapter is an open and inclusive contribution to activities in India towards more sustainable and accelerated sanitation provision with existing sanitation platforms in India being invited to be a part of the SuSanA Indian chapter.

I would like to expand our library with sanitation and/or WASH publications in the Indian context. Maybe you already have noticed that with the introduction of the Indian Chapter, we also provide a separate SuSanA Indian Chapter library . To improve knowledge exchange, it is important to keep this library up to date and we would like to add more publications there.
Therefore, I researched a list of suitable publications from India, published during the last 2 years. You can find it in the excel sheet.


What do you all think about this list? Which of these approx. 60 publications/texts are most relevant and interesting for the SuSanA community? Which ones did I miss out on? Are you just about to finish your next case study? I would be happy get your professional opinion(s) about it.

I would be happy to improve knowledge exchange in this area!

Thank you in advance,
Magda
On behalf of the SuSanA secretariat

Dear all,

I am pleased to let you know that we have set up a Mailing List for the SuSanA India Chapter. To keep yourself updated about all activities around the Indian Chapter, please subscribe here: www.susana.org/en/mailinglist-indian-chapter

And don't miss out to join the first thematic online disussion of the SuSanA Indian chapter: On the way to a “clean India” – 2 years of Swacch Bharat Mission (Gramin/Rural) forum.susana.org/forum/categories?func=view&catid=259&id=18506

Best regards,

Anne (on behalf of the SuSanA Secretariat)

Dear members,

It is great to participate in SuSanA's discussions. I am Nitya Jacob, the moderator for the India Chapter of the Alliance that is hosted by the India Sanitation Coalition and supported by Arghyam.

We have just launched the first discussion on the Forum. I invite you to read and comment on the topic of the Swacch Bharat Mission, India's sanitation campaign. We have specialists from India to lead the sub-topics of the discussion.

Please visit forum.susana.org/forum/categories/259-on...mission-gramin#18506 to view and post on the discussion.

Warm regards
Nitya Jacob

Dear SuSanA members,

In light of the recent increased political and civil efforts to accelerate sanitation provision in India, SuSanA has set up its first regional chapter for India. The SuSanA Indian chapter shall contribute to the Indian Government’s Clean India Campaign “Swachh Bharat Abhiyan” by strengthening discussion on sanitation and by linking the Indian and the global discourse on sustainable sanitation.

The SuSanA Indian chapter is an open and inclusive contribution to activities in India towards more sustainable and accelerated sanitation provision aiming to stimulate knowledge exchange, networking and cooperation within the region. Successfully proven SuSanA tools, such as the SuSanA library, SuSanA thematic discussion series and the SuSanA Discussion Forum as well as the SuSanA publications and factsheets are offered for use in the Indian context.

The SuSanA Indian Chapter Website comprises a first overview of activities and contributions to the SuSanA Indian chapter and will continuously grow in the future. In setting up and further developing the SuSanA Indian chapter, the SuSanA Secretariat is closely working together with our SuSanA Partner the India Sanitation Coalition .

SuSanA partners interested to contribute to the SuSanA Indian chapter are welcome to contact the SuSanA Secretariat at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.!

Please visit the SuSanA Indian Chapter Website for more Information: www.susana.org/en/regional-chapters/indian-chapter

Looking forward to hear all your comments and recomendations.

Regards,

Evelyn (on behalf of the SuSanA secretariat)