Change behaviors for sustainable water and sanitation services

Published on: 10/09/2015

The purpose of the session was to present and discuss the main features of the Sanitation and Water for All strategy. Changing collective behaviors will form a central part of the new strategy.

The need to change collective behavior was based on the results of studies in eight countries on the effectiveness of aid carried out by Sanitation and Water for All partners. Countries in the study included Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Ghana, Honduras, Liberia, Niger, South Sudan and Timor-Leste. The study showed the need for a different way of working requiring collaborative and effective behaviors towards government leadership and sector system strengthening to improve development effectiveness and reach universal access to sustainable water, sanitation and hygiene services.

Drawing on the research findings, the Sanitation and Water for All Partnership identified four collaborative behaviors (for both development partners and governments), which are essential to ensuring that support to the water, sanitation and hygiene sector is effective, equitable and sustainable. The four collaborative behaviors were adopted by the Sanitation and Water for All partnership and make- up an essential component of partnership strategy for the coming years. The four behaviors are:

1. Enhance government leadership of sector planning processes;
2. Strengthen and use of country systems;
3. Use one information and mutual accountability platform built around a multi-stakeholder, government-led cycle of planning, monitoring and learning;
4. Build sustainable water and sanitation sector financing strategies that incorporate financial data on all 3Ts (taxes, tariffs and transfers), as well as estimates for non-tariff household expenditure.

In the Stockholm World Water Week session a broad audience participated of members and non-members of the Sanitation and Water for All partnership. Ministers of South Sudan and Burkina Faso, where the Aid Effectiveness study was also carried out, were also present and underlined the need for these collaborative behaviors.

The findings of the eight country studies were pulled together by the Sanitation and Water for All Country Processes Task Team in the form of five Briefings Papers, an overview paper and a paper for each of the identified collective behaviors. The papers were complemented with regional and global monitoring reports, as well as with learning from other sectors.

As one of the members in the core group of the Country Processes Task Team, IRC contributed actively to the drafting and review of the papers. IRC also conducted the Aid Effectiveness studies in Ghana, Burkina and Honduras.