The Colour of Change

Report The colour of change Innovation, motivation and sustainability in hygiene and sanitation work A A success story in the snapshot of making? Achefer: children Achefer woreda is situated in Amhara collecting National Regional State in West Gojjam Zone clean around 500 km north west of Ethiopia’s drinking capital, Addis Ababa, and a couple of hours’ water from the new drive from the town of Bahar Dar and its famously beautiful Lake Tana. This is the site WAE/ ORDA for the Achefer woreda Water Supply, Hygiene and Sanitation programme, community hand- implemented by the Organisation for pump. Rehabilitation and Development in Amhara (ORDA), and supported by WaterAid (WAE), and the focus of this report: The colour of The second half of the report considers how change. some of these components and mechanisms might look in the future once the project is The title links to something that is unique in handed over to the community. Clearly the Ethiopian WASH projects to date: Achefer’s time to measure overall sustainability will be use of coloured flags as motivators for an in-depth evaluation in several years time. household sanitation and hygiene practice. But for now the fairly raw snapshot provided But this is just one of several innovations by The colour of change should encourage seen in the project that makes it an discussion around issues such as the interesting case study to share. sustainability of promotion work, the sustainability of changed hygienic practice, The report comes out of a four-day visit to the the way in which community and woreda can project by a joint WAE-ORDA team in work together, and so on. At the request of December 2006, some four months before Achefer woreda colleagues, the report also the project was due to be handed over to the includes two “practitioners’ toolkits” (pages community. Base-line surveys, participatory 7&12 and 9&10) which can be separated out evaluation exercises and mid-term reviews (by opening the central staples) as training since the project’s instigation in 2004 had and motivational aids for the community. suggested Achefer was a success story, outstripping many of its project targets. This Abbreviations and explanations visit was an opportunity to analyse and understand this apparent success further. WAE WaterAid in Ethiopia ORDA Organisation for Rehabilitation As such The colour of change aims to bring and Development in Amhara alive various aspects of the project and woreda district provide food for thought. After a brief kebele smaller administrative area overview of the project it considers some of gote group of households/village the elements that might have helped to make WASH Water Supply, Sanitation and Achefer a success: the unique combination of Hygiene WRM Water Resource Management circumstances and approaches in terms of HEW Health Extension Workers the ORDA/WAE partnership and the project’s HP Hygiene Promoters position in relation to other work ORDA is VHC Village Hygiene Communicators carrying out in the region; the unusual staffing model; the holistic nature of the project A WaterAid report. components. Perhaps above all the report Writ ten by: Polly Mathewson (independent highlights some of the innovative and consultant) and Manyahlshal Ayele (WAE) motivating sanitation and hygiene promotion Res earch team: Manyahshal Ayele (WAE), methodologies. Dr Abdu Zeleke (WAE) and Polly Mathewson. Key informants: Tesfaye Yalew and Walle Front cover: Sisay Berhanu hand-washing after Setotaw (ORDA). using the latrine. The project awarded his house- Driver: Tekele Ekubu (WAE) hold with a red flag for sanitation and hygiene. Date : January 2008 1 Achefer: an overview Achefer woreda is typical of the estimated 43 per cent absolute poverty levels (ORDA-WAE report, 2004) and agricultural subsistence livelihood strategies of the rural population of the wider Amhara Region. School drop out is high in the woreda either because children are needed for labour or due to sickness: malaria and other water related diseases are the main culprits. The woreda is mostly plain, with some undulating areas (see photo, left). There are many streams and swampy areas fed by ground water connecting variously to Lake Tana and rivers that later join the Blue Nile. Despite the abundant water resource potential in the region, prior to the project Project facts and figures almost 88 per cent of the rural population of • Achefer woreda population: 344,000 Achefer lacked adequate and safe water for • The project area covers 6 kebeles: drinking and domestic uses, including for Kongerie, Ambeshen, Kualabaka, livestock consumption. In addition between Kurbeha, Lihudi and Dilamo, with a total December and May most of the existing population of 40,623 sources dry up altogether forcing women and • Project office: in Yismala town children to travel long distances for water. • A three year project: 2004-2007 Limited access to unprotected sources has • Project staff/voluntary groups: caused ill health, lost work time and reduced 1 Project Coordinator/Sanitarian, school attendance, as well as created conflict 1 Construction Foreman, 2 guards in the area. Meanwhile a government study 10 paid Hygiene Promoters (HP), (Rural HH socio-economic survey, 2002) 7 voluntary Village Hygiene showed that only 2.3 per cent of the woreda Communicators (VHC), had access to sanitation facilities, though 155 WATSAN Committee members, observation at field level by ORDA-WAE 48 Caretakers/guards indicated that latrine coverage in the project • Water supply components: area was almost nil (0.2 per cent) with proper Hand Dug Well, Gravity Spring, hygiene and sanitation practice and Spot Spring Development and Cattle awareness extremely low. Troughs Water source protection/rehabilitation The ORDA-WAE project was devised to meet Promotion of horticultural activities the challenges of the area using many tried • Sanitation/hygiene components: and tested components. ORDA’s impressive Model Traditional Pit Latrines (TPL) track record of effective water supply delivery TPLs built by villagers was married with the experience WAE could Refuse Disposal Pits (RFP) bring from their insistence on always Hand-washing at household level integrating sanitation and hygiene promotion Communal showers and clothes washing with water supply. Other elements were basins borrowed from projects in other regions and Household improvements countries, and from other partnerships, Hygiene promotion including employing Hygiene Promoters, Community development training awarding flags as incentives, using Video for • Planned project beneficiaries: 29,400 promotion work and providing training in sanitation, 17,410 hygiene, 9,130 water horticulture. Each component will be explored (rising to 18,000 water by project end) in detail, but the box (left) gives an overview. 2 Reasons for success? WAE’s Dr A holistic vision, energy Abdu Zeleke with a traditional and a spirit of innovation water-lifting Visiting the phase I project a few months device. Having seen such a before its completion, there were clear device used in successes to note: for example 27 water Benishangul in schemes had been built as opposed to the the south west planned 22. The reason given for this by the of Ethiopia, he project team was the enthusiasm of the helped community for clean water and their matching introduce the this with a commitment to give their time and simple, replicable labour freely, and to contribute funds. The technology to project office had received 30 further Achefer. requests for water works, villagers having organised committees, elected a chairperson WAE’s growing ethos is to embrace and put money into a bank account before innovative ideas in its work with partner submitting their applications. While organisations: to look beyond the obvious communities are often eager for water, Achefer solutions, whilst trying to ensure new ideas was having wide success with latrine are backed up with appropriate systems. construction, with many gotes (groups of In Achefer the partnership with ORDA was households) nearing 100% sanitation coverage. itself experimental (see page 4) and based on As much as this, many people were working to a desire to integrate water with hygiene and achieve the full quota of hygiene and household sanitation – that part of WASH which time components promoted by the project, such as and again proves difficult and requires extra two hand-washing facilities, clean clothes and energetic thinking and persistence in compounds, fuel-efficient stoves, solid waste implementation. pits and vegetable gardens. What then was driving such enthusiasm and activity? The project was conceived in a holistic manner, so that hygiene and Achefer seems to derive much of its success sanitation was extended beyond latrines and from the sense of “vision” behind the project hand-washing to improved household and the attitude in realising this vision that management and devices. Water supply was originates with the project team. This in turn taken in the direction of Water Resource is supported strongly by ORDA and WAE, Management, so that communities could see and the project team has inspired a similar the future potential of water run off for spirit in the wider team and community. community conservation or income generating horticultural projects. And The two permanent ORDA staff individual households were encouraged to members have personalities that demand of improve their nutrition and make use of easily themselves a high level of commitment to the accessible ground water for vegetable plots. community and their work, but they also saw The project staff took their own initiative the project as an opportunity to trial new beyond plans in the project documents, such methods that they may not have been able to as providing training in food preparation for do in previous more closely circumscribed vegetables previously unknown in the area. work places (e.g. innovative hygiene promotion methods). This was a chance both to be more effective and to further their Effectively designed management personal professional development.

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