Water for Life Voices

Voices from the field: case studies

Elsa Sanchez
SODIS

"I remember very well students in Tiquipaya; how they worked with their parents in promoting handwashing practices and safe water consumption. Children taught their own families to practice. The father of a boy said: "Thank you, my son, no one has taught me to wash my hands as you have taught me." It was a source of pride for father and son.

Arriving to the Sursubi community of the municipality Conception for a monitoring visit and to support the implementation of the Strategy for Health, Safe Water and Sanitation (HASS), I went immediately to the school at the precise moment that children were playing in the green field. I believe we arrived late, I thought silently. Just then I noticed a small, thin boy about six years old with a small bottle in one hand and a ball of cloth worn in the other and said, "Professor, professor, worms that were in my water do not move anymore because I killed them yesterday with the sun. Can I drink it now? ". At that time my heart made a "chuño"/swelled and the tears wouldn’t wait.

Rather than thinking of changing minds, what we try to achieve is the active participation of various actors in the process of reflection on their problems and decision-making, to achieve involvement and ownership of initiatives to help improve their hygiene practices and overall health. We place special emphasis on the participation of community organizations led by women, mainstreaming approaches to gender equity and rights.

Of the adult population in one of the projects of SODIS (Participation and Community Empowerment in Water Sanitation and Hygiene), implemented in the municipalities of Tacopaya, Arque, Bolívar, and Sacabamba Department of Cochabamba during the negotiations 2010 and 2012, we saw a significant increase in the practice of handwashing . With regard to water treatment in the same population group, before SODIS 44% had knowledge about the importance of water treatment, and after, this percentage increased to 98.7%.

Of the student population in the same project, we also saw great results in the final evaluation . Changes for students in schools, managed through the work done by teachers include training on various topics of water, hygiene and sanitation, organization of spaces and practices of monitoring them. In addition, the training strengthened the structure, training and operation of Safe Water Committees and motivation for children’s creative expressions of these topics.

Initially, the project’s methodology did not consider the construction of bathrooms nor the improvement or construction of water systems. There was also no component with menstrual hygiene management and strengthening the social structure by the Water and Sanitation Committees (CAPyS), which were included in more recent initiatives of the SODIS. In the future, the project will continue to evolve with the need to contribute more effectively to national political forces in our country, in relation to the right to water. The future demands strengthening of the capabilities of the SODIS Foundation to incorporate into their projects the issue of participatory municipal management in order to achieve more sustainable impacts.

The most important lesson is that the sustainability of projects necessarily requires strengthening community participation and empowerment, linked to municipal management processes, while considering the issues of water, hygiene, sanitation, and health education as skills of the Gobiernos Autónomos Municipales. The improvement of water and sanitation situations involves various actors from the national, departmental, municipal, and community levels; considering it is the role of the state to generate policies that allow the development of programs and projects to promote participation and empowerment of local actors in the context of strategic alliances with agencies, NGOs, private companies, church, and others.

Everyone does what they can. SODIS supports; facilitating processes of reflection on the problem, strengthening local capacity, providing technical assistance and promoting social development and capacity building, among others.

It's so important that people make decisions in processes and project implementation because any initiative that wants to develop to respond to the people’s needs and problems, must fit the context in which they live. To be legitimate and can count on the people’s support and active participation. To achieve the participation of women, the SODIS Foundation developed a Strategy for Community Participation and Empowerment, which is based on a methodological process . The multiple aspects ensure that women are empowered in their ability to identify needs, prioritize, and participate in decision-making in these solutions and the administration of funds.

The most visible change of the last 10 years is the application of different methods of water treatment (boiled, chlorinated, SODIS, and filtered). In turn, the articulation of a project to promote the consumption of safe water. Hygiene and sanitation with community participation and empowerment.

There are several ways in which you can see the contribution of the SODIS Foundation in improving the skills of those involved in the processes that drive them. In addition to contributing to healthy consumption practices of safe water, hygiene and sanitation, SODIS helps strengthen the leadership and management capacity of various local stakeholders, and emphasizes grassroots women's organizations. Also, SODIS strengthens the capacities of women and high school students (15-18 years of age) to become promoters/educators and managers in the family and community environment.

Another way to improve skills is to strengthen the participation of children in the community self-assessment through the methodology Talking Pictures (Imágenes que Hablan), which uses photographs that children take to express what they think, feel and live in relation to issues of water, sanitation and hygiene. That way we are strengthening their capacity to reflect on their environment and use an important tool (photography), when they usually do not have access to this tool.

We believe that the current work on development projects must be designed in the context of adaptation to climate change and sustainable development. On that line, in Bolivia we have the Bicentennial Patriotic Agenda 2025, which defines guidelines for future initiatives that we will pursue, without losing sight that at the global level everything points to targets beyond 2015."

The initiative ‘A communication strategy for social and behavior change through the promotion of three key practices and the adequate use of services in four municipalities of the Department of Cochabamba, Bolivia’ was awarded with the Category 2 'Best participatory, communication, awareness-raising and education practices' Water for Life’ UN-Water Best Practices Award in 2012.

>> More information about the initiative ‘A communication strategy for social and behavior change through the promotion of three key practices and the adequate use of services in four municipalities of the Department of Cochabamba, Bolivia’

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